Home » 2006 » April » Should Pay per Click convert better then Natural Search?
Should Pay per Click convert better then Natural Search?
I've run a lot of pay per click campaigns in my day, and done quite a bit of search engine optimization for both huge and small web sites. One common misconception I often get from clients when they get their reports is that Pay per Click marketing should always have a higher conversion rate then Organic Search traffic. They think something must be wrong with the pay per click.
In a perfect world, yes, this should be the case. But that assumes your website is found naturally for a lot of keywords other then your brand name.
From my experience, the best converting keyword for many websites is the company's branded terms. For instance, the term "Mustang" probably has a much higher conversion rate for Ford then the term "convertible". This is probably the case for both Paid and Natural search.
Now, Ford ranks number 1 naturally if you search for the term "Mustang" on Google. We should also note it doesn't appear they are bidding on that term at all from a PPC perspective (We'll scrutinize that move later).
Ford does rank number 1 for "Convertible", but this is a paid listing. They are not on the 1st page naturally. The number one natural listing is actually the Chrysler Sebring Convertible, which could use an SEO lesson of their own as it has no Meta Description.
So Ford has decided to rely on its natural search listing for its brand name. I have run some tests on major web sites as to the benefit of bidding on your brand, even if you rank number one naturally, and the results showed that it should still be done. But let's give Ford the benefit of the doubt. Odds are good the PPC initiative at the company is to raise awareness, and to offer Ford as an alternative by concentrating on people who haven't decided on a particular make or model.
Assuming these were the only two keywords in question, it is safe to say that natural search will have a higher conversion rate then paid search.
Now, this doesn't take into account that people could be searching on the term "Mustang Jobs" or "Mustang Show", which probably has a very low conversion rate. It is only looking at the term "Mustang".
On a macro level, if the majority of your natural search engine traffic comes from branded terms, odds are good it will have a higher conversion rate then your pay per click campaigns, unless both are very brand centric. So in the end, it doesn't mean something is wrong with your pay per click, it means it's time to break out the meta tags and page copy and try to get your site listed naturally for more terms. Take some load off of your pay per click!
About The Author
Terry Cox is an Orlando, FL based web developer and search engine marketing expert.
Previously on SearchEngineChannel
- Search Engine Strategies, Much Ado about Nothing or Something?
- 10 SEO Tricks to Attract More Traffic to Your Blog
- Pay Per Click Metrics
- SEO Content Writing - Converting Artificial Keywords Into Natural Keywords
- How To Protect Your Site From A Google PageRank Drop
- How to rank in Ask.com?
- SEO versus Marketing: The Fine Art of Copywriting
- SEO For MSN
- Common Search Engine Mistakes That Kill Your Ranking
- Search Engine Optimization: Your Page Content
