SEO vs. PPC- What Should I Focus On?
October 17, 2013
A frequent question that arises in many of my client’s minds and I’m sure they aren’t the only ones wondering; which is better SEO or PPC? With this post I hope to shed some light on the situation and explain the benefits of SEO as well as the downfalls. I will also explain the benefits of PPC and the downfalls with PPC.
The Glorious Benefits of SEO
There are great benefits to SEO when it is done correctly. SEO has a seemingly never ending return on investment as you continue to grow your site and earn legitimate backlinks to your site. Google indexes more pages on your site, increasing your overall page ranking. With more pages ranking, more relevant search terms and links belong to your website. 85% of clicks to websites come from organic links rather than paid ads, I’ll touch on this later on as well. Organic rankings are trusted about 86% of web users trust organic rankings over paid ads. And probably the biggest factor…. Organic links don’t cost you a dime per click.
Some Tragic Downfalls of SEO
The downfalls of SEO: Some of which are very new with this Penguin 2.0 algorithm released by Google. The biggest impact that this bird has on sites is the crackdown of unnatural links. Let’s just say if they are out there and linking to your site, disavow them time now. Anyway back on track, SEO takes time, and a lot of it. With time comes money. Although you don’t pay per click with organic links you do have to invest in SEO; time, money, & energy. If you don’t know what you are doing hire an SEO service company. You will benefit much more and quicker too. Organic links don’t inspire searches to buy. 50% of searchers arriving to a site are in fact just searching, not in the mood to buy. Last downfall of SEO that I’ll cover is that you can’t really track it with 100% accuracy, or measure your ROI.
The Enjoyable Benefits of PPC
Some of the benefits surrounding PPC are instant. As soon as a PPC campaign is active you begin to gather data, you instantly drive traffic to your site, and you can instantly see an ROI. More benefits of PPC, you set your budget and can measure your ROI much more effectively. PPC ads are number 1! PPC ads show above organic links, this is the first thing a searcher will see, and if they are in the mood to buy you can bet that they will click on your ad. The 50% of people arriving from your ad are more willing to buy than the 50% who came organically. PPC gives you much more control, you are in a place to control exactly who you want to see your ad.
The Unfortunate Downfalls of PPC
It costs money. Straight out of the gate you pay for every searcher who clicks on an ad and is driven to your website. With that you are also limited by your budget. You can only drive the amount of traffic you can afford to pay for. Also your ROI will peak at a certain point. Where there is money to be made there is also competition. You have to compete with other advertisers who may be spending $1000’s more. Google will show them more, give them more impression share, but its fair they are paying for it.
So which is better SEO or PPC?
In my professional opinion neither is more important than the other. If you want to see the maximum ROI your business can produce you absolutely have to do both SEO and PPC ads. If you rank #1 organically for every keyword you want to there are still 3 people above you willing to pay to beat you to take your sale. Now do both PPC and SEO for that keyword. You dominate the top of the page now. Who are they gonna click on? Who do those crafty searchers trust more now? In a previous post by JB he mentions the ROI formula: Visibility + Clickability + Convertability = Maximum ROI. Truth is SEO and PPC are both encased within the first 2 steps of this formula for max ROI. Each fills the voids of the other, PPC and SEO are equally important. And if you want to be successful you must do both, be patient with your SEO, and don’t expect an immediate ROI with PPC. It takes time to optimize both and if you don’t optimize you will never see your maximum ROI possible. If you still have questions please leave a comment or email me. I will answer as quickly as I can.
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