Saad Ullah
⬤ Fresh figures show that marketers trust paid channels far more than organic ones when they have to prove return on investment. The reason is blunt - money goes to platforms that show exactly what each dollar achieves. Search ads besides SEO sit at the top of the trust list - content marketing and podcasts sit at the bottom because their pay off is almost invisible.
⬤ The survey puts numbers on the split. About two thirds of marketers feel very or moderately sure about email and search ads - they see a straight line from click to sale. Organic work - social posts, blog series, podcast episodes - leaves half the room unsure or plain blind. The channels work - yet the proof stays buried.
The gap in ROI clarity does not mean paid beats organic - it means the tools to measure organic lag behind the tools to measure paid.
⬤ The core issue is not quality - it is bookkeeping. Teams still patch data from Google, social dashboards, web analytics or CRM exports. By the time the numbers align, the quarter ends. Paid campaigns report daily - they harvest the next budget round even while cost per click rises.
⬤ Clear ROI decides where money travels next. When measurement stays fuzzy, budgets freeze even if the channel builds long term value. Once unified dashboards and faster feedback loops arrive, organic channels should see the same confidence jump that paid search enjoys today and the budget map of digital marketing will redraw itself within a few years.
Saad Ullah
