It could be hard or confusing when it comes to choosing between SEO and PPC, which are basically the 2 options businesses have got into helping boost traffic to websites. Does one fare better than the other? Which is more result oriented? How expensive will each be? And many more questions that cause a dilemma between choosing the one right for your business.
Here we highlight some of the key areas to consider that helps in your decision making between SEO and PPC.
- Budget
How large is your budget? With PPC, you must allocate a daily budget which will depend on the bid auctions, among many others. If you are not sure to commit on advertising budgets, or if you do not have a pretty good one, a better option will be doing SEO for the website. Here, you do not risk facing budget fluctuations either. This is usually a flat fee paid to the agency for the service rendered, and is often less expensive than PPC.
- Time
SEO is an ongoing and continual activity, besides being a time consuming one. It could take months or even years, to see your website on the optimal level of performance. If your business is time critical, PPC is your key. You could start to see results almost instantaneously, as soon as you have your ads up live. There is no waiting unlike SEO.
- Measurability
As we said earlier, while SEO is an ongoing and time consuming process, there is no guarantee of it brings results either. The organic environment is uncertain as it is subject to algorithmic changes. But when done well, SEO can be cost effective over PPC in the long run. PPC on the other hand, when managed skillfully, can meet guaranteed results and achieve the goals you’ve set. After all, you only pay when there is a genuine click.
- Control
With PPC, you have total control on what people see about you, and when. To elaborate this, you could choose the keywords your ads will appear for, and write the ads customized to them. You could also choose to not show your ad when associated with certain keyword searches. With SEO, you have little control over what users see in the search results against what keyword phrases. Search engines may pick any page which it deems relevant to the search query, and display with any description snippet.
- Flexibility
With PPC you have the flexibility of choosing to show your ads within specific geographies, and customize ad messages based on the dimension. You could also set different landing pages, say for instance, with specific languages, and opt to show within certain time frames in a day. You could also run seasonal ad campaigns and start to see results almost immediately. With SEO, you do not have any of these flexibilities, and your website link may display in a search from any part of the world pointing to the landing page search engines algorithmically decide.
Strategically, the two have varied benefits. To cite a couple of examples, organic listings are more likely to earn trust from users and have a higher percentage of CTR when displayed together with PPC ads. PPC on the other hand aids in measurability and enables tie every click to ROI etc. Here we have only discussed on the factors to benchmark while deciding what fits well with your business. You could also aptly incorporate both into your marketing strategies.
What search marketing channel has earned more success to your business? Share your comments and experiences with us.
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Wonderful post to educate readers about SEO and its constraint.