Pay Per Click Advertising

This white paper will explain how online "paid-for" advertising works and what you need to know before you get started.

  

What is Pay Per Click

Pay Per Click (PPC) is paid-for online advertising that gives the opportunity for businesses to buy their way to the top of the search listings. PPC seems like a very simple and ideal service to help generate more business to your website, and if used carefully, it is! But there are drawbacks to paying for ads, rather than relying on the ‘natural search listings'.

Pay Per Click usually works through bidding on the price of certain keywords so that you can rank higher in the search results. These results are displayed in a separate column to be distinct from the natural search listings. When someone clicks on your PPC link you will be charged the price of your bid, ie £0.10, and if you have 20 people click though to your website it would cost you £2.

PPC is popular. It requires more cash but less effort to reach your goals and it is fully controllable, allowing you more flexibility and breathing space to focus on other aspects of your business without having to worry about Search Engine Optimisation.

Sounds good right? However, PPC isn't perfect...

 

What are the Pros and Cons?

Without a doubt, this is the best way to increase the number of hits your website has, but doesn't guarantee more business and being outbid for the top spot on PPC ads is all too easy and in most cases a click will not convert to a sale. You should also consider that the majority of surfers will not see your advertisement because about 80% concentrate on using the ‘natural free listings. (See our paper on optimisation)

It isn't all about bidding though! Quality goes a long way and it all depends on how relevant your ad is to what you are advertising. Things that are considered include click-throughs, keyword matches and commitment of the searcher to actually buying something from your site once they have clicked through. One of your goals when using Pay Per Click is to turn click-throughs into value actions so that you can get a return on your investment.

Unlike natural search results it is possible to modify your PPC advert when you need to adjust to changing conditions. Paying for a service means you have more control over your advertisements. The Ads are not huge but they do provide enough space for your headline, description and URL, but size doesn't really matter that much - as long as you've got the one of the top three spots.

PPC is extremely fast. You can expect to see results usually within an hour or so of your advertisement being published. It is also possible to discover a bargain with certain keyword slots that haven't already been taken up! It also gives you the opportunity to test a product and how effective your ad campaign is without having to spend too much time optimising your site to reach the natural research listings.

One of the best reasons for using PPC is that you don't have to sign a yearly contract and you can set a daily / weekly budget. Setting a budget is a good way to control your spending. For example you could set a maximum daily amount you are willing to spend on Pay Per Click and once that quota is full your account will be paused until the following day or until you allocate a higher amount to spend. You could also, for example, allocate more money at certain times of the year or even certain times of the day. This way you can promote your product during peak sales times that are associated with your product ie Christmas!

When you set up your PPC ad, most services distribute their results to other search engines. Having more exposure is a good thing, but be aware of junk traffic! This may result in a huge increase in ‘empty hits' that will bring you a large bill, a headache and no business! Using lots of niche terms that might not be able to feature in other websites can give you an advantage when people search for a specific ‘keyword', especially if you are the only company that is PPC associated with that niche.

You should remember that PPC is a costly investment for your company. Research and careful planning will go a long way in assessing if this type of service is right for you! It is faster and more convenient but it is also worth looking into investing some money improving your website so you can perform higher within the natural search listings. Looking to see what your competition is doing will give you a good idea what is working and what is not. It also gives you the opportunity to decide if you want to take you advertising in a different direction or try something new!

You can turn on and off pay per click like a tap when you need to boost volume and because you only pay for each click and there is no annual contract it is easy to stop the service straight away.

 

How do I get started?

The most popular PPC service is Google's Adwords. With Google reaching 80% of internet users it is the first choice for many businesses who wish to target this huge proportion of potential customers. This doesn't mean that you shouldn't consider using Yahoo's Search Marketing (formerly Overture), but you should consider how much you can afford to spend and make sure you can get a return on your investment.

You should first choose a keyword that you think identifies your company or product. It is helpful to try and find a phrase that hasn't already been used or one that you know isn't popular. For example, if you are selling DVDs it is going to cost you £$£ to get a top PPC listing on Google. So you might want to consider using a keyword such as "Anytown DVD's" or "horror DVDs". Also think about the order of keywords. You may already have competition for the search phrase ‘Anytown DVD's', but ‘DVDs Anytown' might just be the niche that you are looking for and could cost you far less.

You should play around with search listings and keywords. Use Googles Adwords to search for keyword trends and generate prospective keyword search phrases for your ad campaign!  Adwords will list the search volume for each ‘keyword' and give you a month by month list, allowing you to compare and make the right decision! Research can save you a lot on your initial PPC investment.

All in all, Pay Per Click is a great service that can boost your online sales if you know how to do it right. The idea is simple but managing and maintaining this type of service so it works for you can be difficult! It is easy to be misled, spend too much money and waste plenty of time trying to understand PPC, when you could be doing something more constructive for your business!

something4 Ltd has the team and the knowledge to help you get started with pay per click! With our help it is easy to know take advantage of this service while avoiding all the pitfalls and mistakes that you could make if you are not familiar with this type of service.