It’s smart business to combine search engine optimization (SEO) and content marketing with pay per click (PPC) advertising in your recovery marketing campaigns. Doing so can help your business significantly lower your average cost per lead (CPL). Expect to see these kinds of results over time with SEO and content marketing, but they’re worth the time and investment for your business. Keep reading for more on how these Internet marketing channels can bring down your average CPL.

The Case for Combining Recovery Marketing Channels

PPC can quickly give your company real estate at the top of paid search results, whereas getting to the top of the organic search results can take time. PPC can increase visits to your website and conversions into sales from those visits. Also, many people can initially discover your site through a PPC campaign, even if they wait to make a purchase and end up converting after exposure from a different marketing channel. In one business case study, Search Engine Watch found that the average sale was 21 percent higher when PPC had an influence. In addition, people visiting the site from a highly focused PPC campaign had 3.5 times better conversion rates than people coming from other forms of marketing. Plus, PPC has more value in certain situations, such as when you need faster results for a timely promotion.

In other words, we’re not telling you to get rid of PPC marketing in favor of other types of Internet marketing. Instead, the point is that it’s worthwhile to use SEO and content marketing along with PPC advertising. Now, if PPC works so well, why do you need these other two marketing channels? Some companies are short sighted and have trouble seeing the value in content marketing and SEO, especially compared to PPC. You might not be able to see results for a while, but if your business executes a content marketing/SEO approach, you’ll reap the benefits down the road by having a greatly reduced cost per lead.

The Value of SEO and Content Marketing

Let’s look a little deeper at SEO and content marketing. Unlike PPC, which gives you quick results, SEO creates long-term results and can make good use of your marketing budget over time. When your optimization efforts get your website listed at the top of the organic search results, it is clicked on 8.5 times for every one time a PPC ad is clicked. BrightEdge data has shown that organic search is the main factor that brings traffic to websites and leads to revenue in a variety of sectors. In addition, people are more likely to trust an organic listing compared to a PPC ad. It’s true that SEO takes a longer time to see a return on your investment, but when executed by SEO professionals, it more than pays off over time.

Content marketing can help bring your business leads in numerous ways. You are able to encourage visitors to sign up to receive content. Content can give you something to spread on social media, establish your company as an expert in the industry and give people the helpful or entertaining content they desire. It can also help build relationships with customers and convert visits into sales. Further, content is one of the main instruments that can help improve your website’s SEO rankings. Each content piece that your business creates can continue to provide leads for years to come.

We hope this helps you see that SEO and content marketing help bring the average cost per lead down over time. By applying multiple marketing channels to your campaign, you should start to see measurable changes that will greatly benefit your company in the long run.