Curious about the benefits and drawbacks of a two pronged approach with PPC and organic SEO? Maybe you’re interested in going with either the SEO (organic), or paid (ads) route? This post examines the core differences between an organic SEO and pay-per-click campaigns.
What’s the Difference Between PPC and Organic SEO – Jump To Resources:
- How are PPC & Organic SEO Similar?
- How Long Do SEO Campaigns Take To See Results?
- How Long Do PPC Campaigns Take to See Results?
- How Long Do PPC Campaigns Take to See Results?
- When Do Organic SEO Campaigns Run?
How are PPC & Organic SEO Similar?
The main goal of the vast majority of digital marketing campaigns involving PPC and/or organic SEO are ultimately the same. However, the time expended, and the route taken differ greatly. The ultimate goal for both a PPC and an organic SEO campaign is to:
Get to the top of the SERPs.
The methodology and approach however differ between a pay per click campaign and an organic SEO campaign greatly and involve a number of similarities, as well as incongruities.
A helpful simplified analogy involves digital real estate. Think of a pay per click (PPC) campaign as renting real estate, and organic SEO as owning real estate.
The main similarities of PPC and organic SEO include:
- Budget constraints
- Tracking measurements
- Landing page quality
- Proper optimization for
- Keywords
- Landing pages
- Target audience
The main differences of PPC and organic SEO include:
- Time necessary to see results
- Paid results are much faster than organic results
- Organic SEO campaigns can take months, to possibly years, to see results. However these results can stick in SERPs down the line
- Pay per click campaigns are generally visible within 24-48 hours of approval by Google
- Resources needed
- Organic SEO campaigns in difficult industries and markets can take 12+ months to see results. Smaller markets with less competitive keywords can expect to see results within 3-6 months.
- PPC campaigns are visible within 48 hours
- Content strategy
- Organic SEO frequently includes content strategy and content optimization
- Links & brand awareness
- Links are still a powerful signal to Google bots. A link is a signal of a vote of confidence from interior pages and external sites
- Branded external links are very valuable
- Brand awareness will increase with organic and PPC campaigns. However a link building campaign is imperative to organic SEO
- Pay per click campaigns and organic SEO campaigns vary after a PPC campaign is set up, landing page optimized and time parameters are established
- SEO campaigns involve a number of facets including local, link building, content marketing, content enhancement, technical SEO, website architecture and more. Organic SEO campaigns require lots of resources and maintenance.
- Higher initial costs for PPC campaign budget and management budget
- Many more!
How Long Do SEO Campaigns Take To See Results?
Unfortunately, questions like when will I see SEO results are ambiguous and very contingent on the targeted market, targeted keywords, the search query and the keyword difficulty. Generally speaking, the larger the market and the higher difficulty of keywords drastically, the larger impact and amount of time is required to achieve the goal of increasing SERP visibility, brand awareness, traffic and revenue.
When Can I See Returns with Organic SEO?
The amount of time needed for organic SEO and Google ads or PPC campaigns vary drastically.
Due to the distinct characteristics for PPC compared to Organic SEO, different answers depend on a number of variables. However, these two digital marketing avenues are similar (and different) in their battle over digital real estate in the SERPs.
This digital SERP real estate can be analogically similar to renting real estate, or purchasing real estate.
Dependent on market variables and keyword difficulty and search volume, some campaigns can take 9+ months to crack SERP results while other keywords can be achieved within one week.
While working with an electrician in the Greater Denver Area, aha SEO achieved top three results for {targeted market} electrician in roughly three days. However keywords for attorneys in large markets like NYC, Los Angeles or Chicago can take months if not years.
How Long Do PPC Campaigns Take to See Results?
Certain keywords that are hyper competitive in nature can be very costly. However, if optimized properly, these keywords can increase a business’ ROI.
During the initial PPC phase, keywords should run 24/7 for at least three to six weeks. After this initial phase, data is reviewed and an ad schedule can be applied. Additionally, keywords may be added or redacted based on the performance of the campaign and keyword performance on a very granular level.
An end user can expect to see valuable data and ROI within the first month of a PPC campaign.
Can I set PPC Campaigns To Run During Busy Times Only?
Initially it is ideal to run PPC campaigns 24/7 or during operating hours to acquire data. This initial phase can vary greatly but normally 3-6 weeks of data is sufficient to analyze and move forward to the next phase. Business entities may be interested in only running PPC campaigns during predefined times to maximize their ad spend.
A PPC campaign drastically increases web (paid) traffic to increase conversions and ROI. This is incredibly beneficial when a business wants to only run PPC campaigns during certain times of the year, days of the week or any other defined time frame.
Google Ads are incredibly customizable and can be fully catered to the exact parameters and requirements of any business. Regardless if the target audience is a few thousand, or a few hundred million, an experienced marketing agency will deliver engaging ad text targeted to motivated potential customers in an optimized PPC campaign.
Google made $224 Billion dollars in 2022. This accounted for a vast majority of the revenue of Google’s parent company, Alphabet, through ad revenue. Google encourages avenues to increase their bottom line. However, a carefully catered PPC campaign set to run during optimal and busy hours can reduce the ad spend of a business, while also increasing revenue for the owner of the ad campaign.
The customizability and parameters within Google ads allow experienced marketers to properly leverage the tools to optimize a PPC campaign and run only during times when conversions are highest.
Renting Visibility & Traffic with PPC Campaigns
Google’s parent company, Alphabet, makes the majority of their income via ads. In July of 2023, the company reported that they had generated revenue in excess of $224 Billion in 2022 alone!
Depending on the keyword search volume, difficulty, time of day, time of year and other components, Google charges entities a nominal fee associated with a keyword in a PPC campaign. When a user clicks on an ad, the business entity running the ad gets charged a fee associated with the keyword.
While PPC campaigns can drastically increase paid traffic, brand recognition and generate revenue from conversions. It is important to recognize the costs associated with the targeted keywords before starting a PPC campaign.
Additionally, it’s also imperative to establish negative keywords that restrict ads from showing for targeted keywords with minimal transactional intent. Queries that are early in the sales funnel, or not related to a transaction, can be avoided to help maximize ROI.
Queries that include certain verbiage generally do not reflect a transactional intent. Popular negative keyword queries without transactional intent include:
- What is {target keyword}?
- How much is {target keyword}?
- {target keyword} jobs
- How to become {target keyword}
- {target keyword} salary
There are hundreds of other negative keywords that can benefit most PPC campaigns. Adult keywords should be filtered as well as branded searches of popular video platforms and social media outlets. An experienced marketing firm will identify what to, and alternatively, what not to focus on in a PPC campaign.
Owning Visibility & Traffic with SEO Campaigns
An oversimplified analogy for organic SEO is owning a home, vs renting a home. As long as marketers maintain and pay their associated bills with hosting, SSL and use best practices and avoid black hat SEO techniques, a website can see positive movements in an organic campaign.
However, if a business entity stops managing SEO or the entity uses improper SEO techniques, the website may be penalized from a manual action or confusion from Google Bots over what page to rank on a site for a given query. In the event that an entity stops optimizing their site, or paying their marketing bills, the website can see a reduction in organic rankings.
When Do Organic SEO Campaigns Run?
Unlike PPC campaigns, organic rankings show around the clock. There is no option, nor is there a benefit, to limiting the schedule of an organic SEO campaign.
Pages that rank for a given query in organic listings show 24/7 365 days a year. When a potential customer clicks on an organic listing, the entity with the SERP result will have a new user without any cost associated with the traffic.
Organic listings are shown around the clock regardless of date and time. However, depending on the tactics and ongoing techniques and strategies used in an organic SEO campaign, the organic results can increase, and conversely, decrease based on a number of factors. This is why it’s important to hire a marketing agency that properly understands the best techniques and approach to manage an SEO campaign.