SEO or PPC?
Search Engine Marketing Strategies - Is one more productive than the other?
Search Engine Marketing – also called SEM – is driven by two main techniques known as
*SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION – (SEO)
If the world of Digital Media Marketing is a mystery, and yet you can intuitively grasp its
significance as a cutting edge tool to generate revenue from volume sales, you will understand the urgent reasons for educating yourself about it.As an academic subject, Digital Media Marketing is categorized mainly, into 7 or 8 different channels. Among them all, SEM – Search Engine Marketing is proving to be the most effective tactic. Almost all major companies across the world have moved into this space to jack up their sales volumes. SEM itself has yielded 2 chief techniques to harvest profit from online business – SEO and PPC. Among many online entrepreneurs there is a general fog of doubt about how each operates and about how to choose one or the other.
Think of SEM as a large traditional billboard on the side of the road. Somehow, it adresses you specifically, as you drive by, and offers you the exact category of product you were thinking of buying.
If the world of Digital Media Marketing is a mystery, and yet you can intuitively grasp its
significance as a cutting edge tool to generate revenue from volume sales, you will understand the urgent reasons for educating yourself about it.As an academic subject, Digital Media Marketing is categorized mainly, into 7 or 8 different channels. Among them all, SEM – Search Engine Marketing is proving to be the
most effective tactic. Almost all major companies across the world have moved into this space to jack up their sales volumes. SEM itself has yielded 2 chief techniques to harvest profit from online business – SEO and PPC. Among many online entrepreneurs there is a general fog of doubt about how each operates and about how to choose one or the other.
Think of SEM as a large traditional billboard on the side of the road. Somehow, it
addresses you specifically, as you drive by, and offers you the exact category of product
you were thinking of buying.
Understanding how SEO and PPC are designed to work!
The content of the vendor website is couched with ‘keywords’ that are anticipated to appear in the search phrase or sentence. Search engines like Google, Bing etc., which store meta data (the code that sits behind each page and tells Google what your website is about, the text on those pages, the layout of the site and more), co-relate these keywords and pop out your brand among the salient results of that search. Both SEO and PPC strategies operate on this basis.
Search Engine Optimization is a digital mechanism to design your website to elicit the most favourable result of an online organic search of your category of product or service. It aims to prominently display your website among those listed on the SERP (Search Engine Result Page) and direct traffic to your site.
An organic search refers to the customer actually searching in real time. This implies that your product could top the ranking in the results of a random search by a potential customer. Of course, for the chance of this to happen, the content of your website should be optimized to connect with the search phrase or words
You are not required to pay for this arrangement but it takes diligence and commitment to maintain your rank at the top of the result list. It also takes 6 to 9 months to establish a top rank there. And once there, you need to maintain that position by constant monitoring and evolving your website content.
Pay Per Click is a strategy to display customized ads on SERPS to direct traffic to a
webpage.Search results appear on a SERP – Search Engine Result Page. The SERP pins your advertisement at the very top of the ranking, even before thre SEO results. This is because you have contracted with the Search Engine owner to pay for every time a potential client clicks on your advertisement.
The more prominent (higher in ranking) you require your ad to be placed, the more you will be billed. The first four results of a search engine results page feature ads. They are identified as such by the word Ad in a
rectangle next to it.The effect here is instantaneous. But the scope is limited to the duration of your ad campaign.
Pay Per Click is a strategy to display customized ads on SERPS to direct traffic to a
webpage.Search results appear on a SERP – Search Engine Result Page. The SERP pins your advertisement at the very top of the ranking, even before thre SEO results. This is because you have contracted with the sarch engine owner to pay for every time a potential client clicks on your advertisement.The more prominent (higher in ranking) you require your ad to be placed, the more you will be billed. The first four results of a search engine results page feature ads. They are identified as such by the word Ad in a rectangle next to it.The effect here is instantaneous. But the scope is limited to the duration of your ad campaign.
Between the Two as an Investment, is there a Better One?
In terms of ROI – Return on Investment, each of the strategies need to be weighed for their pros and cons.
SEO is time consuming and demands due diligence. The process of deploying a SEO strategy involves keyword research, implementing on-page optimization and investing in time and effort on writing blogs and attaining backlinks (recommendations via links on established brands’ webpages). This is a committed operation extending for quite a long period.It takes time before your quality impresses people like Google to bump you up the rankings.
After the initial investment on a website and its optimization, you have no further major expenses. It will require updating of content with blogs and social media interaction on
an ongoing basis, but you could do that yourself. Once the search engine owners recognize the caliber of your content they will direct increasing traffic your way.
PPO in terms of customer response can be immediate. Being among the first four results on the SERP is almost a certainty that your product or service is selected. You display your offers directly to the customer responding to your ad.
Your PPC ads enable you to widen your marketing scope more quickly than SEO. Youeven target a specific customer profile by customizing and personalizing your ads.But your PPC could be constrained by factors within your advertisement budget. If your daily budget dries up, your ads stop displaying. For optimum ad display you need to select premium plans which are costlier. Otherwise your ads are restricted to smaller audience for shorter periods of time.
Your ads may appear instantly but that doesn’t really indicate immediate clicks or conversions. You will need to fine tune your ads to the search engine parameters. So even if the process of PPO deployment is shorter you will still need patience and commitment to reap the benefits.
So in terms of deciding which strategy is better, it is more prudent to consider combining the benefits of both marketing techniques and build a two-pronged strategy to ensure the greater visibility and success of your website and business.
Define an Objective for a Digital Marketing Strategy!
The typical goals for an online business include the success of its e-commerce sales, maximum conversion of leads and audience engagement with the brand. So, depending on the specific nature of the business, its digital marketing strategy should encompass these key objectives:
- Conversion/sale
- Product Consideration
- Online Awareness
- Customer Retention
Deploying a cogent digital marketing campaign in London UK is challenging in terms of the effort and amount of time invested. The techniques are complex and the methods convoluted. A business already fully engaged with different departments of operation in such a busy cosmopolis like London, could find an additional in-house digital marketing division burdensome and cost intensive.
A reputed agency with ready solutions would be a very prudent option indeed!
Attributes of a Successful Digital Marketing Agency
- An impressive clientele list of London’s best performing firms
- Reputed digital marketing engineers
- Social Proof – high popularity ranking among peers and past clients in London
- Crowd favourite
- Word of Mouth
- Recommendations
