SEO vs PPC: Which Is Better?

As one of Sydney’s best digital marketing agencies, one question we frequently get from our clients is: “What should I invest in? SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) or PPC (Pay-Per-Click)?”, and it’s a fair enough question, but that’s the thing, they’re most powerful when working alongside one another. 

Instead of thinking of these as two separate entities, instead frame it as, “how can I leverage both SEO and PPC so I can make the most of my search engine marketing strategy?” When aligned, these two channels are powerful tools for unlocking the ROI you’ve been searching for.

In this AEK Media blog, we will break down what SEO and PPC are, the key differences between them, the cost comparison between the two, and the pros and cons of each tool, before illustrating how they can work together. 

When To Use SEO vs PPC?

What Is SEO?

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is one of the most common terms you’ll see iin the world of online marketing. But what is SEO? SEO is the practice of generating content for your website that helps you to organically (non-paid) rank in search engine results pages (SERPs). Google and Bing are two of the most common SERPs. In essence, it’s a long-term strategy that helps put your business in front of users looking for exactly what you’re selling. 

There are three main aspects of SEO:

• On-page SEO
• Technical SEO
• Off-page SEO 

On-Page SEO: 

Involves optimising your website’s content through keyword research so that your website is reaching the people who are asking the questions you have the answers to. How do you optimise your website SEO? Through strong page titles and meta descriptions, high-quality headings and written content, relevant keywords sprinkled throughout, a plethora of internal links, and clean readability. Finding the right keywords is essential because it helps you rank for search queries, thereby driving traffic to your website. This is one part of your overall SEO strategy. 

Technical SEO: 

Technical SEO optimisation is the process of ensuring your website is working properly behind the scenes. You will struggle to be seen or even acknowledged by potential clients or search engines if your website doesn’t function properly. How do you optimise your technical SEO? You do this by making your website mobile-friendly, ensuring the site speed is where it should be, securing HTTPS connections and making sure your pages can be crawled and indexed without errors. Focusing on getting your technical SEO right allows your content to perform at its best online. 

Off-Page SEO:

Off-page SEO optimisation involves convincing Google and other online search algorithms about your brand’s credibility outside of your own website. How can this be done? Using backlinks from reputable websites, earning mentions from other brands online, digital PR coverage, attracting an array of strong feedback and reviews, and promoting yourself through social media channels. All of the above factors into how search engines read your business; the better your off-page SEO, the more trustworthy and authoritative you will appear, which helps improve your ranking in search results.

Overall, building a comprehensive and effective SEO strategy allows you to achieve:

1. The attraction of high-intent user traffic (get the conversions you’re looking for)
2. A long-term and cost-effective growth pathway (sustainable traffic that won’t break the bank)
3. Heightened levels of brand credibility and trust (The higher you are ranked, the more confidence there will be in your brand)

What Is PPC?

Unlike the organic nature of SEO, pay-per-click (PPC) advertising allows you to bid on keywords and subsequently gain visibility across multiple platforms, whether that be Google, Facebook, Instagram or YouTube. This form of targeted advertising allows you to appear at the top of search results or in feeds, while you only pay when someone actually clicks your ad.

The power of PPC lies in its instant visibility, making it an exceptionally strong tool for time-sensitive campaigns. PPC also delivers precise targeting, whether it’s a specific location, demographic, or search intent. However, once you stop paying for PPC, traffic will follow suit, so think of it as a short–term solution rather than a long-term growth strategy.

If your main concerns are speed and precision, then your best friend is PPC, but you need to account for the costs that come with this instant traffic generation.

When it comes to PPC, the three main advantages of this strategy are:

1. The ability to achieve immediate results (PPC drives traffic, leads, and sales as soon as campaigns go live)
2. Fosters precision targeting and control (choose who is seeing your ads based on search intent, location, demographics, and timing)
3. It’s easy to measure and scale (track clicks, conversions, and ROI accurately, with the ability to optimise as fast as you’d like)

How Does PPC Work? 

So, how does pay-per-click work in practice online? PPC places your ads in front of the audience of your choosing, and only charges you when someone actually clicks on your ad. First, you choose the specific keywords or audience demographics you wish to target, set your budget, and finally bid to show your ads on platforms such as Google, Instagram, and Facebook. 

If an online user is specifically searching for the term that you’ve bid on, Google will pit you against your competitors and decide whether to put your ad in front. If someone clicks your ad and visits your website, you will pay the cost per click. 

SEO vs PPC: Key Differences Explained 

Yes, there is a big difference between SEO and PPC as they’re entirely different things. SEO is a long-term organic strategy that uses a variety of tactics, working together over time to drive traffic to your website. Do not expect to see immediate results with SEO. Occasionally, a business will be an outlier and immediately see dividends from its SEO strategy, but most businesses will gradually climb the SERPs over time. It takes technical skills to curate a strong SEO plan, and working with a marketing agency that knows what they’re doing sets you up for success. 

Compared to SEO, PPC is the perfect choice for a short-term digital strategy focused on driving traffic to your business. While you’ll gain instant visibility, you must continually keep the cash flowing to reap the rewards of PPC. 

Below we’ve curated a handy table that breaks down all of the differences between SEO and PPC:

Cost Comparison: SEO vs PPC

From afar, the main difference between SEO and PPC is that one is organic and the other is paid. However, it is not as black and white as several factors are at play regarding time and costs for the two digital marketing strategies. 

We’ve prepared another handy table that clearly breaks down the cost considerations between SEO and PPC.

To summarise:

• SEO: Is the definition of a long-term investment. While SEO carries a higher initial cost, it can provide free and sustainable traffic once you’ve achieved a strong ranking.
• PPC: It’s all about the short-term. As such, you’ll have ongoing costs that only deliver traffic as long as the budget is active. The attractive part of PPC is the immediate results it delivers.

On Average How Much Does SEO and PPC Cost In Australia?

Average SEO Costs:

• Small/Mid-Sized Business: $1,200 to $5,000 per month for ongoing SEO services and broader optimisation.
• Large Business: Can range from $3,000 to $10,000 per month, or more, depending on how competitive the industry is. 
• Enterprise: On the low end of $5,000 per month, and can be significantly higher. 
• One-Off Projects: These could be an audit, a migration, or a specific setting, and typically range from $2,000 to $10,000+, depending on the scale.

The average price for an SEO strategy is usually based on a monthly retainer with a marketing agency, reflecting the ongoing requirements of optimisation and content updates. 

Average PPC Costs: 

For PPC, the average costs your business will face are based on your ad budget and the management fees (if applicable) set out by your agency of choice. 

• Ad Spend: What you pay the platform; many small businesses start at $1,000-$2,000 per month. A bigger business may spend up to $10,000, depending on the level of competition and specific goals. 
• Cost per Click (CPC): In Australia, the average search campaign faces a CPC fee of between $2 and $4 for general keywords. If you are working in a highly competitive industry, such as legal or medical, you can expect CPC rates from $10 to above $50 per click. 
• Management Fees: Weekly or monthly PPC management, whether with an agency or a specialist, can range from $500 to $5,000 per month, depending on campaign complexity and reporting requirements. 

PPC allows for tailored control over spend and immediate results, as costs scale directly with traffic. A professional marketing team or specialist can ensure your money isn’t wasted, and your ads are seen by the right audience. 

The Pros and Cons of SEO

Advantages of SEO

• Cost-Effective Strategy: A strong SEO strategy helps you organically drive traffic to your website without paying for each click. 
• Fosters Trust and Credibility: If your business appears at the top of search results, you establish yourself as a true thought leader in your field. If you prioritise creating high-quality, purposeful content and have a user-friendly website, you will quickly establish an online foothold. 
• Click-Through Rate (CTR) Frequency: Businesses that appear organically in search results tend to have higher click-through rates than paid ads. 
• Creating A Sustainable Footprint: While SEO can take a little while to get going, once your business is established, your organic traffic is more consistent and reliable. It’s an easy way to establish a long-term audience. 
• Get Targeted Traffic: This won’t happen automatically. You must create content that’s relevant and valuable, and actually targets the audience you’re looking for with the right keywords. However, when done right, SEO puts you right in front of the eyes you want. 

Disadvantages of SEO

• You Have to Be Patient: While PPC can deliver instantaneous results, that isn’t the case with SEO. It is a long-term strategy that may take months to bear fruit. This is especially true if you are in a competitive industry. 
• No Time To Rest: Once you establish your rankings, you can’t just sit back and relax. To maintain your rankings or improve your position, you have to be vigilant and adaptable, especially if you want to stay ahead of your competition.
• Algorithms Are Always Changing: The strength of your SEO depends entirely on search engine algorithms. The problem is that these algorithms are constantly changing. A single update to Google could dramatically affect your rankings and traffic at any one time. Always be ready to adapt your strategy.
• Industry Accessibility: As noted above, certain industries, such as legal and medical, can be highly competitive, particularly for keyword search. This means it can be difficult to rank without diving headfirst into high-quality content creation, backlink building, and other SEO efforts.

Advantages of PPC:

• See Immediate Dividends: PPC advertising is attractive because you can see traffic instantly once your ads go live. If you are looking to make an immediate impact with a specific product or promotion, PPC puts it in front of people’s eyes quickly. 
• Target To Your Heart’s Content: PPC is a highly targeted tool. This means you can zero in on specific demographics, location, and topics. This ensures that the right people are seeing your ads. 
• Measurable and Adjustable: From the jump, you can track every aspect of PPC. Whether it’s a specific click per conversion (CPC), your cost-per-click rate or your overall return on ad spend (ROAS), stay on top of your performance easily. 
• Easily Scalable: Depending on how your campaign is performing, you can easily scale it up or down quickly. This flexibility allows you to adapt on the fly.
• Boosts Visibility: Even if users don’t initially engage with your ads, merely appearing at the top of people’s algorithms boosts the visibility of your brand. As people continue to see your ads, they are more likely to engage with them. 

Disadvantages of PPC:

• Ongoing Spend: Unlike SEO, PPC requires a business to pay regularly to keep its ads running. If you don’t pay, then your visibility and subsequent traffic will stop. 
• Costs Can Ramp Up: If you are competing in a highly competitive industry, your cost per click can increase quickly. If you are a business with a tight budget, this could put you in a sticky position. It is essential that you effectively manage your ad budget and optimise your ads for conversions to get the most out of PPC.
• No Guarantees in Boosting Profit: Just because you get in front of more eyes, this doesn’t mean you’ll immediately get more sales. If your product doesn’t resonate, or your user experience isn’t friendly, you’ll often end up wasting money with PPC. 
• Not Built For Long-Term: PPC is not built for long-term success. Unlike SEO, which is organic, incoming PPC traffic disappears the moment you stop paying. You have to decide what your desired outcomes from PPC are to get the most out of it in the short term.
• Ad Fatigue: We’ve all been there and know how exhausting it can be getting the same ads over and over again. People may begin to ignore your ads if they continually see the same creative. It is always essential to have a diverse content portfolio.

Can SEO and PPC Work Together?

Can SEO and PPC work in harmony? Yes, they definitely can, and it’s honestly recommended most of the time. When the two are combined, it creates a powerful and comprehensive digital marketing strategy. 

Off the bat, the increased visibility that both SEO and PPC can offer you is impressive, especially when working alongside one another. As SEO builds over time to boost your organic rankings, PPC can serve as a marketing steroid, delivering immediate visibility. Combined, you can appear in both organic and paid channels, which have been shown to be incredibly effective at increasing your click-through rate (CTR). 

This follows suit when it comes to keywords. PPC is a quick shot of adrenaline for your system, providing valuable insights into which keywords have the greatest impact, which can directly inform your SEO strategy. 

Think of PPC as your testing grounds for your SEO strategy. You can use your PPC content to test out new ideas, headlines, ad copy, landing pages and products. With the ability to generate immediate consumer insights, you can improve your SEO content strategy to achieve superior rankings and engagement. 

While SEO focuses on your long-term, sustained growth, PPC delivers quick wins and targeted campaigns. By combining PPC and SEO, your business can enhance your digital marketing efforts, reach a wider audience, and consistently aim for the top position on Google. 

Get the Most from Your SEO and PPC Strategies with AEK Media

Offering effective digital marketing in Sydney, Melbourne, and across Australia, AEK Media has been the go-to choice for a range of industries, including legal marketing, dental marketing, healthcare marketing, B2B marketing, E-Commerce and more, helping brands to grow sustainably.

Our passionate team of marketers, designers, and copywriters is an expert in both SEO and PPC, offering highly curated, strategic marketing campaigns that connect you with your ideal customers. 

We aren’t any ordinary agency. From initial discovery sessions where we take the time to learn the ins and outs of your business, objectives, and brand, to developing a custom-built strategy that maximises your growth potential.

If you are ready to experience a top Sydney marketing agency, get in touch with the AEK Media team today or call us on 1300 939 840.