PPC and SEO are two distinct marketing techniques that are vital to any digital marketing strategy. Both of these marketing approaches utilize positioning to achieve increased exposure and traffic. PPC (Pay per click) advertising reaches a large audience through budgeted ads on various platforms such as Google, Bing, or Facebook. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is a strategy that utilizes on page and off page optimization tactics for higher rankings in search results to increase visibility of a search query. PPC and SEO can actually complement each other through their differences. Let’s see how both strategies can assist a business with brand visibility, traffic growth and sales.
Why should you care about PPC?
Pay per click is a paid, immediate advertising method in which platforms showcase ads in relevant search results to receive traffic. A PPC advantage is the advertising model can be efficiently set up using keywords and ad copy. PPC strategies can be created within days and can start advertising to potential customers quickly. Since the paid ad is prompt, PPC is an effective method to get improved brand visibility and increase your leads and sales.
PPC also provides a unique way of audience targeting. Paid ads can target specific demographics such as location, gender, age, or interests. Audience targeting through specific demographics leads consumers closer to a purchase or conversion that relates to them. This type of targeting narrows down a wide consumer base and encourages high quality leads based on the preferences and analytics.
Paid ads often include a call to action (CTA) such as a signup, purchase, or requesting a quote. A CTA allows businesses to view conversion tracking and analytics that determine ad performance. This helps to distinguish keyword relevance, keywords worth bidding on, and which ads are converting into sales/leads.
Overall, PPC benefits may include:
Quicker ad setup time
More immediate results
Focused audience targeting
Conversion analytics directly to ads
SEO Should Be In Your Long-Term Strategy
Contrary to PPC, SEO is a long term digital marketing strategy that drives traffic to a website through organic search rankings. Higher rankings in search results are more likely to get clicks from users and show your business to more potential customers. To achieve higher search rankings, there are on-page and off-page optimizations tactics that can be implemented.
With increased SEO rankings, businesses can increase their visibility to a new market of customers. Search engine rankings are influenced by many factors, but targeted keywords and high quality content can help enhance website visibility.
Benefits of SEO may include:
Increased visibility
Growth in organic traffic
Positioning your brand long term
Cost efficient results
What are the differences between PPC and SEO?
PPC ads appear in the top positions above organic search listings in the search engine . These paid ads show in one of the top positions and the organic search results from SEO appear below. The SEO rankings are not listed as paid advertisements, so these organic results are found through mostly targeted keywords and quality content. PPC results are positioned through bid amount, keyword relevance, and ad relevance.
Another difference between these techniques is cost input. SEO is more cost efficient, while PPC has a higher cost expense. PPC is an investment of cost that lasts as long as keywords are bid on. Conversely, SEO organic rankings are free, but it is an investment of time that could benefit your business with much lower cost input.
Lastly, there are differences in the immediacy and longevity of these tactics. PPC ads can have immediate exposure, but PPC factors involve a bidding cost so this isn’t always a long-term tactic. In contrast, SEO tactics are a long-term strategy, but can establish your business’ visibility by ranking for a longer period of time.
What are the similarities between PPC and SEO?
Although, PPC and SEO have various differences, there are a few similarities between PPC and SEO with keyword research and relevancy. For example, PPC and SEO results rely heavily on the keyword relevancy to the search query. Both marketing strategies rely on keyword research to determine which keywords are effective to use. In other words, ineffective or negative keywords may affect the positioning for both marketing strategies.
PPC and SEO strategies can help increase exposure and reach a larger volume of traffic through higher positioning. Both strategies allow for businesses to expand their consumer base through increased visibility. Pay per click advertising and Search Engine Optimization have the potential to reach a large audience when utilized correctly.
Utilizing both PPC and SEO to enhance your business strategy
PPC and SEO can both be implemented together to achieve higher visibility and sales. Buyer’s confidence in a brand can be achieved through paid and unpaid organic visibility. Paid (PPC) and unpaid (SEO) tactics complement each other, and can elevate a marketing strategy and overall assist in a business’ growth and sales.
Using these strategies together creates an enhanced digital marketing strategy that can be hard to beat!