Each week, the PPC’s and the SEO’s in our office get together to discuss the various goings-on in our relative worlds.  Mostly, it’s a riveting roundtable of deliverables and recaps, observations about the current happenings in the interactive space, a few pleasantries, and then it’s back to our desks and our third cups of coffee.  Last week, however, a conversation formed about the relationship between our two products.  There’s always been something of a rivalry between us, but what none of us ever mentions when we’re teasing each other like bullies on a playground is the fact that (a) many of us have played both sides of that particular professional field at one point or another, and (b) while both have more than enough statistical support to back up their value independently, they work even better as a team.

So I decided to put ‘pen’ to ‘paper,’ as the saying goes – to set the record straight.  Too often have I heard that in a marketing plan, you only need one or the other.  PPC or SEO.  Apples or Oranges.  Batman or Superman…  I may have gotten off track.  Let’s start by highlighting the overall benefits of each product.

PPC is highly customizable, and highly measurable.  You choose which keywords you wish to target, and which ad you wish to appear when that keyword is searched.  If you’re having a promotion relating to that keyword, you can easily drop that into the corresponding ad.  If you’re having two separate promotions, you can create two separate ads in two separate ad groups, targeting two completely separate groups of keywords.  You can see how many times your ad was shown, how many times it was clicked, and depending on your tracking methods, you can get a pretty exact measurement of your ROI per customer.  If one particular keyword doesn’t convert, you can make adjustments accordingly.  PPC is very transparent.

SEO is all about relevance and credibility.  While PPC ads still have to go through quality checks, they’ll never receive the same credibility from users that organic listings have, and therefore organic leads are generally considered more convertible.  Most decent websites rank well for their company name.  The only problem there is that the only users finding them – think about it – are the ones that are looking for them already!  An effective SEO program that helps a business’ site rank for its products and services helps to generate new business from search queries for non-trademarked terms.

Which brings me to the question of the day.  How do these two complement each other?

First of all, PPC’s inherent measurability can be extremely useful when developing and maintaining an SEO program.  Analytics can show you if trending is causing your organic efforts to drop off.  But your paid efforts could be a valuable tool in quickly testing new adjustments.  Analyzing conversion rates on the keyword-level (for either leads or sales depending on client goals) is relatively quick to measure; and you can then use these findings to adjust keyword targets in your SEO program.  You can use your PPC campaign to test landing pages, ad copy verbiage, keywords & phrases, new offers – any elements you want to measure.  I’ve even had a client use the most popular keywords in their print copy from month to month.

It also helps to note that you are often dealing with different audiences in your PPC and SEO efforts.  There are behavioral differences between users that search on Google and those that search on AOL; users that are prone to clicking on PPC ads and those that prefer organic.  In many cases, the same user may decide between paid or organic listings based on what stage they are currently at in the purchase funnel.  The reason that many companies want a well rounded traditional media plan (tv, print, radio) is to reach all audiences.  The same concept applies here.  In order to round out your interactive efforts, you want to reach your organic audience as well as your paid audience.  Though the article is about five years old, I still suggest you take a look at the ClickZ article by Frederick Marckini, “The One-Two Punch: SEO and PPC.”

There’s one issue I’d like to address here that is always a hot topic – protecting your brand through SEO and PPC.  So many times I have heard these words from a client: “But why would I pay for something that I could get for free?” – in reference to bidding on their own brand name in their PPC campaign when their site is well SEO’d and ranking well in the search engines.  This is how I tackle that particular inquiry:

• First of all, nothing worth anything is free.  Secondly, branded key terms are very specific, and are therefore (in most cases) not expensive – unless you are a very large, very highly publicized, very well established corporation, in which case there may be existing competition for your trade name.  In most cases, bidding on your trade name will not cost you much of your budget.
• If you don’t bid on your brand, chances are someone else will.  Brand protection includes ensuring that the true brand owner appears everywhere their competitors do, and moreover, appears above them.
• Two words: dual visibility.  What’s better than having a top ranking in the organic results?  Having a top ranking in the organic results and the paid results.  Your brand will dominate most of the real estate above the fold of the SERPs.

There are so many ways to combine your interactive efforts.  Take a look at Kevin Lee’s “Using Paid Search for Organic Optimization” from earlier this year for a few more ideas.  You can be as involved or as basic as you want to be when marrying these two seeming competitors.  The point is that together, they form a cohesive Search Engine Marketing plan that protects your brand and provides maximum visibility to multiple audiences, as well as a medium for extensive cross-product testing.  Apart, these are both strong products, but together, they are that much stronger.  I never quite understood why one was supposed to be better than the other.  Just don’t tell our SEO team I said so.