There’s a debate going on right now in the Search Engine Watch forums over whether or not it makes sense to purchase paid listings when you have the top organic listing for the same search term.
What do we think? Are two ads twice as nice or just a waste of precious ad dollars? Glad you asked (well, technically you didn’t but we’ll go ahead anyway).
We’re in favor of it and here’s why:
- Double Coverage: Having both paid and organic listings increases the likelihood your brand will be seen and picked out by searchers. In fact, a number of articles and studies point to a statistically significant increase in overall CTR when organic & PPC ads appear together. Additionally, by purchasing PPC placement, you can bump a competitor out of a top paid spot, taking away clicks and brand recognition.
- Tortoise (SEO) Vs. The Hare (PPC): If there’s any change in your messaging (whether it be a relaunch, short-term price promotion, etc.) it may not be reflected in your organic listings. With paid, you can control what people see about you on a daily basis, swapping in new messages to match back exactly to what your company is doing.
- Damage Control: Let’s hope your company doesn’t ever need it, but in times of crisis paid listings can help minimize the damage from negative publicity appearing high in search results for your firm. Remember our story on Enron exec Ken Lay’s AdSense campaign?
We could go on and on, but why not hear what everyone else has to say?
Putting ads out there like a shot gun and just aiming for the sky may not give you results, I have and I still am doing this, I am trying to target ads more to what we sell and the people we sell to. maybe going on fourms, or blogs somehow. as well goggle seems to be best for advertising and paying for it.natural_organic_products