SEO or PPC Comparison – Where should I spend my time & money?

Difference Between SEO and PPC?

Difference Between SEO and PPC?: The cutting edge competition and the horde to be the best on the web have brought every website owner at the doorstep of SEO( Search Engine Optimization ). And with no definitive plans or marketing strategy, the door might turn out to be a dead end.

In an attempt to draw the highest traffic, improving the conversion rates and achieving good SEO rankings, webmasters are more than often seen indulging themselves in the dilemma of SEO vs PPC. Perhaps this article will help you shed some light on the better option between the two.

To begin with, let’s understand the advantages of PPC:

It is like the ready-to-eat food. All you need to do is, pay and then sit back and relax. It will garner instant traffic to your site, provided you are able to dig deep into your pockets. This is however a short term recipe. It will perhaps save a lot of your time and hard work.

PPC is a very simple and plain concept. There are no highs or lows and the results are always even. Your traffic will depend on the amount you spend. The higher the number of holes in your pocket, an equivalent is the traffic that is attracted. Honestly, there is no limit to the amount of traffic that can be brought through PPC.

The Drawbacks of PPC include:

There is no long term value in PPC. The moment you stop shelling out money, your website will have negligible lead generating power. The benefits of PPC purely depend on the type of market you are operating in. Quick results make the PPC option look very attractive but the fact remains that PPC is “temporary”. Excessive reliance on PPC may lend you in difficult situations the moment competition increases or you are not able to spend.

On the other hand, SEO is a well-researched and systematically planned strategy which is used to induce organic traffic.

Advantages for using SEO:

The best and biggest advantage of SEO is that it’s “free”, forever. The ROI is much cheaper compared to PPC. You can use and compete for any and every keyword and there is no bidding for any of them. SEO always gains more credibility from people compared to PPC.

SEO activities like on-page optimization will keep churning out results unless you change it. But when the competition is strong, organic rankings may be difficult to achieve whereas PPC would come in costly.

The negative repercussions of SEO include:

It takes considerable amount of time to achieve noticeable results using only SEO. Google’s ever upgrading axe is always hanging on the head of SEO. Time limitations such as limited stock offers don’t go well with SEO. Although this is a long term strategy it might not fetch you leads at the expected speed. The bitter truth about SEO is that, even you organically rank 1st, you will still be placed fourth since the first 3 positions are reserved for those using PPC.

Conclusion:

To put it straight, SEO is not above PPC – it’s just different. Both are different mediums to gain rankings. While SEO is free from investments, PPC is costly but also gives immediate results. Thus, it is better to conclude that SEO makes a good long term strategy whereas PPC is effective in the short run. Wise man invest their time and money smartly by applying both these tactics in tandem, starting with PPC to roll the dice and eventually applying SEO.