When you’re searching for the best digital marketing plan for your business, you’re most likely making decisions based on the types of results you’ll see. In some cases, like when you’re just getting started, you may be more drawn to strategies that provide quick boosts in a short-term period. But if you’re a stable business looking to build something long-term, your strategy will look different. These are the types of situations that may indicate whether content marketing or paid advertising is better for your business. 

What is Content Marketing?

Content marketing is a slower solution to build visibility and attention, but it can be more complicated. To be successful, there are a few factors to consider:

  • Keeping a big picture point of view
  • Utilizing collaborative work methods
  • Evaluating ROI and value of the work being done
  • Creating a diverse and dedicated content marketing team
  • Keeping an open mind when it comes to making changes

Content marketing is definitely appealing: users of this strategy ofoten have website conversion rates that are almost 6 times higher than non-users. Content marketing also builds trust, stronger relationships with your audience and can help generate leads. This method is also extremely popular: 91 percent of B2B marketers and 86 percent of B2C marketers use content marketing. 

Content marketing presents its challenges with the pros. For one, it can be hard to find quality writers, both because writing is challenging AND it requires you to use valuable time to vet applicants. Additionally, as mentioned before, content marketing takes time to see results – the flip side of this being that, once you start to see ROI, it will “snowballs.” 

What is PPC, or paid advertising?

Pay-per-click (PPC) is online advertising where advertisers gain payment based on how many clicks their ads receive. Downsides of this is that PPC can become a rather costly thing if you’re using it long-term – you end up paying to stay visible on Google. This also means that once you stop paying, your visibility goes back down. 

But PPC can be more affordable for some, like e-commerce or education, because they tend to naturally have less competition. There’s also no denying that PPCs help you rank better, even if it’s short-term. Ranking higher = more traffic. 

Which is better for you?

When it comes down to your individual strategy, factoring in what type of results you need right now is important. That said, it’s better to diversify your methods and actually do a little bit of both! Depending on the situation, you may want to choose one over the other. For example, if you need traffic urgently, PPC may seem like the way to go. But having stable content marketing that can support you when you need a break from the cost of PPC will prevent you from losing all your progress when you stop. When you’re in “in it for the long haul,” it’s better to go with long-term strategies like content marketing that will continuously bring results and grow with you.