If you run a treatment facility, you understand how to help individuals recover from their addictions. What you might not understand as well, however, is how to market your company effectively so that individuals can find your program(s) in the first place.
If you are ready to help more people reclaim their lives from addiction, look to marketing.
Specifically, look to pay-per-click (PPC) marketing.
In this blog post, you’ll learn about two popular types of marketing—pay-per-click and search engine optimization (SEO)—and you’ll also learn why PPC beats out SEO when it comes to marketing your treatment facility.
First Thing’s First
Before we get too far into this thing, let’s define these two techniques. If you’re already a whiz at this stuff, we won’t waste your time—skip to bullet one. For everyone that needs a refresher, or wants to learn a way to remember the differences between SEO and PPC, continue …
SEO and PPC are types of search engine marketing that are used to achieve advertising goals. Overall, the main difference between them is that SEO draws organic traffic and PPC draws paid traffic.
Although there are a few ways to think about these approaches and how they differ, here’s a great way: think about them as used and new cars. SEO can be thought of like a used car that you buy for cash—it runs well, and you can afford it out of pocket. On the other hand, PPC can be thought of like a new car—it costs more to acquire, but it’s in perfect condition.
Both cars are sufficient, but they’re pretty different, and so are their costs. While the used car does not require a large upfront fee, it still needs to be paid for, and due to its age, it might require more repairs—some of which might be costly. The new car has a considerable upfront cost, but it’s in new condition and is likely years away from a large repair.
Both cars have benefits, and these benefits cater to different kinds of people. Overall, it’s up to an individual to decide whether they want to buy a new or used car.
Although some marketing companies will leave you hanging when it comes to deciding if SEO (used car) or PPC (new car) is right for you, we won’t be so rude … If you run a treatment facility, you should go with the new car (PPC), and here’s why:
1) Expedited Optimization
Success boils down to one thing—conversion. Your conversation rate tells you if your efforts are paying off … But what does this mean, exactly?
Well, conversion is anything that furthers a lead.
For example, if someone visits your site and carries out your call-to-action—whether that’s filling out a form, providing their email address or calling you for more information—their action is a type of conversion.
In short, your conversion rate is the percentage of people that do what you want on your treatment facility’s site out of all of your site’s visitors.
Needless to say, conversion should be one of the first things your treatment center aims to improve. Luckily, this can be achieved with the help of … You guessed it! PPC.
PPC can draw more traffic to your site, allowing you to actively test its variables to improve conversion rates. The better your PPC campaign, the more accurate and plentiful the data it’ll produce—allowing for faster and more effective optimization.
2) Clear Expectations
Your treatment facility has a tried-and-true method that’s in place to help others. The problem is, not everything is as sure as your strategy—especially when it comes to SEO marketing.
SEO is always changing, so in some ways, it’s a gamble. If you decide to bet big on SEO, chances are you’ll lose some, and you’ll win some, but either way, you’ll be along for an unpredictable ride.
Luckily, PPC can help you make more out of your marketing budget—no stressful long-term commitment required. For every bit of money you put in, you can expect an ROI that has a high reliability.
Last year, companies walked away with an average of $3 for every $1.60 they spent on AdWords. Begging the question: Why are people still gambling on SEO, anyway? It’s a question far above our understanding, so we’ll leave it to the addiction specialists—like you.
3) SEO Has as Many Updates as Apple
Seriously, though, do we really need endless updates? How time-consuming and tedious is it to update your device(s) several times a year for seemingly no real change?
You know what we’re talking about.
Updates are painful, and can be a big waste of time—whether they’re on your mobile device or Google. The fact of the matter is that SEO algorithms change, and some algorithm changes lead to businesses losing their profits and rankings.
If you’d like to have more reliability and consistency for your marketing plan, go with PPC.
The Bottom Line
Life is full of choices—many of which require serious consideration. When it comes to deciding between PCC and SEO, though, there’s a clear winner for treatment facilities. If you want to make the most of your marketing budget, invest in a technique that’s reliable and ultimately positioned to help you spread the word about your facility.
Now, we know this is exciting news, but don’t run off and start an expensive campaign just yet. It’s true that PPC is a sound investment, but good PPC takes strategy and skill.
So, do a bit of homework and learn about the guidelines for a sound PPC campaign before you start one. Once you are knowledgeable, run a low-budget campaign to see how it does.
If things go well, you can always increase your budget from there. If not, you can always hire an agency that can quickly help you achieve the impact you’re after …
Well, that’s all from us, but we want to know what you think! Does SEO have any advantages over PPC that we left out or vice versa? What are your experiences with these two types of marketing? Let us know in the comment section!
