Why is it necessary to spend all this time and money on organic SEO? Why can't you just buy the search phrases on Google? Well, they are two very different practices and yield very different results.

Pay per click (PPC):
The details PPC is a complementary channel to SEO and involves indentifying key search terms and bidding for a place in the 'paid for' listings area when those terms are searched.

SEO and pay per click (PPC) keyword advertising are two different approaches for achieving the same purpose: to drive targeted traffic or sales leads to a website. Each has its strengths and weaknesses, and using a well-defined strategy where both tactics are used in a complementary fashion often gains excellent results.

For example, one efficient approach is to optimise a site for the most important keyword phrases that are searched frequently, and to conduct PPC keyword advertising on those keyword phrases that are less frequently searched. This is economically sound because SEO entails much effort and attendant cost, and should therefore be used on the most popular keyword phrases that will provide a quicker return on investment. Keyword phrases that do not get much volume of search are in many ways ideal for keyword advertising because they are likely to be overlooked by your competition, and being less competitive, will likely carry lower cost per click rates and better ROI.

Organic search vs PPC
Comparing PPC to SEO is similar to comparing advertising and public relations. Advertising is a clear-cut buy, whereas PR seeks to indirectly influence opinion, through influencing the objective editorial of media. Unlike PR, which is hard to track and measure, SEO is highly measurable. It does the same thing as PPC advertising, drive targeted traffic to your site through internet search.

Results appearing in the "organic" search results receive the lion's share of user clicks - between 60-70% depending on factors such as the prominence of ads, relevance of secondary content and the type of search conducted. The difference is that while SEO can often take days or weeks to notice an effect, PPC can be instantaneous.

You can use this to you advantage by using pay per click advertising for short-term gain, while the benefits of your SEO starts to filter through. As your presence within the natural listings start to deliver more tangible benefits you can then decide how soon and by how much to reduce your spend on advertising.

Keywords
Keywords are the connector, the relationship between you and your prospects, established and indexed by the search engine. Users search on words or phrases, and if your site is well optimised, your pages turn up in the search results, and the higher the better.

Keywords are the foundation of any search engine campaign. By keywords we mean the search phrases people use in search engines. The starting point is to have a clear and thorough understanding of which keywords are relevant and will perform for your site.

Warning
The mistakes often made at the start of the SEO process:

• Not thinking broadly enough about which keywords could be effective.
• Selecting keywords that people don't actually search for.
• Being unaware of which search terms are most popular among customers.

It is also important to remember that the search engines are working on behalf of the end users, not for the website owners, and will do everything they can to recognise when they are being “sold” to. Your content needs to be engaging and relevant in order to guarantee returning, relevant traffic.

Keywords: Points worth remembering

• The classic SEO approach is to target specific keyword phrases and optimise pages on your site to appear high in the search rankings for them. This is the sensible first step; ensure you are targeting the best keyword phrases by selecting those based on relevance and popularity.
• Put yourself in the place of potential clients and think how they would search for you, rather than what you want to be found for.
• High rankings for specific keyword phrases will only translate into traffic if they are actually searched on.
• Another dimension is to optimise pages for keyword searches you do not target, or miscellaneous keyword searches that are nevertheless relevant to your site. The rationale is that people are searching on all kinds of phrases that, individually, are searched infrequently, but cumulatively, can add up to a very significant amount of traffic.
• Expanding a site, by adding new pages, is an effective way to improve ranking and visibility in search engines.

Remember
SEO and PPC can complement each other and form a robust search engine marketing programme. It is essential to understand the differences and the very distinct benefits of each. One is not a substitute for the other.

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