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The Business Case for SEO
It's interesting how potential clients have preconceived
notions about which aspects of search engine marketing
have the most value. In fact, they tend to fall into two camps
that are 180° apart. The first camp believes completely in
the value of pay-per-click marketing (PPC). It's easy to
understand why. PPC provides immediate and measurable
benefits. The ROI of PPC marketing is obvious. This group
doesn't understand why it s necessary to bother doing SEO.
The second camp believes the only way to go is SEO.
Clicks are free and the branding benefits of high rankings
have been well documented.
The right answer is that they are both valuable. Each has its
benefits and when you can afford to, you should implement
both.
Pay-per-Click PPC makes sense if you want immediate
benefits and like the idea of paying for performance. SEO
provides branding benefits and longer-term will provide an
ROI that is compelling. But unlike PPC, SEO revenue
results aren t as directly measurable and manageable.
Pay per click (PPC) gives you the ability to have complete
control over your search traffic. With PPC programs you
select the keywords and write the listings. You control
where you re listed and what the listing says. You decide
what your budget is and can adjust your spend rate based
on results or events (e.g. announcements, promotions).
By tracking results from a PPC campaign, you can build up
a knowledge base with respect to your business, including
which messages perform the best, which search terms
have the best conversion rates, and what destination URL
is best for specific users to land on. Over time, this
knowledge can help you to improve and define your
business.
One of the greatest attractions of PPC is the ability to easily
track clicks and costs allowing you to understand your ROI
from a specific marketing initiative. This gives you
confidence to spend money and drive volume. You may
have thought that spending $5,000 a month on a PPC
campaign is way outside your budget, but once you
measure the ROI, you may realize that it s well worth the
investment.
Search Engine Optimization
So, if PPC is so great why bother with SEO? Basically,
because you will be missing out on a large number of
potential clicks. How large? A number of recent studies
have demonstrated that there are still a lot of users that do
not click on the "paid" listings but rather will search through
the regular editorial search results. The accompanying
chart shows that 60% of the search users prefer (some
exclusively) organic over paid listings. The only way to get
optimized (high) rankings in these regular editorial results
is through an effective SEO program. In most cases, once
you have good positioning in the regular search results, you
will continue to receive free traffic. Again, based on data
from a number of marketers the increase in traffic due to
SEO averaged 73%. Consider search engine optimization
the same as you would word of mouth advertising or public
relations. It s exposure that comes with a very high degree
of credibility and trust. Traffic coming from traditional !
search listings tends to have high conversion rates.
There's another advantage to traditional search listings.
They are considered unbiased and non-commercial.
Traditional search performs very well at certain points in the
buying process. When consumers are gathering
information about a purchase, they show a marked
preference for traditional search listings. When they are
ready to buy online, they seem to have less bias against
paid placement listings and their likelihood to click on one
of these listings increases.
The Dollars and Cents of SEO
Perhaps the most compelling reason not to exclude SEO
from your online marketing strategy comes down to dollars
and cents. In an attempt to quantify the business case for
SEO I have gone back and done some analysis on three
recent SEO engagements and the results they achieved. I
chose ecommerce clients that we had optimized and
reviewed their average sales before and after SEO was
implemented. In two of the situations the only change made
was the optimization of the site. In another the optimization
occurred at the same time we implemented a PPC
campaign. In the first two cases the store sales rose 64%
and 75% after the SEO was implemented. In the third case
the store revenue actually went up a staggering 169%, but if
you back out the sales that were a result of the PPC
campaign, the store revenue that could be attributed to SEO
improved by 49%. In other words, the average improvement
in store revenue that was apparently due to SEO was 62%.
Can we be sure that all of this was a result of SEO? No.
There could have been product, seasonal and other effects
that contributed. But I think it's safe to say that there was a
significant increase that resulted directly from the SEO. The
bottom line: search optimization has a real and measurable
impact on traffic, conversions and revenue (or lead
generation) improvement. Given that these clicks begin to
approach free after amortizing the cost of SEO over time, the
ROI for SEO is compelling. Added to the branding benefits
no marketer or business owner should doubt the value of
search engine optimization.
by Scott Smigler
It's interesting how potential clients have preconceived
notions about which aspects of search engine marketing
have the most value. In fact, they tend to fall into two camps
that are 180° apart. The first camp believes completely in
the value of pay-per-click marketing (PPC). It's easy to
understand why. PPC provides immediate and measurable
benefits. The ROI of PPC marketing is obvious. This group
doesn't understand why it s necessary to bother doing SEO.
The second camp believes the only way to go is SEO.
Clicks are free and the branding benefits of high rankings
have been well documented.
The right answer is that they are both valuable. Each has its
benefits and when you can afford to, you should implement
both.
Pay-per-Click PPC makes sense if you want immediate
benefits and like the idea of paying for performance. SEO
provides branding benefits and longer-term will provide an
ROI that is compelling. But unlike PPC, SEO revenue
results aren t as directly measurable and manageable.
Pay per click (PPC) gives you the ability to have complete
control over your search traffic. With PPC programs you
select the keywords and write the listings. You control
where you re listed and what the listing says. You decide
what your budget is and can adjust your spend rate based
on results or events (e.g. announcements, promotions).
By tracking results from a PPC campaign, you can build up
a knowledge base with respect to your business, including
which messages perform the best, which search terms
have the best conversion rates, and what destination URL
is best for specific users to land on. Over time, this
knowledge can help you to improve and define your
business.
One of the greatest attractions of PPC is the ability to easily
track clicks and costs allowing you to understand your ROI
from a specific marketing initiative. This gives you
confidence to spend money and drive volume. You may
have thought that spending $5,000 a month on a PPC
campaign is way outside your budget, but once you
measure the ROI, you may realize that it s well worth the
investment.
Search Engine Optimization
So, if PPC is so great why bother with SEO? Basically,
because you will be missing out on a large number of
potential clicks. How large? A number of recent studies
have demonstrated that there are still a lot of users that do
not click on the "paid" listings but rather will search through
the regular editorial search results. The accompanying
chart shows that 60% of the search users prefer (some
exclusively) organic over paid listings. The only way to get
optimized (high) rankings in these regular editorial results
is through an effective SEO program. In most cases, once
you have good positioning in the regular search results, you
will continue to receive free traffic. Again, based on data
from a number of marketers the increase in traffic due to
SEO averaged 73%. Consider search engine optimization
the same as you would word of mouth advertising or public
relations. It s exposure that comes with a very high degree
of credibility and trust. Traffic coming from traditional !
search listings tends to have high conversion rates.
There's another advantage to traditional search listings.
They are considered unbiased and non-commercial.
Traditional search performs very well at certain points in the
buying process. When consumers are gathering
information about a purchase, they show a marked
preference for traditional search listings. When they are
ready to buy online, they seem to have less bias against
paid placement listings and their likelihood to click on one
of these listings increases.
The Dollars and Cents of SEO
Perhaps the most compelling reason not to exclude SEO
from your online marketing strategy comes down to dollars
and cents. In an attempt to quantify the business case for
SEO I have gone back and done some analysis on three
recent SEO engagements and the results they achieved. I
chose ecommerce clients that we had optimized and
reviewed their average sales before and after SEO was
implemented. In two of the situations the only change made
was the optimization of the site. In another the optimization
occurred at the same time we implemented a PPC
campaign. In the first two cases the store sales rose 64%
and 75% after the SEO was implemented. In the third case
the store revenue actually went up a staggering 169%, but if
you back out the sales that were a result of the PPC
campaign, the store revenue that could be attributed to SEO
improved by 49%. In other words, the average improvement
in store revenue that was apparently due to SEO was 62%.
Can we be sure that all of this was a result of SEO? No.
There could have been product, seasonal and other effects
that contributed. But I think it's safe to say that there was a
significant increase that resulted directly from the SEO. The
bottom line: search optimization has a real and measurable
impact on traffic, conversions and revenue (or lead
generation) improvement. Given that these clicks begin to
approach free after amortizing the cost of SEO over time, the
ROI for SEO is compelling. Added to the branding benefits
no marketer or business owner should doubt the value of
search engine optimization.
by Scott Smigler
Google SEO 101
