Organic Vs. Paid Traffic: Which Is The Most Valuable?

A debate that has gone on for many years in the digital marketing arena is which out of organic and paid traffic is the most valuable for businesses. If you are exploring your options and don’t know where to begin, give this article a quick read and we’ll share some insights.

What is Paid Traffic?

Paid traffic refers to all of the website visitors who find their way to your website via a paid advertisement, whether it be a PPC campaign or social media marketing (e.g., display ads, banner ads, YouTube ads, Facebook ads, Google ads, and so on).

Every time a customer ‘clicks’ on one of these ads and ends up on your website, a set amount of money is deducted from your established advertising budget.

What is Organic Traffic?

Organic traffic refers to all of the website visitors who find their way to your website without clicking on any forms of paid advertising. The most common example of this is by simply typing a key search term into Google that relates to the products or services that you offer, finding your website in a SERP (search engine results page), and then choosing your listing.

This is often the cause of some confusion because technically speaking, you might typically pay an agency that specialises in SEO in Brisbane to help you establish your local SEO presence and increase your organic traffic. However, you aren’t paying for the traffic itself; instead you are paying for all of the technical SEO, onsite and offsite optimization, and the content creation which ultimately contributes to your ‘online awareness’.

Which is the Most Valuable Between the Two?

This is a tricky question to answer because:

• Both are incredibly valuable in their own right;
• Both achieve wonderful results when paired together.

In the short term: paid advertising is valuable. This is because SEO can take 4 to 12-months before it can yield a sustainable ROI. As such, if you have products or services you want to push right now, running a PPC campaign can deliver much faster results.

In the long-term however, SEO delivers a much better ROI and is ultimately more sustainable. This is because, once properly established, your website can be drawing in tones of highly relevant and ‘organic’ traffic without costing you $1 or $2 every single time (which can be very expensive if people are clicking on your ads, visiting your website, and then abandoning your website for one of your competitors.

Final Thoughts: Use Both to Your Advantage

If you are playing out a desert island scenario and you can only choose one; take SEO. Search engine optimization is the backbone of digital marketing. However, you aren’t stranded on a desert island and you can choose to include as many different digital marketing strategies as you like and the fact is: both paid traffic and organic traffic can bring tremendous value to your business – when executed well.

The best part? The most reputable digital marketing agencies will be able to manage both on your behalf, under the same banner. So, while you have a long-term SEO strategy in place, they can also strategize and manage the occasional seasonal PPC campaign or social media marketing campaign based on your needs and budgetary requirements.

Cover all your bases.