SEO Expert Discussion: Difference between Search Engine positioning and Search Engine optimization

A question I keep getting all the time from my client is: "What is the actual difference between search engine optimization and search engine positioning"? Search engine positioning is actually the exact keywords and key phrases or search terms used that your prospective customers will typically write in the search box when looking for a particular product or service. For example, if we go to Google and type in "new houses", that is a typical two-word search query.To get targeted traffic from search engines, you need to know exactly what your users are searching for and just which companies you are effectively competing against. This may sound pretty basic to most people but it's so important if you want your web site to rank high in the engines. Search query determination really gets down to finding an almost perfect balance between keyword targeting, popularity and direct competition.Certain individuals can come up with very good and targeted keywords in their search terms using basic common sense but it is always better to prepare for the "unexpected". At Rank for $ales we have specialiazed tools that help us do that, combined with research we do for that particular industry or market segment.Search engine optimization
Search engine optimization is the process of putting selected keywords and key phrases into a given web site, using proper placement techniques and carefully using the correct wording, in direct response to what was said earlier on positioning. That's all it really means basically. In most SEO circles right now, there is a great deal of confusion on this subject so, in order to clear this uncertainty, let's start by clearly defining search engine optimization.Search engine optimization can be defined as the rather "less complicated" part of the whole process. The first thing you need to understand is we only use one or two search keywords to optimize each individual page on any given web site. Once we have selected a page to optimize and the exact search keywords and key phrases we are going to use, all that is left for us to do is insert these keywords in their proper places and we have pretty much completed the optimization process.Now you may ask: "Where is the best place to place our keywords"? Here is the answer to that question:The page's title
The keywords & description META tags
In the 1st paragraph of the body text
In the text of any links that point to the page
In a heading tag such H1, H2, or H3 at the top of the page
This is the true difference between search engine positioning and search engine optimization.