SEO Myth 4 – PPC (Pay per click) is more effective than organic SEO
In the short term…true. In the long term…no way. Why? Organic SEO is preferred 5 to 1 over PPC. As I said in the previous article Organic results are preferred as those results are the most relevant to your search term. In most cases PPC ads have little or no relevance to the search. With PPC almost any keyword can be used because it’s paid for.
I normally tell website owners the following. “Let’s first concentrate on getting your site ranked well organically and then we can concentrate on PPC.” 8 out of 10 people end up not going for PPC after this exercise as they are then well ranked. Besides PPC will work much better for your site if it is ranked well e.g. Top 10.
PPC is a short term solution to get your site exposed, and there can never be a guarantee that your PPC advert will be displayed on the first page. Mostly PPC and sponsored listings work like this, the more you pay the better your chances of getting your add shown first. So at the end of the day it ends up being a running cost of thousands of rands. With organic SEO you do not have to pay for keywords or impressions.
I’m not saying PPC should be left out completely, the point I’m trying to make is that it should not be your first and only way of promoting your site. When you have a fairly steady flow of traffic you can use PPC as a “boost”.