If you’re having trouble deciding whether a pay-per-lead or pay-per-click model is best for your business, you’re not alone. With each model, there’s more to consider than just the cost and potential exposure — there’s also the long and short-term returns that both methods offer.

When you’re trying to reach new customers, you want to make sure that the money you spend will be worth it. Luckily, two types of advertising have proven track records in helping businesses grow: pay-per-click (PPC) and pay-per-lead (PPL).

PPC (Pay per Click)

PPC is a type of advertising in which the buyer pays based on the number of clicks their ad receives. If an ad gets 1,000 clicks and costs $5 per click, you’ll pay $5,000 for those 1,000 clicks.

• Advantages – You pay for clicks, not impressions. This means that your ad may be shown 1,000 or 10,000 times but you only pay it your ad is clicked on. And, in most cases, you can also name your price for the clicks.
• Disadvantages – Just because someone clicks on your ad, doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll become paying customers.  You might have a very good, very clickable ad but when they visit your website, it may not deliver what they expected so you’ll want to ensure you’ve optimized your site to suit your target audience.

PPL (Pay per Lead)

In a pay-per-lead campaign, a marketing agency is responsible for everything up to the initial follow-up with potential customers. In this case, there will be no upfront cost from the client—the agency will get paid only when leads are generated and converted into sales or other forms of revenue.

• Advantages – Everything is handled for you until the initial follow up. Also, you don’t pay until you get paid.
• Disadvantages – Each lead will likely cost more that one of those clicks will for you PPC campaigns but you product/service should be at a price point that offers profit over the cost of the lead.

How do I choose the best?

Pay-per-click is excellent for branding and getting traffic to your site—but it’s not always the best method for obtaining qualified leads. Pay-per-lead offers more control over who you’re speaking with, but it also requires a lot of maintenance.

Do you need a lot of leads quickly? If so, then pay per click might be a better option because it allows you to reach out to more people without waiting for them to return to your website again after clicking on an advertisement (which could take days).

Or can you take a little time to get consistent, paying results like Upcision’s ‘Sale Qualified’ leads?

How Do We Generate Sales-Qualified SEO, PPC & Digital Marketing Leads?

Upcision funnels sales-qualified leads to your organization. If fresh, motivated SEO, PPC and Digital Marketing prospects are what you’d like, you’ve come to the right place.