It’s a good question. After all, if I’m working hard to develop great content on my site, and that’s getting me top spots in the organic results – and probably costing me quite a bit of money in writers and research, etc. – why pay again to run an ad alongside my organic link?
I’m simply wasting money, aren’t I?
Simple answer – no, you’re not. And you should always consider running ads even if you dominate the organic search positions.
Here are five good reasons why….
1. Your Competitors Will Be Using Your Name And Brand As Keywords For Their Own Ads.
If you are the Red Widget Co. and your domain is www.redwidgets.com – then someone searching for “red widgets” is probably going to see your organic result – there may even be more than one of your pages in the list. You may well even command the top spot! But there are three ad slots above the best organic position…. and there are others alongside that are all screaming for the searcher’s attention.
Your competitors will all be using “red widget” as a core keyword in their ad campaigns – you should be too. Otherwise you simply hand all that screen real estate over to them.
2. Getting The Top Spots In The Paid Search Results Will Be Cheaper For You Than For Your Competitors.
If you use “red widget” as one of your keywords – your Quality Score is going to be higher than most of your competitors. To win the auction and grab the top slot in the paid search results should, therefore, be much cheaper for you than for your competitors. So go for it. If nothing else, at least make them pay through the nose to compete with you.
3. With Paid Search You Control The Landing Page.
It’s hard to control Google. Whilst you may appear really well for your core keywords in the organic results, you may often be surprised by which pages trigger these results. Sometimes the search term will trigger a link to a remote FAQ listing buried deep in your page, or an old news piece on your blog which will make the visitor think you are stuck in 2004…
With paid search you decide which page the visitor lands on. In fact, you don’t even have to use one of your existing pages as happens with organic search. Instead you can develop a specific landing page that resonates perfectly with the search query (or, at least, that’s the plan) and create a user experience second to none giving you the best possible chance of converting the visitor.
4. When Paid And Organic Search Results Appear On The Same Page – BOTH Show Improvements In Response.
Listings that appear in both the paid and the organic search results, on average, get better click through rates – fact. And it makes sense. Even if you trust the organic searches and tend to (try and) ignore the paid results, if you see the same company appearing two or three times in the overall results, then your perception of them as an authority on what you are searching for improves.
5. This Is An Important Visitor.
Think about it. If a person searches for something, and you come up at the top of the organic listings, what does that tell you about the synergy between what they are looking for and what you are offering? On a scale of one to ten – they’d be an 8 at least – probably a 10. So how interested would you be in making sure you gave yourself the very best chance of capturing their visit? If that meant paying for their click – would you do it? Of course, you would.
And if that same person’s search hadn’t triggered your organic result, would you still be interested in their visit to your website. The answer is still a resounding yes.
So don’t fool yourself into thinking that your organic results are enough because you dominate the top spot. You don’t. Even when you are the top listing you don’t because there are ads above you. And those people for whom you appear at the top of Google are likely to be the best visitors you could possibly get – so make sure you give yourself every chance to catch them.
Or – you could just sit back and let your competitors pick up all your prime targets.
