Marketing any product or service involves an artful combination of sprints and long-distance runs. There is no better example than Paid versus Organic search. Organic search engine optimization is a long term tactic that involves creating a web presence that encourages search engines to display your site when someone searches for a keyword or phrase. Paid search is the process of crafting content and paying search engines to display it to their search engine result page visitors.
Pros of Organic Search
The primary advantages of organic search include:
- It is free, sort of. Many SEO tactics are free or cheap. However, time is money, and these tactics take time. Additionally, high-end search tactics require an expert. Experts cost money. They like to buy things like replica death stars and mountain dew.
- Most of the time, modern SEO strategy is in line with a quality user experience. This means that if you provide your site visitors with what they want, you will also be helping your organic SEO.
- You can benefit for years off of sound SEO practices.
Cons of Organic
The primary disadvantages of organic SEO include:
- The rules change a lot. Staying on top of SEO tactics can be a full-time job, depending on how competitive your keywords and industry are.
- Often factors that cause a site to rank well are out of your control. For example, the age of a domain or the social impact of your subject/product.
- It can take years to rank a site properly.
Pros of Paid Search
The primary advantage of Paid Search include:
- Instant gratification. You can buy ads and start getting leads a few hours later.
- You get graded on a curve. Your ads will display even against large competitors if you do things correctly.
- Testing goes relatively quickly. Unlike SEO, you will know if your ad is working in a week, not in months.
Cons of Paid Search
The primary disadvantage of Paid Search include:
- Clicks don’t equal leads. You can spend a lot of money, increasing the number of site visitors and ending up with 0 sales.
- Depending on your market and product, paid search clicks can be more expensive than they are worth. In many cases, the cost per lead can be more than the profit per product. However, most experts can prevent this issue.
- All benefits to this advertising method stop the moment you stop buying placements.
Both marketing products have pros and cons. In most cases, both channels are needed to be competitive in your niche.