PPC vs. SEO - Why I choose PPC
After writing my previous article it got me thinking. A few days ago I was asked a common question by 2 of my web design clients.
“Hey, now that the site is up and going why am I not showing up in the search engines?”
It’s hard to answer because how do you explain everything to them in 1. less then an hour session 2. without sounding like your trying to make an excuse or justify something. Honestly, anyone that has attempted SEO knows it take months before you show up in the search results and you see any type of benefit at all.
Really, most people do not understand all the algorithms given by the search engines, keyword density, age of the domain name, title and meta tags and so on.
Here is a better description direct from Wikipedia
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via “natural” (”organic” or “algorithmic”) search results for targeted keywords. Usually, the earlier a site is presented in the search results, or the higher it “ranks”, the more searchers will visit that site. SEO can also target different kinds of search, including image search, local search, and industry-specific vertical search engines.
As a marketing strategy for increasing a site’s relevance, SEO considers how search algorithms work and what people search for. SEO efforts may involve a site’s coding, presentation, and structure, as well as fixing problems that could prevent search engine indexing programs from fully spidering a site. Other, more noticeable efforts may include adding unique content to a site, ensuring that content is easily indexed by search engine robots, and making the site more appealing to users. Another class of techniques, known as black hat SEO or spamdexing, use methods such as link farms and keyword stuffing that tend to harm search engine user experience. Search engines look for sites that employ these techniques and may remove them from their indexes.
The initialism “SEO” can also refer to “search engine optimizers”, a term adopted by an industry of consultants who carry out optimization projects on behalf of clients, and by employees who perform SEO services in-house. Search engine optimizers may offer SEO as a stand-alone service or as a part of a broader marketing campaign. Because effective SEO may require changes to the HTML source code of a site, SEO tactics may be incorporated into web site development and design. The term “search engine friendly” may be used to describe web site designs, menus, content management systems and shopping carts that are easy to optimize.
Here is my whole point to this post.
Why I choose putting my time into PPC over SEO any day out of the week.
Wikipedia Description of PPC
Pay per click (PPC) is an advertising model used on search engines, advertising networks, and content websites/blogs, where advertisers only pay when a user actually clicks on an ad to visit the advertiser’s website. Advertisers bid on keywords they predict their target market will use as search terms when they are looking for a product or service. When a user types a keyword query matching the advertiser’s keyword list, or views a page with relevant content, the advertiser’s ad may be shown. These ads are called a “Sponsored link” or “sponsored ads” and appear next to or above the “natural” or organic results on search engine results pages, or anywhere a webmaster/blogger chooses on a content page.
ROI
The most obvious benefit to SEO is the ROI. It doesn’t cost anything to you when a visitor finds you through organic or natural search. Thats not to say the ROI earned on SEO efforts is necessarily better then PPC though.
Why? With SEO you are limited to a number of things. How you can manipulate the user and where you show up in the search engines is night and day when it comes to SEO and PPC.
With PPC in just a few clicks you can show up in Google, Yahoo, MSN or any 2nd tier search engines. With SEO its just not that easy. It can take months and months before you have made any impact in the major search engines.
A few benefits of PPC -
- Manipulate what position or rank you want to show up in the search engines (1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th………..)
- What time of the day you want to show your ad.
- You choose the budget you want to spend.
- Geo Target Specific Locations.
- Local (by zip code, radius of location, metro areas, etc.)
- Regional (one region or scattered regions throughout the country.)
- Nationwide
- Global
- Most importantly you choose the keywords you want to target.
If you have an experienced PPC specialist running your Paid Search campaign the ROI will always be bigger with PPC and the results and growth of your business will rise tremendously.
Keyword Targeting
Targeting the keywords you want in your search engine marketing strategies is a must.
Obviously, certain keywords are more profitable then others. More specific keywords tend to convert better then more generic keywords. Again, with PPC you have the ability to send traffic to your site with any keyword you want.
SEO is a little different ball game. Maybe after months of hard work you are finally ranked number 1 in Google for the keyword or term, “Apple MacBook Pro” but thats only ONE term, the more popular searched term is actually “Macbook Pro” and you are no where to be found. Plus, say that was three months ago and now that new hot product is the “Macbook Air.” Now what??? All that time, energy & manipulating the search engines weren’t as effective as you hoped.
With PPC you would of course have all of those keywords or terms in your ad groups keyword list to gain the most traffic and revenue.
Flexibility
With PPC you have all the flexibility you could ever want.
- Advertise in any search engine.
- Choose keywords you want to target.
- Point to product detial pages and landing page of your choosing.
- Write the ad copy specific to the user, your product, seasonal etc.
So now when you ask yourself, “Can I afford to spend money on paid search in my budget?”
Ask yourself this instead… “Can I afford not to?”
And for all of the “Search Marketing Gurus”
This post is my opinion. Not anyone else. The points I make are true. I know that the entirety of SEO and PPC are much more then this post but this is more of a brief explanation rather then a Search Engine Marketing Handbook… So just chill out and don’t leave comments on how much you know and what I missed.
February 17th, 2008 at 4:00 pm
I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you.
Chris Tackett