Paid Search Vs. Organic Search Marketing – which is better?

Photo of author
Written By Robert Dunford
I am a Marketing Consulting in the Great Toronto Area with over 25 years experience in building and implementing marketing plans for small business.

Paid Search Vs. Organic Search Marketing - which is betterStanding out among the millions and millions of pages on the world wide web can be a challenge.   However, there are two key ways to build up your site and grab the attention of the market.   These two marketing approaches are Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Pay Per Click (PPC). Both of these methods have professionals that swear their system trumps the other, causing the age-old debate in the industry – which is better?

Driving traffic to your website is the goal, and many businesses want to know where to put their focus.   The truth of the matter is that both SEO and PPC are essential!   They are two distinguished methods that have their pros and cons, but both are necessary if you want the best return.

Understanding the Two Terms

Anyone who has some experience with internet marketing must have come across the term SEO or PPC at some point.   These two search engine marketing tactics are quite different, and knowing how they work is the first step of implementing them correctly.

There are two main differences between them. The first one is how they drive traffic to your pages, and the other is how they show up on SERPs.

Organic vs. Paid  

SEO focuses on the organic way to outrank other sites in search engines.   It takes into account algorithms and rules, and it ranks your website based on those systems.   The good news is that SEO is free, if you do it yourself.   However, SEO does require a lot of knowledge, patience, and time to get the results you are trying to achieve.   Knowing what you are doing can be the difference between wasting months of your effort and reaping a huge reward.   So, despite it being free, many still spend money working with pros to optimize.

When it comes to paid traffic, PPC marketing, we are talking about quick results.   All it takes is a payment, and your site will be put above others in the advertisement section. These results can be instant, and a great way to get your name out there.   However, they are limited to the amount of money you can put in them and how long your campaign runs.

Why Settle for One

As you can see, SEO and PPC are both quite different approaches to marketing. They both carry their pros and cons, and working without one will be a handicap.   A paid search is the perfect way to get non-branded traffic to pages.   By standing above the organic search terms, you will get more exposure and some additional clicks that would be missing if the system were not in place.

On the other hand, having a high ranking page, from an SEO aspect, will give your site a lot more credibility, traffic, and branding.   Trying to break through the market by leaning on only one method can be costly in the long run.

As you can see, neither of these methods can substitute for the other, and despite the age-old industry debate, your business will get the best return on investment (ROI) by working both systems, instead of doubling down on just one. If you wish to start enjoying good results for your business faster, don’t hesitate to contact me. I’d love to discuss your marketing strategy and help in any way I can.

Rob Dunford is a Marketing Consultant in the Great Toronto Area with over 20 years of experience in implementing marketing plans for small businesses.

Pin It on Pinterest