This is one of those debates that is often argued about by digital marketers, but there never seems to be a concrete answer…

Until now!

The truth is, both these channels compliment each other perfectly – when both sides collaborate they can create something bigger and better than their separate parts.

Here’s 6 useful ways you can combine your PPC and SEO efforts to get the best results possible.

Real Time Keyword Data

It’s crucial you create content for your site that follows your SEO strategy – especially by tailoring specific keywords to help your company intentionally rank higher for your targeted search terms.

You can use keyword search tools that will give you the terms to chase based on the search volume and keyword difficulty.

With stats available such as keyword difficulty, search volume and clicks per search – you can create content that’s tailored for those keywords.

Do this, and you’ll start ranking higher for those keywords in organic search results.

Doing this will also yield PPC results – imagine having someone search for your keyword and seeing both SEO and PPC results. The key is to focus on keywords with higher search volumes and lower keyword difficulty.

SEO the High Cost PPC Keywords

Sometimes when you’re bidding, certain keywords in your PPC campaigns can be really expensive – especially popular terms that competitors are bidding heavily on as well.

When your campaigns show high CPC rates, why not chase after those same keywords in your SEO campaign?

Instead of paying loads for the most costly keywords, build your content strategy around specific focus keyword topics.

It’s a cheap way to get visibility.

Use What You’ve Learned for PPC for Your SEO Strategy

Naturally as you’re running your PPC campaigns, you’ll be testing for message match for each of your keywords and will most likely have some pretty unique insights.

Anything from ad copy, call to actions, visitor’s intent and highest CTR adverts with the best conversion rates will all have been tested in your PPC campaign

Understand your ad copy and what your visitors are responding to and you can understand what they’re looking for and what stage of the buying process they’re in.

So now – apply it to your SEO strategy!

You’ve already got the best landing page recipe and you’ve pinpointed which content is going to be getting you results, so now use that for your SEO strategy by matching your visitors’ intent with the messaging.

This should help your SEO page rank better in Organic listings!

It’s Cheaper to Test in PPC than Investing In SEO

SEO can often be a bit of a long journey to get successful results. Most claim 4 to 6 months to see any results but bear in mind that SEO results grow over time. Whatever results you’re seeing at 6 months, you should expect these to be considerably less than what you’re getting at 12 months.

In the mean time, why not test your keywords with a PPC campaign first for quick results that can tell you if it’s worth pursuing SEO?

In this way, you’ll get the best of both worlds by having these two working together to save your company time and money.

You Need Return Visitors

By using remarketing lists for search ads in your PPC campaigns, you can take advantage of all the work you’ve put into your SEO campaigns and get those same visitors to revisit your site.

Here are four strategies for successfully remarketing:

1. Target the low hanging fruits – bid for more audiences that are likely to convert.
2. Expand your reach – limit your retargeting reach to audiences that have already visited your site and create event campaigns that are based on an additional keyword set.
3. Isolate which audience you need by device – create mobile only campaigns and test them to check their relative performance.
4. Use RLSA in your shopping campaign – this can help you improve conversions and increase sales, you can offer the same remarketing options as your text ad campaigns.

PPC Can Generate Backlinks!

Running PPC ads that feature your blog posts can and will help your site acquire baclinks.

This is a good way to get your visitors what they’re looking for in the form of a blog post as part of your overall SEO strategy and it also helps your PPC efforts – all the while building crucial backlinks at a much fast pace than organic search.

If you can provide content that people are looking for, then you’re more likely to have those visitors return too – so this improves organic rankings for your site even more.

What’s Next?

Go ahead and give it a shot, if you’ve got to make a choice between SEO and PPC why not try both? They both have advantages that, when combined, can lead to the same goal.

Need a hand setting these up? Get a free strategy session now.