Will pausing my AdWords PPC campaigns impact my organic rankings?

[ahirai]

Over 95% of my revenue comes from organic search; less than 5% comes from AdWords PPC (all other sources account for about 1-2%).

My ROI on AdWords is roughly zero. It's negative if you include opportunity costs.

My question is: if I pause all of my AdWords campaigns, is there ANY chance that my organic rankings (and organic click-through rates) will suffer?

This is really two questions. First, could Google retaliate to my reduced ad spending by dropping my rankings? Second, will searchers think differently about my organic link if they don't also see the accompanying paid link on the SERP?

[EGOL]

Over 95% of my revenue comes from organic search

Yay!   Nice work!   You are one of the few remaining businesses who are able to do this.

My ROI on AdWords is roughly zero.

Me too.  I just did yet another experiment to convince myself that it is almost impossible for a small biz, a retail reseller, to make good money, even any money, using Adwords.

My question is: if I pause all of my AdWords campaigns, is there ANY chance that my organic rankings (and organic click-through rates) will suffer?

My opinion on this is "NO".   I would turn them off with confidence.  I think that you will still get some of the sales that are currently coming in through Adwords.

First, could Google retaliate to my reduced ad spending by dropping my rankings?

I don't think that they will do this.  I don't think that Google is vindictive in this way.  Several years ago we used to run Adwords quite a bit.  We would turn the ads on and off for employee vacations, sick days, and when our retail stock was low.   Organic rankings never changed a bit.

Second, will searchers think differently about my organic link if they don't also see the accompanying paid link on the SERP?

I doubt it.  I think that lots of searchers skip over the ads.  Any searcher who runs ad blockers probably skips over the ads while cursing.   I think that dropping Adwords might increase the profit margin of your business  because it was probably depressing the profit margin while you were paying for the ads.

I think you are a smart guy because you have done the math to figure this out.  Most people who run Adwords are blissfully losing their shirts and pants.

[RobCairns]

Hi Akira,

I support EGOL on this one and would go further in saying that in my experience there has never been an association between organic rankings and Adwords. They operate on 2 very different systems and principles and you are not going to take a hit organically (algorithmically produced responses to search queries based on relevancy) due to a decrease in spending on PPC (basically an open house auction system where you receive placement for bids).

As EGOL mentioned, in several years I have never seen a drop in organic rankings on a mixed organic/PPC campaign if PPC funding has been cut off.

The one problem you might have is on the mobile side where PPC positioning is dominant and organic rankings may not cut it. Depends on if your target audience is mobile-oriented and whether that's where your returns are coming from. Even so, based on your numbers, my guess is this move will save you some money and not hurt you organically.

Cheers,

Rob

[GlobeRunner]

Akira, there really is no direct connection between AdWords and organic rankings. However, there have been studies that show that if you show up in AdWords and in organic search for a search query it will benefit your organic--the visitors will tend to click on your organic listings and on the PPC ads.

Organic is not affected by PPC.

You may be able to pause the low-converting ads while still keeping the higher-converting ones. Furthermore, there may be other keywords that you can bid on that you aren't showing up for. I would look at Google Search Console's Search Analytics report and look at the impressions for organic and see which keywords are getting impressions but not clicks. That may reveal some keywords that you may want to bid on.

All in all, though, if you want to totally pause your AdWords ads it won't affect your rankings.

[amirfariabr]

About the PPC:

There is psychological effect on being on both PPC and top organic ranking. Also, on searches for terms with high intention of purchase, PPC has significant more clicks than organic positions. Google is displaying more PPC now than ever so most people won´t just scroll down to see the organic results.

You should consider this before you really turn off the PPC. If you already did this, then good luck and congratulations for your results.

[JonathanLeplang]

Hi Akira

PPC and Organic position in the SERPs are not related. But you should continue to use PPC. SEO and PPC are complementary. Using the two increase your visibility.

In the SERPs the CTR is about 20% for the ads and 80% for the organic results. But the most people, companies, use 80% of their budget for the ads and only 20% for their content. You see where is the problem???

Regards,

Jonathan

[ahirai]

Thanks for all of the responses - this forum is a great resource!

[Jono_M]

I would be interested to see where in the conversion funnel the Adwords campaign targets as compared to the organic searches, before making a decision to shut down the Adwords campaign.

As an example, I've had clients who shut down or paused ad campaigns and saw a dip in their organic revenue, primarily because their customers were maybe hitting the ads at the start of the research process. By the time they were ready to make the order they came in organically. Multi-channel funnels in Analytics can provide some insight there.

[JonathanLeplang]

Hi Jono,

Yes, you have to check into Google Analytics for this. You can also try to change the model attribution of the conversion to see what's the part of the Adwords Ads into the process.

Regards,

Jonathan