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In this article, Fen Digital discuss the relative merits of pay per click advertising and natural search engine optimisation.
Optimisation brings long term benefits
Adword advertising (pay per click) is an instantaneous approach but the minute it is switched off there is no trace of a site on the web.
Building visibility through natural listings takes a little longer but the benefits are for the long term. A site listed in the natural listings will grow in momentum across all search engines with a potential infinite amount of related key search terms, not just those chosen to highlight the site at the outset.
Which is more cost effective?
Pay per click advertising can get very costly, particularly if you get into a bidding war on popular keywords.
In comparison, search engine optimisation (SEO) can move up your website’s ranking in the natural or ‘organic’ search listings, and work out to be much more cost-effective.
Current research1 confirms that SEO is normally more cost-effective over the long term than pay per click. Over three times as many search marketers generate a higher return on investment from SEO than from pay per click advertising.
Which Google results do users click on?
Internet users are increasingly savvy, and they know that the natural search results are there by merit – because the search engines rated them highly, rather than according to who paid the most for a keyword.
Also, the natural search results are listed in the prime area of the screen, with larger titles and longer descriptions, whereas the sponsored listings tend to be marginalised around the periphery of a user’s vision. From a usability standpoint, there is a much greater likelihood of encouraging a user to click on your site in the natural search list.
This finding was supported by the Marketing Sherpa benchmarking study of 2006 which proved through eye-tracking studies that an overwhelming majority of people clicked on the listings in the left hand column and ignored the adverts in the right hand (sponsored column).
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Advice on SEO
For advice on how SEO could help promote your website:
Read more about SEO
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How much does SEO cost? »
1Source: Jupiter Research and iProspect survey of SEO in August 2005
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