The allocation of a budget to any project is a complex assignment that requires a critical assessment of the associated risks, costs and projected gains. As the economy continues to reel, budget appropriation for selected projects will receive deliberate scrutiny, risk aversion will be amplified and opportunity cost felt more brutally should the investment not deliver bottom line accountability.

Minimising risk in the process of commissioning an SEM provider
Unfortunately, to date there is no regulatory body that is able to provide decision makers with a concise list of SEM agencies that adhere to a predetermined set of accountability mechanisms.

For this reason, it is important to develop a higher-level understanding of the inner workings of SEM agencies in order to critically evaluate their service offerings.

Developing the ‘Consideration Set’
The consideration set is broadly defined as the group of alternatives or brands that a consumer evaluates in making a purchase decision.

Given there is a limit to the number of alternatives that people can evaluate at any time; it is critical to make informed decisions in building this list of potential SEM agencies.

Knowing how to Search
The first, and most obvious choice will be the search engines. As logic would have it, if you are going to pay a business to increase your visibility on the search engines, it would make the most sense to select those agencies that rank at the top of the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages), right?

Not quite. This becomes somewhat convoluted.

There are a number of points to bear in mind when searching for potential SEM providers on the search engines:

1.  Developing your selection criteria
2.  Searching for businesses under a number of search queries
3.  Evaluating the websites of potential SEM providers
4.  Moving beyond the SERPs in your search
5. Questions to ask potential SEM agencies

Each of the above points will be discussed in detail in the individual blog posts to follow.