If you are running an SEO program and Paid Search at the same time, you better keep reading.  According to Search Engine Land, the ranking of a particular website within the natural search results can be negatively affected by a paid search campaign. The report comes as a result of a patent filed by Microsoft; where the algorithm specified in the patent would filter the search results to remove any duplicate listings, such as when two domains point to the same website. Additionally, it can also remove a site completely from the natural search results when that website is also part of paid search listings on the SERPS. Well, then again, maybe there isn’t too much to worry about since Microsoft has roughly 12% market share of searches and is rapidly declining as we speak.

Technorati Tags: search marketing, search engine marketing, sem, paid search, pay-per-click, msn, live.com, seo, search engine optimization, microsoft patent