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SEO “less risky” than PPC?

17 December 2008 by admin
Filed under Articles

Just found this news item from www.directnews.co.uk, that references a Pitstop media article stating that SEO “carries fewer risks” than PPC.   Unfortunately, the directnews article does not link to the Pitstopmedia article and I cannot find the article in Google either.  Anyway I felt the need to take issue with some of the claims contained in the news article.

Firstly it is impossible to claim absolutely that either PPC or SEO is more risky because it depends entirely on who is executing the PPC or SEO campaign.  However, on balance, surely PPC is LESS risky than SEO?  Below I have outlined the reasons why this is so…

SEO is not an absolute science

SEO is a dynamic, evolutionary form of marketing.  There are hundreds possibly thousands of intricacies and techniques that can be applied or classified as working towards an SEO campaign.  These are also constantly evolving with some elements becoming more important and some becoming less important.  For example what worked in 2001 for SEO may not work in 2008, Meta keywords being one example.

PPC on the other hand is much more exact and precise.  You decide the budget, the campaign structure, the keywords, the match type, the CPC and the landing page.  You can even preference which position you wish your ad to appear.  There are some elements which you cannot directly control, such as the way quality score is calculated and applied, but you can optimise to increase this.

SEO relies on an algorithm

The organic results are ranked by order of which site is deemed the most relevant according to the search engine algorithm. As such the person leading the campaign can only optimise to appear as high as possible in the results, they cannot control them directly.  There are no guarantees as to where your site will rank, even with the best on and off page optimisation.  Contrast this with PPC where broadly speaking you can remain in position one should you have an adequate budget.

SEO horror stories

SEO disasters are much more prevalent and much more widely reported than PPC cock ups.  The term “black hat” SEO has become synonymous with underhand techniques that people have tried to trick the algorithm.  Because of the nature of SEO, the amount of variable factors that can impact upon rankings, the constantly evolving algorithm, coupled with a VERY limited understanding from the general public, it has been abused by some unscrupulous companies and individuals looking to make a quick buck.  Part of the problem is that SEO consultancy is not a tangible commodity, there is not actual product, just someone’s acumen.  With PPC you to a certain extent know what you are buying and can see the results and measure the performance easily.  The results are also immediate, there is no waiting around while the changes take effect.

Refering to this article directly, two things which stick out are the following…

“The author called attention to the relatively low costs of SEO “

Relative to what?  TV advertising maybe, but it depends who is doing your SEO.  The big SEM agencies are not by anyones standards “low cost”, quite the opposite in fact.

“Furthermore, it was explained that well-executed SEO works quickly”

SEO does not work quickly, unless you define “quickly” as several months which no one would credibly do in terms of online marketing.

In conclusion nothing is risk free, at the end of the day you are marketing a product. PPC and indeed SEO when done well should yield a positive ROI. IMO PPC is on balance less risky because the methodology is much more transparent and much less complex.

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