Many journalists, pundits, and online “experts” say that search engine optimization (SEO) is free. However, that’s not true. While it won’t necessarily cost you a lot of money, implementing SEO the right way will take time and effort on your part. That said, SEO done right will deliver far more benefits, consistently, and for far longer than you’ll get through alternative search engine marketing (SEM) and other online advertising techniques.

When your site receives ‘free’ visitors and traffic from organic search engine results and links on other websites, there is less of a need (in many cases *not*) to spend extra dollars on pay-per-click advertising. Therefore, SEO done right will save you money. PPC and other marketing campaigns will usually work only as long as you pay the provider. SEO, on the other hand, continues to work long after you stop investing in it, as long as it’s content-focused SEO.

For many sites with tight budgets (perhaps all of them?), correct and effective SEO can be the difference between survival and death of an Internet business. Because of this, it really pays to spend some time and effort in the planning and development stages of your website, to build SEO into the DNA of your site’s design and architecture. This will only pay dividends in the long run.

Embracing SEO early on and as a core component of your online strategy will make a lot of other things easier in the long run. When your web designers, your technical team, and your marketing department factor SEO into all of their decisions, the rewards you’ll reap from SEO will be many times greater than if you just tried to implement SEO as an afterthought.

Below is a summary of the pros and cons of PPC and other search engine marketing strategies.

Advantages of PCP:
* You can provide immediate traffic from the moment you start the campaign
* Easier to get started as most search engines provide you with tools
* Easier to manage because you can just turn it off and on

Disadvantages of CPAP:
* It can get very expensive very quickly, especially for expensive or popular keywords with low conversion rates.
* In the placements, the first positions will go to those advertisers who pay more
* There is not as much trust in PPC as in organic results
* Once you stop your ads, visitors stop coming

SEO Advantages:
* Can be significantly less expensive to start
* Benefits are long-term and sustainable
* Helps increase trust in your website and brand
* Click-through rate is usually higher than with PPC
* The increase in your website traffic will be more natural and depends on the content of your site

SEO Disadvantages:
* Achieving initial results may take some time
* It takes brain power and effort to get it right
* There are no guarantees of success.

While it is true that SEO comes with no guarantees in your search engine ranking, all the SEO effort can increase your ranking, ensuring that you at least perform better than you would have without SEO. Finally, SEO has worked for clients time and time again, which cannot be said for most other internet marketing strategies being sold on the internet.