w o l l e n e v e s y white paper Organic SEO or PPC? BOTH! Most, if not all, businesses will eventually have to ask themselves the question: “Should I invest in an Organic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy or in Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertis- ing?” How do you know which one will provide the best Return on Investment (R.O.I.)? The short answer: Both! Purchasing “clicks” is known as PPC advertising. With PPC advertising you bid (pay) for key- words on the various search engines ( usually Google and Yahoo! ) and when that keyword is searched, and depending on your bid amount, your advertisement is served up for the searcher to see, and hopefully, click. You are competing with other advertisers for the same keywords and depending on your bid amount compared to your competition determines who’s ad shows up first. Organic or Natural SEO consists of optimizing your website pages to make your site more relevant for a given keyword or set of keywords so that the website shows up within the organic/natural/non-paid listing area. Organic SEO is the process of making sure the search engine spiders can crawl and understand your website pages. Organic SEO gets the spider to not only understand it, but like it more than the other website pages with the same or similar content. PPC is a strategy to employ when you need to ring the cash register fast. “He who pays the most wins!” Organic SEO is a more long-term strategy. A strategy that paints with a broader brush and allows you to target a larger set of keywords than most PPC budgets would support. Who clicks where? On Google, 72% surveyed felt organic results were more relevant, with only 28% preferring paid listings for search results. In addition, conversion rates are slightly higher for unpaid search results than the rate for paid ( 4.2% vs. 3.6% ). With 30% of search engine users clicking on paid listings, that leaves 70% who are clicking on the organic or natural search engine listing results. 72% Click Organic Listings 28% Click Paid Listings www.yellow7.com | 972-731-6720
Transcript
wolle nevesywhite paper
Organic SEO or PPC?
BOTH!Most, if not all, businesses will eventually have to ask themselves the question: “Should I invest in an Organic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy or in Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertis-ing?” How do you know which one will provide the best Return on Investment (R.O.I.)? The short answer: Both!
Purchasing “clicks” is known as PPC advertising. With PPC advertising you bid (pay) for key-words on the various search engines ( usually Google and Yahoo! ) and when that keyword is searched, and depending on your bid amount, your advertisement is served up for the searcher to see, and hopefully, click. You are competing with other advertisers for the same keywords and depending on your bid amount compared to your competition determines who’s ad shows up first.
Organic or Natural SEO consists of optimizing your website pages to make your site more relevant for a given keyword or set of keywords so that the website shows up within the organic/natural/non-paid listing area. Organic SEO is the process of making sure the search engine spiders can crawl and understand your website pages. Organic SEO gets the spider to not only understand it, but like it more than the other website pages with the same or similar content.
PPC is a strategy to employ when you need to ring the cash register fast. “He who pays the most wins!” Organic SEO is a more long-term strategy. A strategy that paints with a broader brush and allows you to target a larger set of keywords than most PPC budgets would support.
Who clicks where?
On Google, 72% surveyed felt organic results were more relevant, with only 28% preferring paid listings for search results. In addition, conversion rates are slightly higher for unpaid search results than the rate for paid ( 4.2% vs. 3.6% ). With 30% of search engine users clicking on paid listings, that leaves 70% who are clicking on the organic or natural search engine listing results.
72%Click
Organic Listings 28%
ClickPaid
Listings
www.yellow7.com | 972-731-6720
wolle nevesywhite paper
63% Search Engine20% Direct Traffic16% Referring Sites
Total Traffic from Search Engines: 53,137Traffic from organic listings: 48,473 (91%)Traffic from PPC with $5000 monthly budget: 4,664 (9%)
Case Study #1
Client: Major RV Dealership with national reachAdvertising Strategy: PPC, SEO, TraditionalMonthly Traffic: 84,000 VisitsAverage Time on Site: 7:42Average Pages per Visit: 7.81
Traffic Breakdown
44% Search Engine11% Direct Traffic45% Referring Sites
Total Traffic from Search Engines: 2,881Traffic from organic listings: 1,794 (63%) Traffic from PPC with $7000 monthly budget: 1,087 (37%)
Case Study #2
Client: Plastic Surgeon with local reach onlyAdvertising Strategy: PPC, SEO, TraditionalMonthly Traffic: 6,400 VisitsAverage Time on Site: 4:27Average Pages per Visit: 4.28
Traffic Breakdown
cont.
91%Visits from Organic Listing
9%Visits from Paid Listing
63%Visits from
Organic Listing
37%Visits fromPaid Listing
Using the knowledge that 72% of searchers click the organic listings and 28% click the paid list-ings, you can develop an online marketing strategy that encompasses both advertising oppor-tunities. Failure to adopt either PPC or SEO means you are leaving a substantial amount of traffic on the table for your competition. Below are some real-world, actual client case studies showing their traffic breakdowns by PPC and Natural SEO.
www.yellow7.com | 972-731-6720
As with any marketing strategy, there are pros and cons associated with each. Below are the advantages and disadvantages of both PPC and SEO marketing strategies. Use the informa-tion to decide for yourself.
wolle nevesywhite paper
cont.
ADVANTAGES OF PPC DISADVANTAGES OF PPC
Immediate results - Need to get the cash register ringing right away? You can setup a PPC account and get site visitors by the end of the day.
Easy to calculate R.O.I. - You can quickly calculate daily R.O.I. How much did you sell today? vs. How much did you spend today?
Keyword testing for SEO - With PPC you can test specific keywords and get real-time data on your best performing keywords giving you a roadmap illustrating the best keywords to target with SEO.
Conversions are lower - Data provided by Google suggests conversions are slightly higher for unpaid search results than for paid (4.2% vs. 3.6%).
Less visits per keyword - Roughly 30% of search engine visitors click PPC listings, leaving 70% clicking organic results.
Budget limitations - Paying for traffic as a sole marketing strategy means traffic comes quickly and can leave quickly once a budget is exhausted. Daily budgets are exceeded, in most cases, long before daily searches.
ADVANTAGES OF SEO DISADVANTAGES OF SEO
Increased searches - 70% of search engine visitors use the organic listings when searching for goods and services.
Target more keywords - With SEO you can target an expanded set of keywords which are not tied directly to daily budgets like PPC campaigns are.
Long-term marketing presence - As you build up popularity for a given keyword, your rank within the search engines for that keyword(s) improves giving you “more bang for your buck” for as long as you are listed in that position. Comparing this keyword to the cost per click associated with it in PPC adver-tising gives you a clear R.O.I. picture.
Slower results - Unlike PPC, SEO takes a more long-term commitment. Natural rank-ings take time to prove their worth within the search engines for a given keyword(s).
Algorithm changes - Search engines routinely change the algorithm used to deter-mine how sites should rank. A good SEO com-pany can identify these changes and adjust efforts accordingly.
Customer expectations - SEO is a long-term commitment. As a SEO client you must have realistic expectations and realize you are investing present day dollars for future gains - Gains which have proven to exceed PPC R.O.I. over time.
www.yellow7.com | 972-731-6720
How do you calculate the value of organic search traffic?
Organic search traffic accounts for anywhere between 65% and 80% of all search traffic to a website. Yet, most online marketing budgets allocate less than 15% to SEO giving PPC, which receives 15% - 30% of all search traffic, 80%+ of online marketing budgets. Showing up in the organic listings for a given set of keywords can boost traffic dramatically. The below chart illustrates the cost-per-click for SEO compared to PPC for the case studies previously discussed.
If SEO is so great, why even recommend PPC?
Simple. PPC is immediate and results in targeted clicks.
PPC traffic flows as long as you have the budget to support it. Even though most traffic flows from organic listings, it would be foolish to completely ignore the 15% - 30% of search engine traffic that follows paid listings. This PPC traffic is usually ‘on-target’. The only way they found your site is by first searching for the specific keyword or keyword phrase you bought with PPC. For example, if the search is for “Used Motorhome For Sale” you have a pretty good indi-cation the person is indeed looking for a used motorhome for sale.
Best of both worlds.
By developing an online strategy that utilizes both organic SEO and PPC you can take advan-tage of short-term conversions while building long-term search engine saturations that will pay out dividends long into the future - decreasing your cost-per-visit and increasing R.O.I.
