Which search option is the right choice? We are asked that question from time to time in planning out an online marketing campaign for clients. Also, when developing a campaign plan, we may suggest one search effort over another for various reasons. Both organic (SEO) and paid search campaigns can deliver successful results. For the most part, Organic and Paid work well together. Although both Paid and Organic listings both show up on Search Results Pages (SERPs), they have some unique traits that provide different opportunities (and limitations) to advertisers. This article will highlight some of the major differences and how each search offering can be best leveraged.
Rent or Own
Paid Search is a rental. When you are willing to pay for traffic, your ads will show in SERPs. When you are not willing to pay, your ads disappear. It’s that simple. There is no real equity derived from a Paid campaign. Organic search efforts (SEO) build equity. Optimizing a site and improving standing in SERPs lasts beyond the effort applied. While rankings may deteriorate over time (due to lack of ongoing effort, etc.), the fruits of your labor continue to provide bounty long term.
Targeted vs Broad
Paid search offers much more flexibility and control. This is quite necessary as advertisers pay on a per click basis. Organic lacks much control. However, there is no cost per click. Untargeted traffic has little downside. Below are a few targeting examples and how each differs from Paid to Organic.
Timing
Advertisers with time constraints may find Paid more attractive. Campaigns can be set to run from a start date until a specified end date. Additionally, there are dayparting settings that allow ads to be active or paused during days of the week and hours of the day. Aggressiveness (keyword bids) can also be raised or lowered based on time of day or day of week.
Organic search happens when it happens. There is no set period as to when rankings will improve to the point traffic starts to flow. Organic has major drawbacks for time sensitive items. It can take months, without any specific timetable, for keywords to rank in the SERPs. Additionally, you can’t turn Organic off. The upside to organic, is that in most cases there is no need to turn Organic off. Traffic will keep coming to your site whether you have a need for it or not. Generally, there is always some value in traffic, especially where it doesn’t cost on a per click basis.
Location
Paid search’s geotargeting capabilities are off the charts. Users can be targeted based on numerous location attributes including Country, Region, States/Provinces, DMA Regions, Congressional Districts, Counties, Cities, Postal Codes, Neighborhoods and user defined radii around map points. Your ads show where you want them to and that’s it. Ads also can show to users who are normally in an area but may not be in the area at the time of their search activity.
Organic location settings are defined by how relevant search engines feel your website/web page may be to a particular area. While this makes sense. It may not deliver the optimal amount of reach you desire. While you may rank well in the location your business resides, you may not at all be visible just a few miles away in surrounding areas.
Keywords
Paid allows you to input the specific keywords you want to show ads for. There is no limit to the number of keywords you can have. There are also several settings that allow ads to show for related keywords to expand your reach including misspellings and synonyms. You may also input negative keywords so that your ads do not show on specific related keywords. There is a drawback in paid search that keywords with very low search volume will be disqualified from showing ads. Additionally, keywords may not show in results if your ads are deemed as low quality in reference to the search query. Other than that, all your keywords are eligible to show in the SERPs based on bidding and other settings.
Organic keywords can be limited. There is only so much real estate on a webpage or website. While you may discover that there are literally hundreds of keywords that are relevant to a single webpage. It is not possible to optimize the page for even a small portion of that number. Simply optimizing the page for a keyword set does not ensure that your site will show in the SERPs for those keywords. There are many factors that play a role in rankings. You may find that your site only shows up in the search results for a small number of identified keywords. Again, it may take some time to acquire any rankings at all. On the upside, organic does have an advantage when it comes to keywords that are not affordable in Paid or cannot be shown (low search volume, low quality score). Broadly targeted keywords may be too costly for paid search. Since there is no cost for clicks on the organic side, there is no real downside to non targeted users entering the site along with targeted users. Where keywords are disqualified in Paid search, they are eligible to show in organic.
Ads
Paid search ads allow for greater control as to what is displayed in the SERPS. While there are character limits and editorial rules, largely what you enter in for ad copy is what the end user sees in the SERPS. There are also ad extensions to allow additional items such as phone numbers, addresses and product/service highlights to show in the SERPs.
Organic search results mainly display a title and a description for the ranking webpage. While you can define a Title tag and Description tag for a page, you still don’t get to decide which page gets shown in the results. Search engines are also changing the information that they provide to users in the SERPs. A recent report noted that Google is changing a site’s meta description, to their liking, over 62% of the time. Google is also changing the title tag.
The Winner is…
The above information is a sampling of the differences between Paid and Organic. It does a good job of outlining the high-level differences and noting some specific examples. The winner depends on your goals. In fact, for most websites, a combination of Paid & Organic effort works best. Paid clearly works best where timing is most important. But a well optimized website can quickly supplement paid efforts with a small amount of investment. On the other hand, Organic is the better play for keywords that are broadly targeted and can’t deliver a positive return on ad spend (ROAS) in Paid. Paid search can deliver a positive (ROAS) almost immediately upon launch. Organic efforts are an investment in the future. Effective Organic efforts outpace Paid’s return over time. Outlining your goals will allow a search expert to formulate a strategy that includes either or both of Paid & Organic to deliver success in search.