PPC

Pay Per Click Advertising – Troll
Online For Business!

There seems to be two schools of thought about using pay per click (PPC) advertising online for business these days: people either absolutely hate it, and all the hoops they make you jump through, or others quietly go about their business, reaping the rewards of a platform that can bring many advantages to the smart marketer.

The truth is, that like any other marketing platform, it needs to be used with care and wisdom, in order to gain the kind of results you are seeking. Let’s take a long view of PPC in general, and look at how it might be an effective strategy for you to use in your online business.

So What Exactly is PPC?

PPC is an advertising platform that places targeted ads on search engine results pages as well as websites that have indicated that they would like ads on their sites. You place a bid and this, along with a few other factors, determine where your ad shows. This type of advertising has many advantages, some of which are

Speed – You can have campaigns up very quickly, and start seeing results nearly immediately. This can be very effective for testing new products, sales and squeeze pages, and more.
Targeted Traffic – By using the ad platforms interface, you can effectively target you who want to view your ad. The ad platforms are all a bit different, and some use keywords as the method of targeting, while others use other demographic factors to determine the audience for your ads.
Ability to Test – You can test headlines, site designs, sales copy and a myriad of other conversion factors before you spend a lot of time and money developing your site.
Extensive Tracking Data – The ad platforms themselves have good tracking and stats, but you can always use a third party solution to accomplish this as well, like Google Analytics, GetClicky and others.

The traffic numbers you get are of course dependent on your ad spend and click through rates, but if your campaign proves to be successful, you can always scale it up!

PPC is not without it’s dangers, however. There are many things you need to consider when running a PPC campaign. Here are a few:

Form a Budget – It’s very easy to spend a lot of money if you’re not careful with PPC. Most ad networks have safeguards and daily budgets you can work with, Use them!
Make A Marketing Plan – This includes identifying the keywords you want to  pursue, the demographics that are imp0rtant to you, and what the competition is doing in the space. Do this beforehand, so as not to waste time and money!
Who Are You Targeting? – Take some time upfront to learn who your ideal customer is. Having this information in hand at the start will color every aspect of your campaign.
Explore Long Tail Keyword Opportunities – Instead of chasing the competitive and extremely expensive keywords everyone in the space is going after, instead focus on more of the long tail “buying” phrases that the competition is likely overlooking.
Get Great Ad Copy – Writing PPC ads can be tricky, as you only have so much space, so choosing every word carefully for maximum effect is paramount. Web searchers are getting more and more savvy, and paid ads have to stand out to get the clicks.
Take Care With Landing Pages – This is very important. Not only will you need to satisfy the ad networks (Google is particularly finicky!) you will want your landing page to get results. This would be a great area to test!
Check Your Reports and Analytics – You need to know which ads are not only getting the clicks, but making the sales. (Two different things!) You can use this data to adjust your campaign as you go along, eliminating under-performing ads and elevating winners.

Using these guidelines on nearly any pay per click ad network you choose can bring great results if undertaken carefully. Make it your business to learn how to use this ad medium right, and to treat it seriously, and you won’t be disappointed!

So which Ad Network Do I Choose?

Ad networks come in many flavors and sizes. Google Adwords was one of the first and is still by far the largest, but here are many  other good alternatives.

Google Adwords – Still the big dog in the space, but getting increasingly harder to work with. The now infamous “Google Slaps” heard round the world are now legend. It can work if you can meet all of their expectations. Miss one, you’re gone!

Yahoo Search Marketing – Now only for monthly budgets of $10,000 or more. Smaller accounts are now directed to

MSN Adcenter – Yahoo’s new partner in PPC. Slightly less expensive than Google, but also a good alternative.

Facebook Ads– Perhaps the best choice nowadays. More friendly to marketers, and not as keyword centric (they rely on user demographics) Facebook has by far the biggest audience.

Twitter – Relatively new to the game, Twitter Ads now only has Promoted Tweets to play with, but very shortly will have a self-service ad platform, sometime  in late 2011.

Also there are a number of second tier PPC networks that can bring decent results. These would include

Ask.com
Miva
AdBirte
Kanoodle
LookSmart

Pay per click advertising can be a lethal marketing weapon in the hands of a smart marketer. Take the time to learn what you’re doing, and how the different ad networks operate, and you be very pleased at the results you get!