Social media vs SEO is like men are from Mars, women are from Venus.  SEO would be Mars: cold, rocky, and technical.  Social media would be Venus: passionate, energetic, and inspirational.  Many will attempt to enter these unfamiliar domains, yet few will succeed. 

So when do you use social media?  When do you use SEO?  Which is better for your marketing strategy?  We're going to answer all these questions here. 

Social Media vs SEO

Let's start by saying, social media and SEO both have equal benefits…and they are both some of the most cost effective forms of marketing today.  Ideally, you'll want a mix of both; so don't discount either.  The largest similarity with both of them however, is they both need engaging content to be powerful & reap rewards from.

Social Media

Marketing with social media is different than SEO in the sense that it's usually more engaging than SEO content.  Here, you’ll focus on easily digestible, quick information & tips, or stories.  It’s like the Venus example, it is passionate.  This is because content is made specifically for engaging customers in social media channels.  Most people read content through social media purely to be engaged & humored.

Social media marketing & content is also meant to go viral…in other words: strike up a passionate cause in someone.  Think of it as authentic interactions.  Ask your customers questions.  Give them a chance to respond and voice their opinions.

The Benefits of Social Media:

• Social media, unlike seo, can drive in large amounts of traffic…often overnight.
• It's a cheap form of marketing.
• Engaged customers become brand promoters.
• One on one interaction with customers.  There is no better way to hear where your customers stand.

 

The Weaknesses of Social Media:

• Just like it brought in traffic overnight, you will loose that traffic overnight.
• Engaging customers with social media is a hard skill to perfect.
• It must be consistent, if you stop, you will loose that traffic.
• Without a passionate cause backing your business, it may take a content mastermind to do anything for you here.

 

SEO

Unlike social media, people seek content through SEO to be informed.  Being informed is usually about finding information in/on something they don’t currently have in their knowledge.  For this reason, driving traffic in through SEO is usually done by How To guides, pillar articles, etc that all focus on providing a user with knowledge value.

There is a way, however, to make SEO content engaging.  It just will never be as “passionately engaging” as it’s opposite…social media.

The Benefits of SEO:

• Organic traffic (organic means free).
• Over 90% of information searches begin with Google.
• It builds up overtime (you can post an article today, and still see traffic 3 years from now without doing a thing)
• You can actually dominate a long tail keyword with just one article.  Pump out 100 articles each dominating a long tail keyword in SEO, each averaging 500 visitors per month…and that’s 50,000 more visitors total a month.
• For example, in 3-4 months from now, this article will dominate the keyword: social media vs seo and bring ThinkaboutCRM.com 800 more visitors per month.

 

The Weaknesses of SEO:

• Again, SEO builds up overtime.  This can be frustrating to businesses who want the “now” factor.
• Slow, steady growth.
• Higher bounce rates, lower time on page (customers are less engaged).
• Not just any content will do, it has to retain visitors and be seo optimized.  Not easy at all.

 

In conclusion, it really depends on what type of business you have…and what your overall goals are as to choose social media vs seo.  If you have a service based business, or a business heavily relying on interactions with customers….I would go with social media.  If you have an internet company, you’ll likely need a good mix of both.  If you sell advertising space, you’ll definitely need to focus on SEO & Content as advertisers want to see a steady increase in traffic.