SEO VS PPC – Which Is Better?

In Search Marketing, there’s an age-old debate as to which is better: Search Engine Optimization (where you appear “naturally” in Google’s Search results) or Pay Per Click Search Advertising (sponsored ads in the Google Search results).

In part one of this 2-part series, we’re exploring the advantages of SEO for small business owners. The following brief explanation present the advantages of SEO.

Join us next month as we put on our PPC hat and argue why PPC is better!

The Trust Factor: The first thing to know is consumers trust organic results dramatically more than search ads. In fact, a 2019 study (by SparkToro) revealed that organic results attract 10 times more search than paid results.

Cost-Effectiveness: In terms of cost-effective ROI, SEO adds no additional cost as your traffic grows. Your effective cost per click just gets lower and lower (as a percentage of the labour cost that goes into your effort) vs. the limited reduction in cost per click you get as you grow Paid Search ads.

Early Awareness: With Organic search, you can quickly move to obtain “top of funnel” clicks that will attract people who are early in their purchasing journey and searching more general topics. And because there is no fixed fee per click with Organic, you can target all kinds of terms, even if they are not immediately profitable. On the flip side, Search Advertisers can only afford to target searches that are occurring late in the customer research cycle.

Easier Competitive Insights: Using SEO, you can determine exactly what your competitors are doing with their SEO strategy. Conversely, with Paid Search, it’s impossible to see how companies are managing their bid, keyword and optimization strategies, which can make it very hard to beat a strong competitor. 

Additional Costs: Paid Search is so complicated and competitive that as well as paying Google for the clicks, you also need to pay an agency or specialist to monitor and optimize your campaigns in order to stay competitive.

Enjoying Sustained Results: You can invest in PPC (paid clicks) for years but your presence in Search disappears the moment you stop running your ads (or the moment your budget runs out). However, SEO work that you invest in can create value for years to come.

As you can see it literally pays to understand how SEO can work to your advantage!

More info on this topic on our blog.

Thoughts or questions? Just contact us.

Join us next month as we turn the tables and explore why PPC is better!