SEO vs SEM: Which should you choose?

As the world becomes more digital, search marketing continues to grow and evolve as well. Search marketing is comprised of two main strategies: search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine marketing (SEM). What are they and which strategy is best for your organization? Let the battle of SEO vs SEM commence!

Search Engine Optimization

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of optimizing your website to increase the visibility of your website organically with search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo. This process involves ensuring your website is fast, free from errors and includes relevant, authentic content for your organization to meet the needs of your audience.

Benefits of SEO:

• Cost effective
  • Except for the upfront investment in time and effort, once your site is ranking well, the traffic directed to your page is free.
• Increases user engagement
  • SEO means having a website that runs efficiently and shares content that is engaging to your user which means they’ll stay on your site longer and are more likely to convert.
• Long-term visibility and brand awareness
  • Unlike paid advertising which only works as long as you’re paying for it, once your website starts ranking well, it can stay there for a long time, especially with consistent content creation.

Challenges of SEO

• Results don’t happen overnight
  • It may take a while for you to see results in search engine rankings. Search algorithms take time to index and evaluate websites.
• Long-term maintenance
  • Website content should be updated regularly to meet the evolving needs of your audience and align with any changes in search algorithms.
• Can be competitive
  • Ranking for high-volume, generic keywords can be daunting when there are other organizations vying for the same keyword.

Search Engine Marketing

Search engine marketing (SEM), also known as pay-per-click or paid search, uses paid ads to increase visibility in search engine results.  When people are looking for a particular search term, your ad will show up near the top.

Benefits of SEM

• Faster results
  •  As soon as you set your campaign in motion, your ad will show up and your website will show higher on the search results.
• Campaigns can be changed quickly
  • If a particular campaign isn’t working for you, it is much faster to change direction with a different campaign.
• More targeted
  • SEM can target users geographically, by device and even certain times of the day, allowing you to target the exact audience when you want.

Challenges of SEM

• Limited long-term benefits
  • Once you stop paying for it, your website no longer appears at the top of search results pages.
• Competitive bidding can be costly
  • Everyone wants to be at the top spot so this can drive up the price for high traffic keywords.
• Constant management
  • Since you’re paying per click, you should be monitoring your campaign regularly to ensure that it is still performing to your expectations and driving your desired traffic to your site.

In the battle of SEO vs SEM, which strategy should you choose? The answer is both. Each has tactics to drive more traffic to your site. Both will put your website in front of your desired audiences at the right time. Consider this: SEM is a sprint and SEO is a marathon. SEM needs SEO to ensure when people click on your ad, they arrive at a website that runs efficiently and has the content they are looking for. SEO needs SEM to help drive faster results while the rise in organic visibility grows over time.

These strategies require a wealth of knowledge in keyword research, website design and content creation. If your organization needs the resources and manpower to help you drive more traffic to your website, Chartwell Agency can help!