SEO vs. PPC: Why You Need to Use Both

SEO, or search engine optimization, and PPC, or pay-per-click advertising, are two popular methods of promoting a brand.

SEO is the process of optimizing your website for search engines via content marketing, on-page SEO and link building. PPC, on the other hand, relates to paid advertising on search engines (think: Google Ads).

Usually, the discussion of SEO and PPC turns into a question: Which should my brand use?

While this is a great instinct – your brand should be using at least one of these methods to expand in the digital world – pivot so that your question transforms to: How can I use both SEO and PPC?

SEO and PPC complement one other so that your brand can reach its fullest potential.

SEO and PPC work together to drive traffic to your website and make sure it’s optimized to convert those users into customers.

How to Use SEO and PPC for Brand Growth

Now that we’ve agreed on your goal – to use both SEO and PPC to grow your brand – let’s dive right in to the nitty-gritty aspects of an SEO and PPC-driven strategy.

Maximize on the staying power of organic search results through SEO and get supplementary results fast with PPC by integrating the two.

Three ways to align, or combine, your SEO and PPC strategies:

1. Social media ads (a form of PPC)
2. Retargeting campaigns (a form of PPC)
3. Competitive keyword targeting (a form of PPC or SEO)

Social Media Ads: Use PPC to Increase Website Traffic

Paid media campaigns, like social media ads, will drive tons of traffic to your website. This website, optimized to convert through a good SEO strategy, is one of your best sales tools. SEMrush sums it up perfectly:

“You should be using shopping ads alongside SEO to make sure that you’re maximizing your visibility on SERPs [search engine results pages] and covering all options on how your customers want to find a new supplier of products or services.”

Social media ads also help with backlinking, as users will share your post with their friends.

Since you’ve already taken the time to build a quality audience with your social media accounts, it makes sense that your social media ads will get good engagement.

Retargeting Campaigns for Users Who Have Already Seen Your Content

Sometimes, a user sees your content, but not at the right time for them to convert. It happens all the time. Retargeting campaigns will ensure your brand stays top-of-mind for those users until they’re ready to convert. So, in other words, your good SEO practices got that user’s attention (content marketing was your foot in the door, so to speak), and your paid retargeting campaign kept knocking until the consumer was ready to answer the door. This strategy is a great way to get the most out of your content marketing and SEO strategies.

Target Keywords Your Competitors Are Bidding On

Getting competitive with keyword targeting can increase your domain authority and brand awareness. If a competitor is ranking for a keyword but isn’t dominating the SERP, try your hand at incorporating that keyword into your content marketing or PPC strategy. That way, you can maximize on the traffic that keyword generates and piggyback off the work your competitor has done to rank for that keyword.

If done correctly using content marketing and/or on-page optimization, you could even end up ranking higher organically than your competitor for that keyword. Do this through SEO or PPC, whatever you’re more comfortable with. It’s important to note that you will not rank above your competitor’s display ads with good SEO, but you can rank in the first organic spot on the SERP.

SEO vs. PPC – Why Not Both?

If your brand is looking to expand its digital presence, we’re ready to combine our small business-specific SEO and PPC know-how to help your business reach its fullest potential.

Our team will set up a Google Ads account for your brand, optimize ongoing campaigns, track conversions and more with our PPC and SEM service package. Supplement your paid campaigns with great SEO – consider our small business SEO package for keyword research, schema markup, rankings analysis and more. Give us a call at 231.882.1100.