New to digital marketing?
All the various marketing jargon can start to sound similar, to say the least. CTA, CTR, UX, PPC, and SEO — but what does it all mean?
In this article, we’ll be clearing up at least some of that confusion for you as we’re looking at the difference between PPC and SEO and how they can help you grow your business.
What Is SEO?
SEO stands for search engine optimization. This refers to the idea of making your website as search engine friendly as possible.
This is important because around 50% of all traffic to all websites comes from search engines. This makes it a valuable source for potential customers that your business can’t afford to ignore.
Google is the market leader of search engines with a colossal market share of 92%. This is why when most marketers refer to SEO, they refer to optimizing their website for Google’s search algorithm so they can appear higher up in the search results pages.
There are three main aspects of search engine optimization which are:
- Technical SEO
- On-page SEO
- Off-page SEO
Technical SEO refers to the health of your website. If your website is in poor health, Google can’t crawl and index it to appear in the results. This includes things like HTTPS security and page speeds.
On-page SEO does what it says on the tin. This is the content on each page of your website. Optimizing for on-page SEO involves creating keyword-rich, user-friendly content.
Off-page SEO refers to everything about your website that doesn’t happen on it. This includes links from high-quality, relevant sites.
Put together, optimizing all these different aspects helps improve your search engine ranking position and bring you more traffic and sales.
What Is PPC?
PPC stands for pay-per-click advertising. There are many types of PPC advertising platforms for both search engines and social media.
Google offers its own PPC advertising platform, Google Ads.
Your PPC ads on Google will appear at the very top of the results page. These ads are triggered to appear when a user enters a certain query or keyword. They’re very affordable because as the name suggests, you’ll only pay for your ad if a user clicks through to your site.
The Main Difference Between PPC and SEO
As you can see, the main difference between PPC and SEO is the money involved. SEO is referred to as an organic channel because your users come in naturally. Whereas for PPC, you’re paying upfront to bring users to your site.
Both have their advantages and disadvantages. For starters, SEO isn’t really free. You still need to dedicate time or hire someone to optimize your site. But it is a long-lasting strategy that can keep steady traffic coming into your site.
For PPC, the results are much quicker than SEO because as soon as you’ve set up a campaign, you’re good to go. This can bring in fast results for newer businesses on keywords they don’t yet rank for.
Both are equally time-consuming for businesses, especially if you want to do them right. That’s why many businesses of all sizes opt to use contractor internet marketing instead.
Learn More About Digital Marketing
Now you know the main difference between PPC and SEO is the upfront costs and the longevity of the strategy. But this is only the beginning of digital marketing.
There are many more platforms to consider which you can learn more about on our blog, so make sure to read all our great articles.
