As you may already know, two main strategies dominate digital marketing for boosting website traffic. These are Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising and Organic Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). Understanding these concepts is crucial for any business or individual looking to enhance their online presence.
Potential clients often ask us whether running a PPC campaign can influence a website’s organic ranking. This article delves into what PPC and organic search entail and explores whether PPC campaigns can influence a website’s organic rankings on Google.
What is PPC?
Pay-per-click (PPC) is a form of digital marketing in which advertisers are charged a fee every time their adverts are clicked. In essence, it’s a method of purchasing site visits rather than making an effort to “earn” them naturally. PPC ads can appear on search engines like Google, social media platforms, and other websites. Google Ads is the world’s most popular PPC advertising system. This multi-billion making platform enables businesses to create ads on Google’s search engine and other Google properties. This gives them instant visibility, potentially leading to higher website traffic and, most importantly, conversions.
What is Organic Search?
Organic search refers to the unpaid listings in a search engine’s results. The search engine’s algorithms determine these listings, and their rankings are based on relevance to the search query, website quality, and many other SEO factors. Unlike PPC, where visibility is bought, organic visibility is earned through effective SEO strategies. This involves optimising website content, improving site structure, and earning backlinks from other websites, among other tactics.
Does PPC Impact Organic Rankings?
The direct answer is no; running a PPC campaign does not directly impact your website’s organic rankings on Google. Google’s search algorithms are designed to provide users with the most relevant and valuable results, regardless of any paid advertising. The integrity of organic search results is maintained by keeping them separate from paid advertisements, ensuring that paying for ads does not give any site an unfair advantage in organic search rankings.
However, the indirect effects of PPC on organic visibility should be noticed. However, you will want to avoid these common Google Ads mistakes. Here are some ways in which PPC can indirectly influence organic search performance:
Increased Brand Awareness
Running a PPC campaign can significantly increase brand awareness. People who repeatedly see your ads become more familiar with your brand. This increased brand recognition can lead to more organic search queries for your brand name. While this doesn’t directly boost your organic rankings for non-branded keywords, it does increase the overall traffic to your site and can improve the click-through rates (CTR) on your organic listings.
Keyword Insights
PPC campaigns provide insightful data on the best keywords for increasing traffic and conversions. With time, your organic search rankings can be raised by optimising your website’s content and meta tags for organic search.
Improved User Experience
The feedback gained from your PPC campaign will highlight areas of your website that need improvement. This includes issues such as landing pages with high bounce rates or low conversion rates. Optimising these pages can enhance the user experience, which is a factor in Google’s organic search rankings.
SERP Dominance
Having PPC ads and organic listings appear for the same search query will help improve your visibility within Google’s Search Engine Results Page (SERP). This dual presence can enhance the credibility of your brand and increase the likelihood of users visiting your website, even if it doesn’t directly impact your organic rankings.
In summary, while PPC campaigns do not directly affect organic rankings, they can have significant indirect benefits that can enhance a websites online visibility and performance. For the most comprehensive digital marketing strategy, we recommend that clients run both PPC and SEO campaigns to help maximise online visibility and obtain the most significant outcomes.
Contact the Jump 2 IT Media team today to learn how we can help you.
