Everyone wants to be the winner and appear on the coveted first page of search results. Google Ads are a great way to instantly appear on the front page – all you need to do is set a budget and select some good key phrases, right?
Yes, this is true, Google Ads are a very powerful service that allows you to appear on the top page very quickly without much effort. However, there are a couple of down sides to the system that you should be aware of.
- Only about 20% of the people click on a paid ad result. Everyone else will scroll pass and click on the organic results.
- You have to continually pay for the ads to remain on the first page. Good Search Engine Optimization strategy will allow you maintain the high position without having to acquire additional cost.
Times when you should pay for ads
- You have a very specific, time sensitive, product or information that you would like to promote. Example: your ad would only be running for a week.
- You have done everything else right on your site in terms of Search Engine Optimization but the market for your key words is very competitive. This will happen in industries like law or real estate.
- You have a large budget and the projected income from the customer acquisition is high.
Times when you should NOT pay for ads
- You have not optimized your site to perform well for organic search engine listings.
- Your site is not easy to navigate or not visually pleasing. You might get visitors clicking on the link but they would not likely become paying customers.
- You have a limited budget and the monetary reward for each customer conversion is low comparable to the cost of the ad.
Optimizing your site for search engines requires more work upfront but it will continue to pay dividends over a long period of time. It is an investment that outscores paid advertisement almost every time. Learn more about Google Analytics and the difference between users, sessions and pageviews.
Not sure how to start optimizing your WordPress site? Let us know how we can assist you and put your business in a winning position.