SEO vs SEM: Which Is Better For Your Business?
Wiki Article
Business owners may have heard the terms "SEO" and "SEM" thrown around when they talk to digital agencies. SEO and SEM are two acronyms that can refer to different things. SEO and SEM can help bring more people to your business's website, but the strategies used for each are different. Read on to find out how SEO and SEM are different, hopefully after reading this you will be more informed – you wont quite be SEO experts like FullbeamSEO but you will be on your way.
What Is SEO?
SEO is a method for enhancing the visibility of your business website by using keywords, phrases, and backlinks from other websites that don't compete with yours to bring more people to it. On search engines like Google and Bing, SEO assists a website in ranking higher in SERPs for specific terms in certain places. This happens naturally.
Some other SEO techniques are researching and analyzing keywords, optimizing the site and server, writing home page titles and meta descriptions, creating content, and more. The goal of SEO is for your website to naturally rank high for hundreds or even thousands of keywords in specific areas that you want to rank for, so you don't have to pay for Google or Bing PPC ads.
What Is SEM?
Search Engine Marketing, or SEM, is a type of digital marketing that includes paid ads and SEO results that naturally appear on search engine pages. On the other hand, SEM is a general term for SEO because it consists of some of the same things. This is called pay-per-click (PPC), and it uses paid ads to direct traffic.
The advertiser pays Google a fee whenever someone clicks on a paid ad. SEM is the process of creating and managing ad campaigns on Google AdWords, Bing Ads, or other trustworthy ad campaign sites. These ads show up near the top (or bottom) of the SERP as "sponsored ads."
Bidding on keywords is a big part of paid search, whether a business uses Google AdWords or Bing Ads. If the site's bid puts it among the top seven advertisers, the ad could show up on Page 1 for that keyword when someone searches for it. SEM aims for a business's paid ad to be at the top (or at least in the first three positions).
Key Differences Between SEO And SEM
These digital marketing strategies will make websites more visible and get qualified search engine traffic. However, SEO and SEM are not the same in essential ways, which could affect your choice.
The Cost
The price is one of the most significant differences between the two main kinds of digital marketing. Many digital marketers use SEO because it helps bring people to your website. SEO is an organic marketing method that doesn't pay for ads directly. Conversely, SEM puts paid ads at the top of the SERP.
SEO and its visitors won't cost you anything. But nothing is free, not even air. Most of the time, SEO costs money because it takes work and services, even though you're not paying Google directly for services like you would with pay-per-click advertising and other SEM-related strategies.
An average to medium-sized marketing company will spend between $700 and $2,000 monthly on SEO and between $5,000 and $10,000 monthly on SEM marketing. SEO is a long-term method of advertising that requires work, time, and patience to show results. SEM gives you results immediately, but you need a big budget to keep the ads running.
Website Visibility
The way people see your website is another difference between SEO and SEM. SEO only cares about the natural search results below the paid ads. It takes time, work, and patience to get organic results. Luckily, SEO usually brings in good traffic interested in your business and its products or services. If you read enough data, you'll see that organic rank gets more than 85% of the clicks on the SERP page.
Paying for ads on Google or Bing as part of SEM will ensure that your website seems at the top of organic search results. Pay-per-click (PPC) ads give businesses instant visibility. Still, they also run the risk of fraudulent and unwanted clicks that drive up costs and make it harder to perform helpful analytics in the future.
SEO And SEM Sustainability
The last difference between SEO and SEM is how long they last. SEO is a long-term digital marketing strategy that works when used 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It takes time and work to see results from SEO, but once you have a high ranking, it's easier for competitors to make your position drop (dramatically) on Google.
SEM doesn't last as long as SEO does. Your traffic will decrease once you stop paying for the PPC ads at the top of SERP queries. If you want SEM to last, you must keep spending money on ad campaigns to keep traffic and visibility high.
SEO Vs SEM: How Do You Choose For Your Business?
We've examined the pros, cons, and differences between SEM organic SEO and PPC. Which business strategy should you put your money into:
Advertising Budget
It can cost a lot to advertise on search engines. Sometimes, a single click on a PPC ad can cost more than $9. It depends on the industry. If your business is very competitive and you don't have much money to spend on ads, you should focus on organic search for a while. You are especially interested in improving your Google Business Profile and adding your business to other directories.
ROI
Your budget and the return on investment (ROI) you need from your SEO must go hand in hand. You need to be able to make money from the investment you make. The item you sell costs $20, and you make a sale for every 100 clicks on your PPC ad. For every click that costs $2, you'll need to spend $200 to make a $20 sale. A blog focused on SEO and a few relevant, natural keywords placed strategically on your website would be better investments.
Timing
You can't always wait for SEO to start paying off in the long run. That's where paid search shines. PPC ads will get you to the top of search engine results and bring you high-intent traffic immediately, whether you're a new business, a new product, or need to increase in your area. If you have the time, you can publish content and work on other on-page SEO steps while running PPC ads.
Targeted Keywords
There are different ways to use other types of keywords in search marketing. SEO works better for informational keywords because those searching for them want to learn, not buy. PPC ads work great with very competitive keywords that show that someone wants to buy.
In this case, SEO is better than SEM. Let's say you have a business that takes care of lawns. You want to do well with the phrase "when should I water my lawn?" because people who search for that phrase probably have lawns and want to make them look good. But take note of how few ads there are on the pages that show results for that keyword.