7 SEO ROI Statistics to Know in 2024

SEO has gone through many changes over the years, with 2023 being one of the most volatile years in terms of algorithm updates and AI rollouts.

While some may say that “SEO is a dying field,” I beg to differ. In fact, there’s never been a better time than now to get started.

If you’re relying on AI alone then you might run into some problems. However, I made this article to show you the power of SEO. Hopefully to show you how to improve your SEO strategy, and get more out of your organic traffic.

So here are the top SEO ROI statistics you should know.

1. 57% of B2B marketers say that SEO generates more leads than any other marketing initiative 

This one seems to be a no-brainer, as SEO can capture leads for users when they’re ready to buy.

Because SEO can perform indefinitely, it has a higher likelihood of a driving leads consistently compared to other marketing channels that need to be constantly tweaked.

2. 60% of marketers say that inbound marketing (SEO, blog content, etc.) is their highest quality source of leads – [9]

Piggybacking off the above statistic, SEO can drive higher quality leads as well too.

With SEO, you can drive leads at different stages of the funnel including when users are close to making a purchasing decision. Because of this, the leads you target can be highly qualified.

And because you don’t have to pay for ads, the CAC for these leads is much lower compared to other marketing channels.

3. SEO delivers the highest ROI, averaging 200%-275% and generating $2.75 profit per dollar invested for eCommerce businesses (source: soocial.com)

For e-commerce, SEO is probably one of the best marketing channels for driving purchases. Users are looking up your categories and products, so now it’s just a matter of positioning your brand in front of those searches.

You can even use Google Merchant Center to get even more reach out of your product. The benefit of the merchant center is that you get the bonus of having your products appear directly on the SERPs, without users having to click on your website URLs.

Because of this, the ROI for ecom SEO is much higher compared to most industries.

4. SEO outperforms pay-per-click advertising, driving 15 times more clicks. [8]

This one is always an interesting debate. Marketers are always split between choosing the better channel, SEO or PPC. While PPC can be an effective channel, you have to account for ad spend as well. So CAC will typically be much higher.

While PPC can position your brand in front of high-value searches, searchers are much more likely to trust organic results over paid listings. Because of this, you have access to a much lower audience compared to SEO.

When you consider this, SEO will drive considerably more clicks and results than PPC.

5. 49% of marketers say that organic search has the highest ROI of any marketing channel [5]

Compared to most marketing channels, marketers believe that SEO has the highest ROI compared to other marketing channels.

Again, with SEO, while you can generate demand depending on the budget you have, it’s much more likely that you’ll be capturing demand already interested in your solution or product.

With capturing demand at a much lower acquisition cost, a majority of marketers believe that SEO has the highest ROI out of all marketing channels.

6. 69% of companies invested in SEO last year [5]

We will continue to see brands investing in SEO moving forward. More companies will realize the potential it has and will invest more in a channel that typically has the best ROI to offer

7. SEO generates ROIs of up to 12.2x initial spend [4]

With SEO being the channel that generates the most ROI, it should be no surprise that the initial ROI is up to 12.2x the initial spend. The thing to consider here is that SEO does take time to work. So, while PPC might seem like a better channel in the short term, SEO is a much more effective channel in the long term.