This is a great
article by Paul J. Bruemmer published on the Search Engine Land site. It's based on a research study in the U.K. that shows that natural search is the best tactic for generating online leads.
Here's the intro:
"It's been a long held concept that natural search, aka SEO, is a top internet marketing tactic for acquiring better conversions, leads, and ROI. Now, eConsultancy has collected data and documented a study in the U.K. showing that natural search is the best tactic for generating online leads, concluding it is greatly underused despite the fact that it outperforms nearly all other types of online marketing."
I maintain that the power of SEO is tied to the same perceptions that power good PR. Having your brand or business show up in the natural search results feels more "honest" to the user than showing up in the paid results. The searcher feels that your high natural search ranking is a 3rd party endorsement of the relevance of your site.
Now the problem is, much less money gets put behind natural search, even though it is a better tactic. As Paul reports:
"The report found a greater proportion of online lead generation budgets are allocated to paid search advertising despite the fact that natural search is perceived as providing the best value for the money. Companies haven't invested in natural search over and above other internet marketing tactics because it requires more effort, but don't make that mistake in your search marketing efforts."
Natural search does require effort and patience and time. But it is well worth all of that. At the SMX Advanced seminar in June, we heard that 87% of Google searchers never look beyond Google's first results page. That's a big group of interested folks to lose by not investing in the effort of SEO.
