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SEO vs PPC – Which Is Better For Lead Generation Websites?

February 25, 2009 on 10:44 am | In Google Adwords, Lead Generation, SEO | 29 Comments

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Here’s a question I’m often asked:

“Which is better: optimising my site for “free” search engine rankings, or paying for clicks on Google Adwords?

My answer is always the same – if you can profitably generate website traffic with both, it’s best to do both to generate maximum returns.

But you should also keep in mind that free search engines and paid search engines are very different animals.

Let’s look a little deeper so you understand the pros and cons of Search Engine Optimisation for the “free” search engines (SEO) and Pay-Per-Click optimisation on paid search engines (PPC).

SEO vs PPC

PPC (paying for clicks) is good because…

It’s a very fast way to generate targeted traffic – you can literally generate visitors to your website within 10 minutes. SEO takes much longer to see results.
You can easily decide where to send each visitor (e.g. if a visitor searches on “blue widgets”, you can direct them to your “blue widgets” product page.) With SEO, the search engines decide for you.
You can easily test multiple headlines / copy / offers by testing ads in Google Adwords.
You can easily drive traffic for a broad range of keywords. With SEO, you’re wise to focus on fewer keywords.
Your website doesn’t have to be “search engine friendly” for PPC to work. (Websites built with “Flash” are notoriously UN-friendly to search engines, but they don’t necessarily affect PPC traffic.)
You’re optimising for conversion results, not the ranking formula for a particular search engine.
You can easily change positions on the page in order to find the best Return On Investment.
Changes in “the rules” of Pay-Per-Click search engines tend to be smaller and less frequent than changes to the “free” SEO rules.

SEO (free traffic) is good because…

It’s free!
You can generate hoards of traffic for search terms that it would be un-economical to bid on with Pay Per Click.
The long-term Return On Investment is often better than Pay Per Click. It’s slower at first, and the risk is higher if you don’t know what you’re doing, but it’s cheaper in the long term.
Once you get good rankings, it’s relatively easy to maintain them with little incremental effort.
You can build incredible momentum and dominate your market while your competitors bleed themselves dry trying to compete with you on PPC search engines as they pay for every click.

Conclusion: SEO and PPC both have their place in any online lead generation strategy for your business website.

But the Search Engine Optimisation field is riddled with mis-information and half-truths that can waste your time, blow your budget and frustrate the heck out of you, all at the same time.

That’s why I’ve decided to totally rework my audio program, “Search Engine Strategies for lead generation websites”. It will contain what I believe to be the most concise, most effective way to generate free Search Engine traffic to your “real” business website. And…it will be available for less than $50.

This new program will be launched on Tuesday 10th March at 12 noon AEST, but if you want to get access before everyone else, and gain access to extra Early Bird bonuses, you can join the pre-launch notification list here.

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29 Comments »

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I’m not that optimistic about PPC. You have to spend a large minimum to have any significant impact.

Comment by Joe — February 25, 2009 #
Hi Will,

“Your website doesn’t have to be “search engine friendly” for PPC to work”

It might be useful to say that SEO & PPC seem to be merging closer together and that both are important. And SEO of websites and PPC landing pages can influence the Quality Score of a PPC campaign.

Regards
Ros

Comment by Roslyn Garavaglia — February 25, 2009 #
@Roslyn – touche, you are correct. Changes to QS have made PPC a little more like SEO, although I would argue that Quality Score guidelines are somewhat easier to navigate than changes in SEO algorithms.

Comment by Will — February 25, 2009 #
Good thoughts Will. I agree you should do both, if both are turning a positive ROI.

However to get ROI, you have to put a time frame on when the costs are incurred, and when the revenue is realized. That’s real easy with PPC, but for SEO what you do today will have some impact 6 months from now, so its tough to fully quantify results at any one point in time. With PPC its not so tough, b/c once you spend the money its gone, and you won’t get leads the next month!

Comment by LeadStorm — February 25, 2009 #
@LeadStorm — True. The first 3-6 months of an SEO program are often done “on faith”. But once you get some SEO leads coming through the pipeline, you can begin to get a more accurate view of ROI. It’s not an exact science, but I figure if you can get it 80-90% right, you can use that info to make profit-boosting decisions. Thanks for your thoughtful input.

Comment by Will — February 25, 2009 #
As stated in the article PPC can lead to a “point of no return” where the bidding on the words u need, seems to go up and up. Therefore there is no alternative to doing the Seo work. Use PPC to get started on certain campaigns… the rest is hard SEO work.

Comment by Bob — February 25, 2009 #
Fantastic Article mate. I didnt know much about ppc after reading this article i have got some overview of it. I always thought that SEO is best thing to do but PPC is not bad either. I think SEO got more famous than PPC because SEO is free to do anyone can try but for PPC you have to spend money.

Comment by Money Saver — February 26, 2009 #
I think it is a misconception that seo traffic is free.
Of course you don’t pay for clicks, but you need to invest time and money to appear in the organic search results.

Comment by Ilan Hertz — February 26, 2009 #
SEO not on words but on sentences. That is my advice.

Comment by Naruto — February 26, 2009 #
Yeah, in my experience it really depends on the company, and how much a sale is worth to them.

Like say there is a clothing store that is doing PPC. say it is priced at $2 a click. Average shirt sells for $20. They need one in ten people that click on their PPCs to buy from them. That is a pretty high and unlikely conversion rate for PPC.

Now, if you are say, a huge manufacturer of some high tech gear. A sell might be worth thousands of dollars to you. Say its even $5 a click, but if you get one sell out of 1,000 than it is worth it. Those are much better odds.

Obviously organic SEO is the best, but PPC does have its place.

Comment by SEO Minneapolis — February 27, 2009 #
I would say SEO. PPC is good for short time boost of traffic. But it has much less value in long term. But it is easy once you have some amount of money to spend on it. On the other hand natural search engine traffic is continuous and good for long term. But more and more effort has to be put in to building it. Once you have reached that level there is no stopping of traffic.

Comment by loan modification — February 28, 2009 #
Well ppc is immediate and can generate the funds to do proper seo technique. The best would be a choice between both. Do 30% ppc and 70% seo.

Comment by blog flipping secrets — February 28, 2009 #
I recently completed a website overhaul and SEO work for a site that was exclusively PPC. Within three months of the new website launch the organic SEO hits were exceeding the PPC volume and the client quit his PPC. Now after six months the organic SEO hits have doubled again and the client is on course to recoup his website overhaul costs within another 3-4months through savings on PPC.

Perhaps the way forward is to do PPC until your organic SEO volume overtakes it.

Dennis Foreman

Comment by Annuity Leads Generation — March 2, 2009 #
# You can build incredible momentum and dominate your market while your competitors bleed themselves dry trying to compete with you on PPC search engines as they pay for every click.
—

Absolutely and this is why established companies who employ long term SEO strategies mixed with PPC will always come out top and why new emerging companies who have NO organic rankings and rely of PPC generally go under within the first year, dropping out with several maxed credit cards.

Comment by Matthew - Business Franchise — March 4, 2009 #
I agree with Matthew. Organic rankings are the clear way to a low overhead, high profit margin business model.

PPC instantly turns your business into a very highly levered operation, and if your conversion results aren’t quite high enough, or competition for adwords increases, you may find your margin wiped out and end up mounting huge debts.

Comment by Leadership Expert — March 11, 2009 #
Both PPC as well as SEO has its’ own place. I believe SEO is the great solution for the long term solution and PPC is the short term solution. If there is no traffic to a website, PPC can solve that problem immediately.

Comment by Jay — March 16, 2009 #
We tested ppc on a small site we built before building our main site which we have designed to target longer term natural traffic. We found that when we tested ppc on our mini site the bid requirements were too high to be able to generate a margin. We are at a loss as to how existing advertisers make it work. We have heard that if you run your ppc campaign for a long period the bid price will fall. Is that correct?

Comment by Now Mobile Broadband — March 29, 2009 #
I agree with jay. having used both strategies, SEO has a long term effect when it comes to traffic and lead generation. But it would require more time to implement a good SEO strategy compared ro PPC where you will just manage your ads and check it every now and then. I prefer doing SEO more, but I still use both.

Comment by Victor — April 7, 2009 #
PPC can get immediate traffic, but SEO build for the long haul. That’s my plan.

Comment by Jacksonville real estate agent - Brad Officer — April 14, 2009 #
I have both organic and google ppc traffic at my site Shifting Calories Diet. Problem is, how do I know which type of traffic converts?
I have affiliate products on my site and I have no way of knowing my affiliate commission is generated from organic or paid traffic.

Comment by Shifting Calories Diet — April 16, 2009 #
You have nailed it on the head! A lot of people always look at it as SEO vs PPC. However, using both can be the best of both worlds! You must do your research with PPC as it can cost you a lot of money for your mistakes, however you have a little bit of learning with SEO in my opinion.

Both of these strategies together can give you the best shot at winning that coveted number 1 position in Google, Yahoo, etc.

Comment by Minneapolis SEO — April 29, 2009 #
PPC, as we all can agree, has its place in generating business. The problem is being able to tell how much business actually comes from the CTR. However, typically, if the CTR is high, one should tag those same words with SEO and see a good return from both. SEO traffic has its same limits on being able to track how many calls come into the business, much less the number of transactions. Maybe a search engine will one day be able to help do this, but until then, PPC is required as well as SEO for a successful SEM strategy.

Comment by Rabbit Hole — May 5, 2009 #
This is an awesome blog.

SEO (free traffic) is good because… It’s free!

Comment by Video Production Birmingham — May 14, 2009 #
i should also keep in mind that free search engines and paid search engines are very different animals.

Comment by mouse — May 25, 2009 #
i have been working with PPC,,PAYING $5 OR $6 DOLLARS per click,,,,is ok if the product you market can give you $5000 dollars minimun per prospect or click…one prospect can pay your campaing for a long time…just imagine 300 or 400 prospects per week…if you spend money in PPC you have be sure that the returns are alot higher for example from 300 leads at $5 bucks is $1500 dollars if you only get one prospect that sends you or spend $5000 with you ,,,, that is good for one more month in leads and still have $3500 for spenses of your company …and paying the product you sell….
Just one of 300 fresh prospects can give you $5000
and you can have at least 3 people that invest with you that is $15.000 is it worth it…i say all depends in how much money you have to invest in google….to make money with PPC,,you have to make at least 5 times more money ..than the one you invested in google..that is the only way…you pay alot of money monthly but you have higher returns because one or two leads will pay your campaing for along time..IF YOU SELL $3000 PRODUCTS AND UP is good–SEO IS GOOD FOR A LONG TERM…BUT WITH PPC,,YOU CAN MAKE THE MONEY TO PAY YOUR SEO CAMPAING…FOR ME FASTER WAY TO MAKE MONEY IS GOOGLE ADWORKS ..THE ONLY THING is that you have to know what your doing,,,and why you pay so much per click..and know how much the google campaing can give you in return..both works it depends on your company needs…make up your mind…

Comment by harold — June 4, 2009 #
“PPC, as we all can agree, has its place in generating business. The problem is being able to tell how much business actually comes from the CTR”

If you are having issues with this I recommend you look into using a couple of things:

Adwords conversion codes.
Analytics goal funnels.

Using these two you should be able to work out your PPC cost per acquisition plus a bunch of other juicy info.

And yes, PPC and SEo complement each other. I often use PPC to do the market research on which keywords convert well, then SEO them.

Comment by PPC Review Guy — June 16, 2009 #
Fantastic Article mate. I didnt know much about ppc after reading this article i have got some overview of it. I always thought that SEO is best thing to do but PPC is not bad either. I think SEO got more famous than PPC because SEO is free to do anyone can try but for PPC you have to spend money.

Thanks and Regards

Comment by New electric socket — July 21, 2009 #
[...] SEO vs PPC – Which Is Better For Lead Generation Websites? – Marketing-Results [...]

Pingback by Bluewire Media Web Design Blog » Blog Archive » SEO for beginners – 5 part process — September 9, 2009 #
In my opinion there is absolutely no need of PPC if your website is performing fine in organic searches.

Comment by Article Directory — November 27, 2009 #