Pros and Cons of SEO & PPC

Among a lot of people there's always different opinion to promote or markt their online business. Often people go for PPC because they want early results to get but some believe on SEO however it requires lot of patience and hard work.

SEO and PPC both have their own benefits.

Here we discuss about what are the similarities, advantages and drawbacks or you can say "PROS and CONS" of Search Engine Optimization(SEO) and Pay Per Click(PPC) advertising..

SIMILARITY: PPC and SEO

Both SEO and PPC provide targeted and motivated visitors… people who are actively searching for products or services you offer.
Both help to maximize a website’s exposure on the Internet. Also Enhance corporate sales and marketing efforts… leading to improved profits.

Both are good and effective for brand awareness, revenue generation and lead prospecting.

Both are capable enough to turn a website from being a business expense to a business asset.

In their simplest and purest forms; SEO is about optimizing and lucking into rankings… PPC is about controlling and paying for rankings

PROS & CONS: SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION(SEO)

SEO Pros:

Traffic through organic search engine results is almost free if the up-front work has been done.
Long-term costs can be lower than PPC.

After optimizing your website you can use your money for different things and the optimized site will still run.

Good ROI and is relatively inexpensive when compared to other forms of advertising… both online and offline.

A larger number of visitors and search result clickers is not a problem.

People trust SEO rankings more than PPC rankings… more than twice as many people will click on an organic listing than a PPC listing.

SEO Cons:

Not guaranteed results… be very wary of hardly any company that guarantees top rankings.

Time consuming, higher start-up costs and longer timeframe… approx. 3-6 months to start seeing results.

Rankings are not stable… top rankings can come and go based on various of factors that are beyond your control.

Requires on-going maintenance to ensure website remains relevant to search engine algorithm changes.

Many changes may have to be made to the site itself to make it search engine friendly.

Changes may have to be made to the Web Host server(s).

Good SEO costs money… you get what you pay for.

Geographic targeting is more difficult than with PPC.

To the search engines, ‘content is king’… websites need to have good, unique content.

Content written to target keywords isn’t usually the most compelling or the easiest to read from a human perspective.

You may not know whether your SEO company is using ethical or unethical techniques… unless they are certified.

Competition is fierce and some companies use unethical practices to attain top rankings.

Un-doing what is already done can be difficult… especially if your site has already been penalized in the past.

Some keywords are just too competitive to be even worth going after… unless you have a large budget.

PROS & CONS: PAY PER CLICK(PPC)

PPC Pros:

Instant results… top rankings can be achieved in a matter of hours or days --not months.

Very little website changes required.

You can target as many keywords as you want.

Control… you can control/ change almost all aspects of the campaign.

Costs are only incurred when someone clicks on your ad.

Results can be tracked and measured precisely… improving ROI.

Permits geographic targeting… pick your country, region, state, city, or town.

Permits running of ads at different times… 24x7, morning, afternoon, evening, night.

Will direct users to the exact page on your site you want them to visit.

Allows for testing of landing pages and conversion rates.

Immediacy… get instantaneous, real-time feedback on changes/ adjustments.

Perfect for time limited offers such as holiday sales

Ideal way to ‘test’ whether online marketing is right for your business.

Must rank for a particular keyword? If you have the budget, you can rank for it.

PPC Cons:

Rankings disappear as soon as you stop paying.

Can be expensive in the long term.

Be wary of ‘bidding wars’… costs can quickly spiral out of control.

Susceptible to ‘click fraud’… people/ competitors clicking on your ads to drive up costs.

Keywords are initially reviewed and approved/ disapproved by the search engines.

The cost for keywords is going up.

Search engines don’t care how much you value a keyword… if it doesn’t generate enough traffic, they will disable it.

Your rankings can be affected by the number of ‘click-throughs’ your ad generates… so even though you ‘bid’ for the number two position, someone else may get that spot.

Rankings are viewed by people as being a form of ‘advertising’… some users consider this a plus, others a negative.

Most people prefer to click on‘natural/ organic’ (i.e. SEO) results rather than PPC ads.

An edited article from http://www.seo-promotioninc.com/seo-resources/printerview.asp?id=170 To read more visit To learn more visit http://www.1stonthelist.ca/