Episode 68: SEO and PPC: An Easy to Understand Explanation to What it is and How it Works
If you've ever had a vendor call promising to get your shop "to the top of Google," you know how confusing the pitch can get. SEO? PPC? AdWords? In this episode, Vonda and Lori share a portion of a recent Flower Clique members-only webinar with Ryan Freeman, president of Strider, who untangles the two big pieces of search marketing in plain English — and explains how to figure out which one your shop actually needs.
Two ways to show up on Google — and they are not the same
Ryan starts with the picture every florist should memorize. When someone searches "florist" in your town, the results page has three zones: paid ads at the very top (marked with a little "Ad" label), the local map pack of three businesses below that, and then the organic listings — roughly ten links Google chose on merit.
Pay-per-click (also called Google Ads or digital ads) is that top section. It works like an auction: you bid, and you pay only when someone clicks. SEO — search engine optimization — is everything from the maps on down. Ryan calls the organic results an "editorial endorsement": Google's own calculation, factoring in about 500 signals in a fraction of a second, of which sites best match the search.
Why does the distinction matter? Because vendors blur it constantly. Ryan warns that pitches often use the words "search optimization" while actually selling paid ads. His advice: ask point-blank, "Is this pay-per-click or is it search optimization?" The answer changes the kind of traffic you can expect and how long your investment keeps working.
Where the clicks really go
The ad slots are not a sideshow. On desktop, close to 40 percent of commerce-related clicks now go to the ads at the top of the page. On mobile — where shoppers have to scroll past ad after ad before they ever reach the map — it's about six out of ten. Somebody is going to occupy those spots in your town. If it isn't you, it may well be an order gatherer, and as Ryan bluntly puts it, when a florist's whole goal is to compete with the order gatherers, the answer is ads.
That's also why he recommends a simple brand-defense campaign: bidding on your own shop's name so a national site can't intercept customers who were looking for you. It feels a little yucky to pay for your own name, but the alternative — a stranger taking the order, disappointing the customer, and the blame landing on your reputation — is yuckier. A well-run campaign earns a high quality score, which makes your clicks cheap and actually drives up what competitors must pay to play in your market.
The three-legged stool of SEO
For the organic side, Ryan uses a classic analogy: SEO is a three-legged stool. The technical leg is whether Google can crawl your site and how fast it performs — most florist platforms handle this competently today. The on-site leg is what you say about yourself: real product names and descriptions, local content on your delivery pages, a blog, and an About Us page with actual personality instead of the generic "family owned, dedicated to fresh flowers" line every shop uses. (And no, stuffing your footer with zip codes doesn't fool anyone — "Google's not stupid.") The off-site leg is what the rest of the world says about you: links and mentions from local businesses, news sites, directories, charities you support, and events you sponsor. If any leg is weak, the whole stool wobbles.
Motorcycle vs. Mack truck: which do you need?
Ryan's favorite answer — the one Lori loved most — is "it depends." Ads are the motorcycle: fast off the line, instant on, instant off. Perfect when you're late getting a Valentine's page up, targeting a specific neighborhood, or grabbing visibility after a nearby shop closes. Organic SEO is the Mack truck: slower to get rolling, but it keeps its momentum long after you ease off the gas. Weigh your local competition, the realistic revenue opportunity in the areas you'd target, and your urgency. Many shops need both; a few need neither.
How do you know it's working?
Answering a member question, Ryan explains that ads are wonderfully measurable: I spent this, I got this many visitors, this many orders, this many calls. Factor in lifetime value — a $3 click that lands an $80 order from a customer who reorders for years — and the math gets compelling fast. SEO is less linear, so watch your organic traffic trend in Google Analytics: with a good campaign, organic visitors become your best-performing traffic, viewing more pages, staying longer, and completing more orders while your monthly investment stays flat.
Key takeaways
- There is a definite difference between SEO and PPC — and if a vendor shows you results at the top of the page under the search box, they're selling you ads, whatever they call them.
- Each plays an important role in staying relevant online: ads for speed and targeting, organic SEO for long-term staying power.
- Run a low-cost brand-defense campaign on your own shop name so order gatherers can't intercept your customers.
- Strengthen all three legs of the SEO stool — technical, on-site content, and off-site links and mentions.
- You can measure the results: track ad spend against orders and calls, and watch organic revenue and traffic quality in Google Analytics.
Want to go deeper? Ryan offers no-cost conversations — email ryan@striderseo.com, visit StriderSEO.com, or schedule a call.
Sponsored by:
Flower Clique
Flower Clique Prep School
Real Life Retail Florist