SEO vs. Paid Search? How About SEO and Paid Search! Ep. 581

Hi, welcome to the Unknown Secrets of Internet Marketing. My name is Matt Bertram. I'll be your host for today and your SEO strategist. I will try to leave you with some unknown secrets that you haven't known before. We're trying to illuminate and uncover why digital marketing works for some and not for others. Jumping into an article and a topic that has been on my mind recently, SEO versus paid search. How about SEO and paid search, right? So I want to talk about the advantages of using it together. One of the things I also want to do is change the format of the podcast a little bit. I know a lot of people have asked to be on the podcast in the past. If you'll reach back out to me and you have a unknown secret that you want to share, we'll investigate that. And if I feel that it's valuable and something that the audience would like to hear about, I would love to have you on. You know, there's a lot of people that I met. I went to about 11 conferences last year. I've been a little bit quiet on my writing, but I've been meeting a lot of people. I've been learning a bunch of new things. I've been having a lot of fun, but I'm getting serious now that kids are back in school and, you know, want to reconnect and share some of this knowledge with you. All right. One of the other things that I want to do is typically we'll read an article for from one of the journals and, you know, certainly that is a quality article in itself typically. But I want to reach out to other SEOs in the community and read articles that they've done that I find to be valuable. I also am looking for those unknown secrets and those pro tips that I want to share. So I did find an article and I want to highlight hawksem.com. And this is Sam. He wrote this article September 6th of last year. It's

called SEO and Paid Search, Why They Work Better Together. The reason I like this article is, well, he gives some pro tips that are pretty good that I definitely agree with. And so let's jump into it. I know this is a little bit different format. Chris usually reads the article and I give my two cents. I'm going to kind of summarize. I really speed read when I read articles. So it's very hard for me to slow down to read the article. But I'm going to just go through this and pull out some of the good stuff for all you that are listening and just try to give you all the meat. All right. So, you know, reasons to have paid search and SEO in your marketing plan, ways SEO and paid media complement each other, tips for leveraging ROI, how to increase, well, no, how these strategies can be an integral part of your overall campaign success. So that's kind of the gist of what we're going to cover. Um, you know, I think where it all starts is keywords, right? Keyword research, finding the right keywords, uh, paid media helps you do that, um, very, very well and very, very cheaply. And there's, well, here's the thing, uh, Google keyword planner only shows you paid keywords. There's a lot of organic keywords that don't have a bid auction that convert really well. Google's not going to show you those. Google's only going to show you the paid search because they want you to buy their ads. And I'm not saying it's bad to buy that. Um, they actually help. So that's what he talks about. First. He talks about how, um, one is you can test new keywords. So let's go there. Uh, keywords are the pillars of both SEO and PPC campaigns. You can use the keywords for both. If you can test with PPC to find out if they work quicker and easier, uh, and then you can decide what to commit to from an SEO standpoint. Uh, one of the things

I like to look at is, uh, is the SEO term a high value term? Is there a big auction for it? And is there a lot of search traffic for it? If there's a lot of search traffic and it costs a lot, that's a good candidate for SEO. If there's a lot of search traffic and there's, uh, not, uh, you know, uh, a bid auction for it, uh, you could go either way, but maybe there's some kind of something wrong with that commercial intent, or it could be a hidden gem. Right. Uh, so I think it's 50, 50 there. I like to use paid when the, you know, SEO, it's very difficult to rank for. Uh, there's maybe not a lot of, uh, search traffic for it. And, uh, the bid auctions low. Right. So you want to evaluate these different tools in the tool belt and not one works for, for every situation. Uh, he leaves a pro tip. So let me read it. Pro tip when selecting keywords for SEO and PPC, be sure to keep the intent in mind. As HubSpot explains, you want to avoid keyword traps and words and phrases that sound good, but have a dual meeting or mismatch intent. Perfect example of this is, well, EWR, uh, e-web results. Uh, I rebranded, I did the KFC thing. I shortened it to EWR digital. Um, when I did that, there was one thing that was our, well, there was a caliper or something like that, uh, called EWR, but there was one big thing that had a ton of search terms. I was ranking for it. And I did talk about it. If you binge listen to some of these old podcasts and it is the Newark, uh, ticker symbol, uh, for planes, like for the airport. Right. And so we started ranking for like EWR to LAX and, you know, all these different terms were coming up to tell Google started to understand if people were searching, uh, for marketing related things or agencies where we started to

come up. And that is still on my list to do is to outrank EWR for EWR. Uh, but Google is starting to kind of figure that out, uh, based on your search terms. Um, but you know, I'll tell you, I had a client that, um, everybody in the, well, the, the roofing industry wanted to name themselves the same thing. And in Houston, uh, had a client that everybody wanted to be named the same thing. There were seven companies, I think that were named the same thing. So when we brought them on as an SEO client, the first thing we did is let's out, let's outrank everybody for your name. Um, and you know, then that caused like a bunch of calls to come in and people were confused, but man, it really helped with the brand, uh, equity. It really helped with the search terms and, um, you know, the, the quality of ranking for other terms got a lot easier when we were ranking for the name. And there was also a lot of search volume. So that, that kind of plays into it. But, um, you know, there's all these keyword traps that things could be other things. Uh, I know in the nutrition space, uh, in the scientific space, trying to think of specific examples, um, EWR was just the best example I could come up with, but you got to think about that. What, what could people be searching for? That's not what you have actually. What was it? I can't remember. There was a client that, uh, I think they were in the auto industry and then there was no, no, no. Okay. So we, we do have an existing client. They're just not one of my direct clients. They're a publicly traded company and, uh, they do like ingredients. Okay. And I can't remember what the ingredient was, but I was brought in to do some consulting and they were trying to figure out the strategy and they were like, yeah, we should rank for that. We should rank

for that. And there wasn't a lot of search terms. And when you search Google, it was like an auto parks that always came up. Right. And so trying to force that, uh, would just have spun the wheels, spun a lot of money. Now, if they want to go to SEO and you want to, you know, qualify, um, as an expert and all these other areas associated with that. And then that becomes a subcategory, like that's a different strategy, but to go after that term, because that was like the name of your product or something like that, but it was competing in different industry. There, there are issues like that. And you, you want to look into those, um, especially before you start a big SEO campaign and maybe you would get that by running some PPC ads. So, um, that could be something to consider. All right. Point two, uh, only took me eight minutes to get here. So, um, retargeting visitors. Yes, yes, yes. A hundred percent. If you're not doing retargeting, remarketing, uh, to, uh, people coming to your website, once you qualify for that, you got to put the pixel on there. I think you got to get about a hundred, you know, it's different with GDPR and, you know, all the, uh, tracking that that's happening. Certainly Facebook right now, you have to have, I don't know for retargeting, but if you're running a new campaign, it's now 200,000 people in that audience. That's crazy. I remember when it was like a couple hundred. Um, but retargeting people coming to your website is absolutely the best. Uh, people already are familiar with you. They've checked out your site. Uh, maybe they got busy doing something else so they didn't convert or they didn't take action. Uh, you showing them an ad, you chasing them around, uh, reminds them of that. It's like pens and pencils for you salespeople out there. And, um, yeah, there's a lot of chance they'll convert. So remarketing campaigns do fantastic. So, uh, data shows only about

2% people convert after the first visit. Absolutely. Data we see is either you convert on the, like the first day or you convert on like whatever your sales cycle is seventh day or 10th day or 15th day. And probably they come back like 10 times. Right. And so spending a couple cents to, to get them back, uh, and maybe even having retargeting on multiple platforms is a great way to go. Um, remember, and I'll, I'll talk about this later, so I'll, I'll save it, but, um, social platforms and Google need to be viewed very differently. So hopefully remind me in the comments. Um, if, uh, I, I don't come back to this. All right, so pro tip, uh, retargeting is evolving with the essential demise of the third party cookies, uh, marketing or making things like zero party data and first party data is even more important. So that's like building your own lists, right? You need to build your own list. There's actually co-ops that you can join. Um, you know, basically they use hashing tools to say, Hey, if you went to this website, you're agreeing to the terms to share that, um, hold on. I got a kid running in. All right. Real world COVID kids running in. All right. Uh, let's move on. Number three, cross analyze data. Uh, look at the metrics, right? Uh, time spent on site, conversion rates, click through rates, local conversions, AB test stuff. Uh, he talks about the new privacy laws, uh, behavioral modeling, uh, ensure compliance. Model conversions. And then basically his pro tip was universal analytics ends because it's an old article GA four. Everybody's on GA four. Now you don't have GA four. You're not getting any data. Um, but man, looking at these things are so important. Also, I would say, look at heat mapping. Uh, I have a lot of case studies internally that I haven't like built out or, or shared, uh, how important, uh, looking at these metrics are, um, these need to be your guiding light. You

need to be looking at search console. You need to be looking, uh, at Google analytics. Uh, a lot of the third party tools data is not accurate. Um, you know, so, so you could be misled. Uh, I would tell you though, the, uh, you know, heat mapping and, and, uh, catching what the, the, uh, sessions are. So, uh, next door or, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, lucky orange and a hot jar. And well, you know, you could use crazy egg. Uh, Microsoft has something that's pretty, pretty pricey, but really good SEO clarity. Uh, if you're enterprise, um, understanding what, uh, you know, what's going on on the site can, can really help you find some things. I actually, uh, through analytics, uh, had a site, it was crushing it. It was converting like crazy. And then it just stopped. And so I had to investigate why this was the case. If I didn't have analytics, I would have no eyes. Uh, within a day, I figured out that there was a button on a page that was ranking really high that people were trying to click on, uh, through, through a combination of the data and it, but broke the button broke, the form broke. And as soon as I fixed the form, it started converting again. It would have taken me, I don't know how long to find it if I didn't have the, uh, eyes from all the analytics. So analytics is important for a lot of different things, uh, forward, backward management, et cetera. Everything you should do in digital marketing over traditional marketing is because of analytics and data. And if you don't love data, try to love data because it really helps you save money and make more money. So I would encourage you to, to learn it. All right. Um, four dominate the SERPs. Just love the title, dominate the SERPs. Uh, he talks about on this, you've got to sit on the first page of Google. That's where a lot of the traffic is. If you can't get there,

pay for it. Um, say he says, many assume that when running in tandem, they still only produce a hundred total visitors because it's the same searches that appear. No, no, no different people click on ads, then click on organic. There's very little overlap from the data that I've seen. And he points to an article in search engine land, uh, that looks at various studies and case studies and found that despite, uh, nothing about SEO changing when PPC ads are stopped. SEO also underperforms. I think there's a lot of reasons for this. They call the phenomenal search incrementality. I think I had that right. Um, I have not heard of that before, but I can tell you the search engine algorithm and the paid algorithm. I don't think they talk to that. I think it's a big company. There's different departments, but, um, a lot of things are based on the same principles. Uh, but think about it. You know, if you're paying for people that are searching for a particular term to go to a website consistently, you're giving the search engine, those signals, and you're giving, uh, the search engine, the data on how they respond on that page. And they can come up with an assessment a lot faster than through the Google dance. So basically if running paid ads on the keywords, you're trying to rank for, or you're testing stuff out, you can expedite the, uh, ranking movement to where you really should be. You know, I don't know, by a quarter, um, that's pretty significant on potential loss. Certainly there is a little bit of sandboxing, even though they say they don't do it, they do it, I see it every day. Um, I have a client right now that for two months, we could not get that sucker to move. And then guess what? This last month we doubled the traffic, right? So, um, you know, they're, they sandbox and, and, and I can break down maybe an insider group exactly like where the different thresholds are and the

tiers are. And certainly you get to the top three and you're kind of like an incumbent and it's like a jet stream and, you know, if you can just get there, just don't do anything to screw it up, to lose that ranking. Like, uh, you know, have your site go down or something like that. Cause once you get knocked out of that spot, it's hard, hard to get it back and it's hard to get in there. And that's where all the traffic is. Um, that's why SEO takes so long. She's got to be on the top of the first page. Um, all right, five, see faster results. Um, paid search gets you to the top immediately, right? Um, you need to have a high quality website, well-structured, uh, with valuable content, domain authority, increased traffic, strong social influence to gain momentum. Alternatively, search ads, bring, uh, visitors to your website in less time. Um, and you know, with a couple of tweaks, you can, uh, improve the bounce rates. So SEO can improve bounce rates and dwell time, uh, to rank higher in Google. Uh, paid ad gives you a little bit of a push, right? Uh, that's, I think what I was talking about before. So, um, I think that that's what he's referencing. So I'll move on. Uh, point six, enhance SEO content through PPC ad company, right? Basically what he's talking about is you can test out stuff a lot better before you apply it to, uh, organically. I actually was a PPC guy, uh, when EWR, EWR hired me a long, long time ago. Uh, they brought me on as paid ads and, uh, and, and really, um, you know, I, I, I built my chops in, in paid ads and it really helped me to understand how the algorithm works and what people like, because you're getting that instant data, uh, which, you know, SEO doesn't give you. And, and, uh, it really helped me understand how people search online and it's not your preferences, right? Like you're like, I

wouldn't do that, right? I wouldn't click on any ads, but guess what other people do. And you're speaking to the majority or you're speaking to another segment, but not everybody does exactly what she does. And I know it's shocking, shocking to me too, when I learned it. Um, all right. Learn more about your target ads that leads into this. Uh, and he's talking about paid social ads and paid social ads are a great way to understand your client better. Uh, you can segment out, um, and you can find out who's clicking on your ads too. So there's all kinds of different categories, um, different areas, different interests. Uh, if you're doing, let's say display, um, what websites, what apps, uh, it's kind of scary. I know like what a lot of the apps that people play are in, in the Houston area, like a lot. Um, and like some of the apps too are really spammy apps that ads pop up all the time. So if you're playing games on your phone and ads are popping up all the time and you're having to click on the ads on accident, there are other games that offer, uh, the same game probably without, without all those ads and all those ads screw up metrics. And, uh, if you're not watching it, they make it seem like it's a great converting site when it, when it's really not, um, not going to be on that soapbox for, for much longer. But, uh, he says you can get hyper-targeted about who you want to see, who you want to see your ads, like middle-aged luxury car drivers who live in Chicago that love fishing. That's a fantastic example. Uh, analyzing this data, uh, the more data you have, the better, uh, your marketing campaigns can be. Uh, eight, optimize your budget using PPC and SEO together, not only enhances your over-marketing average, you can leverage them cutting content creation costs by, uh, testing keywords, generating revenue and PPC in tandem. It helps the SEO campaigns get momentum, uh,

time saving on keyword research, speeding up SEO and PPC retargeting and lead generated shepherds, optimizing your landing pages for both SEO and PPC in mind. Um, so the, the takeaway is, uh, you know, the sum of the parts are greater or something like that, right? What is it? Uh, SEO and PPC don't only coexist, but they enhance one another with great, greater results, greater than the sum of their parts. There you go. And, and so I think this is a really great article by Sam from, uh, Hawk SEM. Uh, he offers, what, what do they do? They offer PPC, SEO, content marketing, paid social media marketing, conversion rate marketing, enterprise, and remarketing. So he's a, uh, agency out there. I don't know where he's located. Uh, didn't, don't even know him. Okay. I just found this article online and I just wanted to highlight somebody in the community, um, that's contributing. So, uh, great job on that. Um, and, uh, I don't know if he's working with these really, really big companies. So great job out there. And, uh, until next time, if you want to grow your brand or your company with the largest, powerful, strongest marketing tool on the planet, the internet, uh, reach out to us at EWR digital for more information about a free consultation. If you find value in this podcast, please leave us a review. Please subscribe. Um, very few percentage of people subscribe and very few percentage of people leave reviews and it helps with the algorithm. So, uh, if you've got value, the content would love for you to just leave me a quick review. Uh, let me know how I'm doing. I'm certainly changing the format. So, uh, and if you'd like to be on, uh, reach out as well. So, uh, until the next time, bye-bye for now.