Via Enquisite: PPC Agencies Make 45X What SEOs Do for the Same Value

SEO digest

Here at the Seach Insider Summit in Park City, UT, Richard Zwicky from Enquisite has just released some amazing data. As Jessica Bowman, Todd Friesen, John Marshall and I sat in the lunch room watching his slides, we alternately stared in shock, shook our fists in anger and raised eyebrows in disbelief. If you've ever felt, as an SEO, that you were undervalued and underpaid compared to your paid search compatriots, here's the evidence to back it up.

First, a bit about Enquisite's data. Enquisite is a web analytics company that focuses on search. They track search traffic to more than 5,000 sites, including SEOmoz (the rest of their client database is private), and record millions of search engine click referrals every day. From this information, they can see some amazing statistics, including:

• For every 1 click on a paid search result, the organic results generate 8.5 clicks (this is on a keyword parity basis, not counting those search results that have no paid ads)
• Based on action/conversion tracking, paid search clicks convert, on average, at 1.5X the rate of organic clicks (no surprise, since that ad text and landing page is custom optimized by the advertiser)
• From the numbers above, we can see that the opportunity from organic search is 5.66X that of paid search
• Across the board ad spending (via SEMPO):
  • 2004 was 85% PPC vs. 12% Organic
  • 2005 was 87% PPC vs. 11% Organic
  • 2006 was 87% PPC vs. 12% Organic
  • 2007 was 88% PPC vs. 10% Organic
• Spend on SEO is 1/8th of PPC
• Paid Search Agencies earn, on average 10% of their clients' PPC spend (this number may actually be low)
• By this logic, SEO Agencies earn 1/45th (1 / 5.66 x 8) as much as paid search agencies (from a direct keyword-to-conversion path perspective)

Richard has even more interesting and in-depth data than what's above, but the direction is crystal clear. Because PPC is easier for advertisers and agencies to value, agencies and businesses are spending many multiples of dollars to get that traffic. Is SEO a good investment? Considering the data above, it's exceptionally hard to argue otherwise.

So what's Enquisite up to? Solving this problem with an automated, software solution, of course. Given the screenshots and private demos Richard's been showing off, I'd highly recommend installing Enquisite's analytics. It's free for the first 30 days, SEOmoz PRO members get an additional discount (use this URL) and the data that's gathered now can be used for additional insight when their final product launches (~Q2 2009 with a beta as early as January).

Thanks much to Richard Zwicky, who's sitting next to me at the bar helping author and fact check this post :-)

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published @ December 5, 2008