Managing Pay-Per-Click Campaigns For Greater Profits

By Greg Jerum

All online business owners need a steady flow of traffic and paying customers to their websites in order to keep the cash register ringing and profits flowing. Most webmasters struggle with exactly how to make that happen, until which time they discover pay-per-click (PPC) advertising through the search engines, utilizing the Google Adwords and Yahoo Search Marketing programs.

As small business owners discover the powerful advantage of using PPC advertising, they tend to spend a lot of time learning the systems and figuring out how to use these top-tier search-marketing tools to gain an advantage over their competitors.

In the growth curve of any business, a day will come when the business owner realizes that his or her personal time is best spent taking care of other business processes. When this time comes, the business owner will seek out other people to manage his or her PPC advertising campaigns.

It is at this juncture when business owners will either hire an in-house marketing person, or they will employ a third-party PPC Management company to service their PPC advertising accounts. This is where most businesses using pay-per-click advertising start to go wrong.

In-House Marketing Staff

It is true that the business owner needs to get back to the tasks that will make his or her business a true success. Part of the growth cycle is to find people who can replicate certain business processes, freeing the business owner to focus on other more important areas like product or service fulfillment, customer service, sales, human resources management, strategic planning and financial management.

But, finding the right person or company to best represent the needs of the business, in regards to PPC Management, can frequently be a crap shoot at best.

Racing to the local university to find a recent marketing graduate to bring into the company often results in opening a can of worms. Most college grads, which leave college with a degree in marketing, leave school with a very general understanding of basic marketing principles, human psychology, consumer behavior, advertising and promotion concepts, business finance, organizational management and strategic planning.

Although most universities do a good job at preparing their students for an entry-level job in marketing, few give their students any hands-on training in specific advertising methods that will be used in the real world, let alone with the advertising methods that enable commerce to flow on the Internet.

Pulling a marketing person from another business is often as problematic as hiring a recent college graduate. Unless one hires from a company that has used PPC advertising for some time, one might find the new hire possesses the same lack of hands-on experience with PPC advertising methods as the college grad.

Don't get me wrong; marketing professionals are essential to the overall implementation of a business' marketing plan. The problem is that the process of managing pay-per-click advertising campaigns really requires someone with very specialized experience, skills and knowledge.

The Problem With Most PPC Management Companies

An alternative to hiring someone in house is to hire a professional PPC Management company. The problem with most PPC Management companies is the same problem most people have with ordinary marketing companies.

* First, typically there is that huge down payment to get the job started;

* Most marketing companies require an ironclad contract committing the buyer to a six-month or twelve-month service contract;

* Marketing service companies typically require huge monthly fees to maintain the contract (with most PPC Management companies, these fees frequently run in the range of 10%-20% of your monthly PPC spend);

* The worst part about the typical Marketing company and PPC Management company is that while they extract a high toll from their customers, these companies seldom if ever offer any kind of real guarantee of results for the work that they will do for you.

After being burned two or three times by Marketing or PPC Management companies, most businesses start shopping for performance-based service providers. Unfortunately, it is a buyer-beware market out there.

PPC Management companies frequently suggest that their services are "performance-based", but what they define as "performance-based" is often different from what you or I would define as truly "performance-based".

How to Identify a "True" Performance-Based PPC Management Provider

When you are spending thousands of dollars per month on your pay-per-click campaigns, there are certain things that you should be able to expect from any PPC Management provider, who is claiming to offer performance-based services. I will outline some of the questions you should ask here:

* How are your performance-based programs structured?

* How will you measure performance improvements?

* Will I have to pay any fees that are not directly linked to performance improvements?

* Will the compensation that I have to pay be in proportion to the results you achieve for me?

* Who will be working on my account? Is their compensation fixed or is it derived from the real performance improvements they make for my account?

* How are you going to help me bring additional net profit to my business?

* What other clients have you worked with, and what kind of successes have you achieved for them?

* How long will I be required to keep my commitment to your company, if you are not producing real measurable performance improvements?

* Do I have any recourse if you do not produce better results than I can accomplish on my own, without your help?

The problem within the PPC Management industry is that most management companies see themselves as advertising services companies. They often lack the in house skill that it takes to consistently produce significant performance improvements for client accounts. Their only recourse to stay financially viable is to offer fee-based services where client payment is guaranteed but clients' results are not.

But, when a marketing management company adopts a true "performance-based" stance and begins to see itself as a partner in its client's future, then the management company will have the appropriate incentives to take care of its client's businesses in the same manner that it would take care of its own.

About the Author:

Greg Jerum is a principal at Net Return Marketing, a company which delivers true "performance-based" PPC Management to its clients. Net Return Marketing's programs require little to no up front investment and the long-term compensation that a client pays is based directly on account performance. Whether you are just getting started with PPC advertising or spending $100K plus per month, Net Return Marketing could be the solution to your PPC management needs. Learn more at: http://www.netreturnmarketing.com/ppc-management.html

Drive Immediate, Targeted Traffic with the Mother of All Pay Per Clicks

By Ivy Liu

Do you want to drive massive targeted traffic to you site instantly? We have used GOTo several times for our marketing campaigns and have found it to be indispensible. There are several other pay per click engines, but GOTo is #1 with its numerous partner advertising networks like MSN, Dogpile, America Online, EarthLink, CNET, Netscape and many more.

Nowadays, it takes weeks and even months to get listed at traditional search engines. That's why pay per clicks are so popular for delivering immediate results. We use regularly GOTo to test individual campaigns and new launches. Although we did have experience some administrative delays, overall we are extremely happy with the results.

The beauty of GOTo is that is it extremely cost effective as you only pay when a highly targeted
prospect clicks on your link. The secret of an affordable and successful GOTo campaign is to bid only a few cents for each search term. By having hundreds of search terms that are only costing you a few cents each, you can explode traffic to your site.

My secret market research weapon is GOTo's great Term Suggestion Tool at
http://inventory.go2.com/inventory/searchInventory.mp.

Think GOTo is just another pay per click? Think again! You can use this indispensible tool to do
market research on the most popular search terms. Although it just counts GOTo's search terms, you can multiply that traffic many times over if you use those same terms for other search engines.

Set a maximum price limit of $0.01 - $0.10 for click throughs, and use the GoTo.com Power Submitter Spreadsheet at http://www.goto.com/d/about/advertisers/powerform.jhtml
This is a great resource as you can download it and use it to enter in hundreds of relevant terms and bids easily. It may take some time to research and enter all the terms, but it is really well worth it!

By using these tools and submitting 100+ keywords, we were able to generate hundreds of visits and leads within a couple days!

Remember that GOTo is a tool. It can enormously help you promote your business and services quickly. Whether those visitors convert or buy is up to you and your marketing process. But at least you don't have to wait to test out your campaigns affordably.

If you haven't tried it yet, what are you waiting for? They are running a special promotion now till October 31, 2000 where you can sign up and get a FREE $10 welcome credit to test it out yourself!

Sign up and get your $10 credit now at: https://www.goto.com/s/p/standard/?project=friendsAd&amount=99&promoCode=B105&source=61820

About the Author:

Ivy Liu owns several web sites including:
http://www.iMarketingSource.com,
http://www.iMarketingResource.com and
http://www.NYCareerWoman.com.

She also publishes two bi-monthly Internet Marketing ezines, the free iMarketingSource Letter and the subscription-based iMarketingSource Infopreneur. She has been on the Internet and developing web sites since 1996. Her experience in business and technology consulting gives her a unique perspective on finding effective ways to use the Internet to provide business solutions. Subscribe to the free iMarketingSource Letter ezine and get 2 months of free advertising and free ebooks. http://imarketingsource.netfirms.com/free.htm

Fwd: AdSense And The Marketer

By Paul Majestyk

There is Cheech and Chong, Beauty and the Beast, and then there is AdSense and the marketer. In some ways it is a marriage of convenience, while in other cases it is a mutually beneficial relationship that makes a level of exposure possible that few had considered achievable.

In simplest terms, AdSense is Google's brainchild and is a program destined to remain in place. Website owners turn into marketers by placing the AdSense code onto their sites, and Google will populate the allotted fields with ads targeting the webmaster's niche by being relevant to the site's content.

Webmasters sign up for the AdSense banners and then receive a bit of code which is quickly and simply incorporated into the site. As visitors come to the marketer's site, the meter ticks and each and every time an ad is displayed or a link is clicked, there is a credit put toward the
marketer's account. Webmasters may earn per click rewards but also impression based revenue which is usually calculated on a per-thousand ad display.

Remember that as a webmaster you still have a lot of power in regards to the way the ads are displayed. For example, you may choose the colors, and even the drop down menu option! This permits for seamless integration in your site as well as a congruent display of information that is a far cry from the flashy banner ad of yesteryear that has added little content and instead detracted a lot of class from a number of otherwise well designed websites.

It is noteworthy that even those who in the strictest sense of the word are not webmasters have found a way to cash in with AdSense. In some cases there is the opportunity to use the program for revenue generation on a social networking site, blog, forum, or even within articles! While this might not be the vehicle to riches and independent wealth, it is a means to generate a little income via an under served medium.

Conversely, if you are a marketer who is seeking to advertise a product or service via AdSense, the program enables you to fund an account that determines how much click through and per thousand impression advertising you are willing to pay for and once the funds are exhausted you may choose to continue the contract or you may opt out and search for other marketing opportunities.

A word of warning to the webmaster using the AdSense program: it is not foolproof! Even though by and large the ads displayed on your website will be relevant to the content of your site it is not a guarantee that once in a while an ad that is objectionable to your visitors will slip in. Visit your site frequently to monitor the ads and if you receive emails complaining about any ads displayed, take them seriously! Fortunately, with a simple communication to AdSense, this may be fixed and your website as well as its message will once again be harmonized with the ads.

About the Author:

Paul Majestyck is the publisher of Global Entrepreneur http://ibuildempires.wordpress.com/ EZ Affiliate Profits - 100's of Great Articles Top Notch Resources Product Reviews Free Downloadable e-Courses & Videos To Help You Shorten The Online Learning-Curve And Start Generating Income . Visit : EZAffiliate Profits http://ezaffiliateprofits.blogspot.com/. Also be sure to visit The #1 Digital program and product store on the internet eNetMall
http://www.enetmall.net/

A Beginner's Guide to Pay Per Click Marketing

By Kalena Jordan

Pay Per Click (PPC) search engine marketing refers to a specific type of advertising where you pay a search engine every time a potential customer clicks on your ad. These ads appear on search engine results pages and sometimes on sites within a search engine's network of partners.

How do Pay Per Click Ads Work?

If you look at a search engine results page (SERP) carefully, you can generally distinguish between search results that are regular algorithmic or "organic" search listings and PPC search results which are actually paid advertisements. The latter are generally listed under the headings "sponsored results" or "featured listings" and consist of specially designed text, image or video ads that are triggered to display when your target keywords are used in a search query. The PPC ads generally appear on the right hand side and/or at the top of the search results pages.

To appear in the PPC results, advertisers sign up for the PPC program of their choice and create short text ads, image ads or videos describing the product or service available on their site in a way that will best entice searchers to visit it. During the program setup, an advertiser will decide which trigger keywords/phrases they wish to bid on and how much they are willing to pay when a visitor clicks on their ad. Generally, the higher the bid, the more likely their ad will show above their competitor's.

The Origins of Pay Per Click Marketing

The PPC industry was pioneered by GoTo.com (later re-branded as Overture before it was purchased by Yahoo! in July 2003). Despite their enormous success, GoTo's PPC model was met with a lot of skepticism in the industry following their IPO in 1999. Their eventual purchase by Yahoo put to rest any doubts that pay per click advertising was here to stay.

In October 2000, Google which was eventually to become the world's most popular search engine, launched their own keywords advertising model (Google AdWords), blending algorithmic search results with pay per impression ads.

In 2002, in an attempt to compete more successfully with Overture, Google expanded AdWords to include the pay per click pricing model we are familiar with today. This model provide both more popular and more successful and eventually replaced the pay-per-impression model as the default system.

By 2002, GoTo (by then rebranded as Overture), had distribution deals with an impressive range of search engines including Yahoo!, MSN, AltaVista, InfoSpace and a number of meta search engines including MetaCrawler and Ixquick. Overture's powerful distribution network guaranteed advertisers placement of their ads in front of a LOT of eyeballs and it became clear that many were willing to pay big bucks for the privilege. Other major search engines also formed successful distribution partnerships with PPC providers during this time, noticeably AOL, AskJeeves and MSN with Google AdWords. The pay per click industry had officially arrived.

Scores of PPC search engines began to spring up following Overture's lead, however the PPC industry continued to be dominated by the two big PPC players, Overture and Google AdWords, while Yahoo!, MSN, AOL and Google fought it out for dominance in the general search market.

In July 2003, in a move that shocked the industry, Yahoo! purchased Overture to enable them to better compete with market leader Google. In April 2005 they rebranded the PPC engine as Yahoo! Search Marketing and in 2006 they launched a revamped version of the service, code-named Panama.

Meanwhile, in October 2005, Microsoft quietly launched their own PPC service called MSN adCenter. An official launch in the US, together with a name change to Microsoft AdCenter occurred in May 2006. In May 2007, Microsoft revamped AdCenter with new features and rolled it out to advertisers worldwide.

Currently, Yahoo and Google continue to dominate the PPC landscape, although Microsoft AdCenter is beginning to make an impact. Second tier PPC engines such as MIVA (formerly Espotting and FindWhat) and Kanoodle are fast catching up to the majors.

There are now hundreds of PPC search engines worldwide, servicing global, regional and niche markets, but only a few that have achieved a significant market share of advertising revenue. A summary of the majors are listed below.

Yahoo! Sponsored Search

Yahoo! Sponsored Search is the current name for what was originally called Overture Precision Match. Yahoo! Sponsored Search prominently displays your site in search results on some of the top U.S. search properties that Yahoo! partners with. With Sponsored Search, you set the price you're willing to pay for each customer who clicks on your listing. Your ads appear at the top, bottom or right hand side of Yahoo search results pages under the heading "Sponsor Results". Your ads are triggered on search result pages when searchers enter the keyword combinations that you've bid on. Your ads can be targeted by language and country.

If you create a keyword campaign and you use the ContentMatch option, your bid also buys you top listings on Yahoo's partner sites AltaVista, InfoSpace, eBay, CitySearch, AllTheWeb and a range of news and content portals, such as USAToday, National Geographic, iVillage and NBC.

Google AdWords

Google AdWords gives web site owners the ability to promote their site when particular keyword or phrase searches are conducted at Google and partner sites. Your ads appear at the top or on the right side of search results pages in a "call out" box under the heading "Sponsored Links". Your AdWords text, image or video ads appear on search result pages for the keywords you buy, and can be targeted by language and country. With Google AdWords cost-per-click (CPC) pricing, you pay only when a customer clicks on your ad, regardless of how many times it's shown. Google adjusts your bids automatically to keep you ahead of your competition at the lowest possible price. Google AdWords results appear on Google search results pages, Google's distribution partner sites, Google Gmail, and numerous content sites which are syndicated through the Google AdSense program.

Microsoft AdCenter

Microsoft adCenter is the newest kid on the Pay Per Click block. It includes the ability to target your ads to MSN Live Search users who match your target regional and demographic criteria. Microsoft adCenter allows you to submit base bids for keywords or phrases you associate with your ads. This base bid is the maximum amount you are willing to pay if any Live Search user searches for one of your keywords and clicks your ad. You can also increase your bid in order to reach specific audience targets, which help increase the chance your ad will appear for a user who fits your buyer profile. Targeted bidding in the Campaigns tab allows you to add amounts to your base bid to increase the possibility that your ad will show to searchers who fit your optimum buyer profile. You can use your bid amounts to influence your ad's position in the Live Search results. In general, the more you bid, the higher the position your ad will have. You can use Microsoft's Intelligent Targeting feature to adjust your ads to match these variables:

• Geographical location


• Age and gender


• Day of the week


• Time of day (morning, afternoon, or night)

Interestingly, Microsoft pitch the ability to "build brand awareness" with their PPC program, due to the continued exposure of your ad and brand to a large market, regardless of whether that ad attracts clicks. This is an important feature of all major PPC programs but one that is rarely promoted by Google or Yahoo! Perhaps brand-building is adCenter's Unique Selling Proposition (USP) because Microsoft claim to reach more potential eyeballs than their competitors: over 99 million people per month have access to their Live Search tool across MSN and Windows Live.

The Advantages of Pay Per Click Advertising

The growth of the search industry worldwide has created a huge market for paid search advertising and most search engines and directories now have some type of Pay For Performance or Pay Per Click (PPC) element to them.

Pay Per Click advertising:

• Enables webmasters to target geographical and niche markets more precisely via specific search queries.


• Enables webmasters to have their page URL displayed at the top of the search engine results pages without having to figure out complex search engine algorithms or pay an SEO expert to tweak their site for higher rankings.


• Enables webmasters to receive new traffic instantly.


• Enables a website or offline store to be found by search engine users even if no site exists or the site is not search engine compatible.


• Enables small businesses to operate globally and compete on an equal footing with much larger competitors.


• Enables instant sales and more measurable ROI via conversion tracking.


• Enables more precise visitor pathways to be plotted (e.g. by leading visitors to specific landing pages).


• Enables campaigns to be switched on and off on-demand to meet specific needs, search trends or specific events (e.g. Christmas sale).

About the Author:

Article by Kalena Jordan, one of the first search engine optimization experts in Australia, who is well known and respected in the industry, particularly in the U.S. As well as running a daily Search Engine Advice Column, Kalena manages Search Engine College - an online training institution offering instructor-led short courses and downloadable self-study courses in Search Engine Optimization and other Search Engine Marketing subjects.

Managing AdWord Campaigns Properly

Article By Andrew C Clacy

Lately, the ads associated with various Adwords are being used for the product marketing. With the help of your Adword campaign, you can gain profit in Dollars only by working few hours and now it has become a good business proportion in Australia.

So, it becomes essential to manage Adword or PPC campaign at the first place. To manage PPC campaign, we require an abundance of management personnel.

The first thing you need to manage is the database to discover the keywords that are popular among the latest search. The next step is to write down all the keywords that are appropriate for your product and services.

You can simply perform this step by entering the keyword in the search engine that you think as relevant for your product. After getting the keyword, you need to select the bids that you have to put on them. That doesn't mean that you write an e-mail to the search engine telling that you will use these keywords because you bid for them. That is just impractical.

The standard operating procedure is that search engine handles the ads by displaying the ads that are most likely to bring maximum profit first and makes their baseline more frequent and much stronger. Adword is also known as PPC (pay-per-click) operation.

It means that the marketer wants the user to pay a fee each time when there is a click on the ad and even if the searcher visits his website using that ad or link. Anyways, this does not mean that the product has been sold.

An advertisement which is clicked a number of times is chosen as the one that brings maximum profit to the PPC. Therefore, it is placed at the top of the list to the users who are willing to pay substantial amount of money per click.

The moment you place the bid, the ad start running. Then it becomes necessary to monitor it successfully on each and every step. It is essential for you to keep the track of the charges that may incur pertaining to the popularity of the keyword associated with it. It is also important to replace those ads and keywords that have lost their popularity against the current and latest keywords.

Adword is an effective tool for online advertising especially, for medium-sized Adword or PPC campaigns and of late has become a chief source of revenue. Its advertising is accounted for almost 99% of total revenue. Adword offers many services such as managing your accounts, reviewing your campaigns and making necessary enhancements.

It also helps in mastering of ads, creating new ad groups and test reports. Apart from this, it is a targeted form of advertising making you pay for per click. Due to all these, the management of Adword or PPC has become the need of the hour. To manage Adword, there is an account known as EPS account which helps in managing Adword campaign. EPS account manager will make the management of PPC campaign easy.

It gives the information about the number of clicks that you receive on every PPC campaign. This also helps you to identify your target audience and generate a list of keywords for approval. Once the keyword list is approved, your account is established and your ads start appearing within few minutes. Then your PPC campaign will be clearly monitored by your EPS account manager. It should also ensure that your Adword remains optimised to earn maximum profit for your business.

About The Author:

Australian Adwords Management is a service that Andrew Clacy provides to his clients. He has helped many Australian businesses with http://www.australianonlineseo.com/adwords.html

Top 10 PPC Ad Tricks to Boost Your Click-Through Rate

By Kalena Jordan

When it comes to Pay Per Click campaigns, there tends to be a lot of focus on the quality and content of landing pages in order to increase conversions. That's all well and good, but to get people to visit your landing page, you first have to convince them to click on your ad. This is often much more challenging because while your landing page generally has your visitor's full attention, your ad is just one of several ads all vying for the same attention.

That tiny ad has just 2 or 3 seconds, a tiny headline and a very short amount of copy to convince the viewer your site is worth visiting. So how do you make your ad jump off the page and become a click magnet? The secret is *triggers*. Your ad headline and copy need to trigger a response within the viewer instantly.

Pretend for a moment that you own a florist business in Miami that specializes in bridal bouquets. Imagine you have set up a Google AdWords PPC campaign to attract customers to your web site where they can order their bouquets online.

Here are some of the triggers you could use in your ads:

1) Ask a Question

People are naturally curious and seeing a question addressed to them automatically triggers a reply in their minds, whether they intend it or not. By asking a question in your ad headline, you are taking advantage of this curiosity and making your ad appeal to them on a personal level. Here’s an ad example our fictional Miami florist could use:

Need Wedding Flowers?
Gorgeous wedding flowers
delivered free to your door
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com

2) Use Humor

People like to laugh. If your ad headline or copy makes them chuckle they are already associating your ad with positive emotions and are more likely to be receptive to your message. Here’s a humorous ad example our Miami florist could use:

In the Dog House Again?
Sweeten her up with a dozen roses.
Free delivery to your door!
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com


3) Use: Colons

Using a colon after a word indicates you are about to sum up or define an idea. This creates an automatic trigger in readers to pay attention to the content following the colon. Our Miami florist could take advantage of this with:

Bridal Bouquets: Stunning
Browse our unique and stunning
bridal bouquets. Free delivery.
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com

4) Get Regional

Depending on how you’ve set your ad campaign’s regional/demographic settings, it often pays to use regional triggers in your ads such as city or state names. Persons from the mentioned areas will automatically recognize that your ad is relevant to them and be more inspired to click on it. Our florist in Miami could use:

Need Flowers in Miami?
Floral bouquets for every occasion.
Free delivery throughout Miami.
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com

5) Use Power Words

There are a number of keywords known as “power words” that are proven to attract attention and sales. They include words like “secret”, “free”, “super”, “now”, “limited”, “exclusive”, “must”, “save”, “expert” and so on. Our florist in Miami could tailor his ads to use some of these. For example:

Free: Roses
Order a dozen roses and receive
half a dozen free! Limited time.
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com

6) Use Catch Phrases

People recognize popular catch phrases used by major brands. Provided you are careful not to directly infringe on their trademarks or copyright status, you can use them in your ads. For example, our Miami florist could use:

Got Flowers?
Floral bouquets for every occasion.
Free delivery throughout Miami.
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com

7) Use Personalization

Just like ads asking a question, ads that specifically address the audience are much more likely to gain attention. Our fictional florist could use this to his advantage with ads like:

Your Bouquet is Ready
Your wedding bouquet can be ready
within 24 hrs if you order online.
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com

8) Tell a Story

Internet searchers are good at recognizing advertising and blocking it out. So your ads can sometimes be more effective if they have a storyline and appear less like advertisements. Stories create empathy and parallels with the reader’s own life. For example our florist could try an ad like this one:

Your Perfect Wedding Day
Dress dirty. Veil torn. Rings lost.
At least your bouquet was gorgeous!
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com

9) Use Emotion & Senses

As well as personalization, your ads can appeal to the five senses of readers: sight, sound, smell, taste and touch. Our Miami florist could achieve this with:

Stop to Smell the Roses
Nothing beats the heady fragrance
of a bouquet of lush red roses.
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com

and finally…

10) Use Calls to Action

In my experience, ads that achieve the highest click through rate (CTR) are ones that use a call to action within them, for example “download now”, “read our e-book”, “sign up now” and “call us toll free”. Our fictional florist could achieve this with:

Gorgeous Wedding Bouquets
Order your wedding bouquet online and receive free wedding-toss posy!
www.funkyfloristsmiami.com

Apply a few of these triggers to your current PPC ads and I guarantee your click-through rate will improve dramatically.


About the Author:

Article by Kalena Jordan, one of the first search engine optimization experts in Australia, who is well known and respected in the industry, particularly in the U.S. As well as running a daily Search Engine Advice Column, Kalena manages Search Engine College - an online training institution offering instructor-led short courses and downloadable self-study courses in Search Engine Optimization and other Search Engine Marketing subjects.

How To Beat The Google Sandbox And Make Some Cash At The Same Time

By Rob Sullivan

I stumbled across this quite by accident. I knew it was there because I'd seen it before but I forgot about it until today.

So I did some checking to see if it still does work and based on my limited test it appears that it does.

What I'm about to explain to you may not only help get sandboxed sites indexed and ranking quicker, it can even make the site owner a little money.

I've been blogging for a few years now. I started it as a hobby and the blog I had was actually a blog before there were blogs. In other words I was "blogging" with a regular website.

Then a friend turned me on to Movable Type. It is a software which allows me to automate the publishing of content on my website.

I was having problems getting my website/blog indexed by Google back then - this was about 3 years ago.

It was also around this time that I heard of a new program called Google Adsense (https://www.google.com/adsense) in which one could place code on their web pages that would display ads, and the website owner would earn money on every click.

I thought "what a cool idea" so I immediately applied for an account. 48 hours later I was placing ads on my blog.

Shortly after this while reviewing my server logs I noticed that I was getting Google referrals! That's right, within days of placing the ads on my site, it had been fully indexed by Google and it was actually ranking quite highly for terms related to the content I was posting.

I couldn't believe my luck. Here I thought all I was going to do was make a little money on the side yet I found that the Adsense may have actually helped get my site indexed.

Remember, this was before the Sandbox, but it was a time when link popularity ruled the web. But since it was only a hobby I wasn't worried about building links. Because I already had a few loyal readers, I wasn't trying to position this site.

Flash forward to December 2005 and a friend asks me to help him set up his own blog. Actually he wants two of them - each with their own topics, and both very different in nature.

I consult with him and on February 1, 2006 we register two new domains for him.

He proceeds to build out his blogs and as he's doing this I suggest placing ads on them. At the time I wasn't thinking that it would help with indexing, just another way to increase exposure of the ads to generate more revenue for me and him.

We agree to split the money and he places the ads on the two new sites.

I didn't think much of it until his visitor traffic started going up. He also placed Google Analytics code on the sites and gave me access to them so I could take a look to see where all this traffic is coming from.

Turns out, he's getting a few Google organic referrals.

Imagine that - two brand new sites, with no incoming links, but somehow they have managed to sneak out of the Google Sandbox in 3 weeks?

Imagine my surprise, considering I have another site that I started over a year ago, and have been dutifully building content and links, yet I can't get it out of the sandbox. In fact, the current Google cache is of pages that no longer exist, and haven't for months.

My explanation, however "out there" it seems to be is that somehow the Google Ads have allowed the site to bypass the sandbox and move into the index almost immediately.

The first Google organic referral came last week, just two short weeks after the site was tagged with the Google Adsense code. Since then, both sites have received a handful of Google organic referrals.

Based on this very small and somewhat limited test case, my gut is telling me that one way out of the sandbox and into the SERPs is to apply for and install Google AdSense onto your site.

At the very least you'll make some money - maybe not a lot, just a few dollars a month (Google only pays out in $100 increments mind you, so it may take a while to get that first Google check) and the best case is that you'll bypass the sandbox, get indexed quickly and even start driving organic referrals to your site.

Like I said, this isn't anything near a scientific study but it seems pretty clear to me that what has helped these two sites become indexed so quickly are the ads.

So if you're stuck in the sandbox, perhaps applying for AdSense is a good idea.

I know I'm going to be placing ads on my other site to see what effect (if any it has). My guess is that within a few days it too will start ranking.

About The Author:

Rob Sullivan is a SEO Consultant and Writer for http://www.textlinkbrokers.com. Textlinkbrokers is a link building company. Please provide a link directly to Textlinkbrokers when syndicating this article.

How To Click With Online Advertising

By Mark Vandorone

How To Click With Online Advertising

For a small business competing in a niche market it is becoming ever harder to achieve high rankings in the free search engines. Pay-per-click ("PPC") advertising can be a great alternative.

Learn the secrets of PPC search engines and success on the internet could be yours. Be warned, however, a lack of understanding could put your business on the road to insolvency. I can't emphasize this strongly enough. An understanding of PPC can be a great advantage to your business.

If you've ever attended an auction to bid for a piece of furniture or artwork you'll have some idea of how to advertise on the PPC search engines. In this case you're bidding for high ranked spots on the keywords you've identified for your business. Visitors will arrive at your site by clicking on your search engine advert, and each time that happens you'll pay the search engine the value of your bid. A bid can be as low as 5 cents, but some highly competitive keywords can cost several dollars.

Now I'd like to discuss some advantages and disadvantages of advertising with PPC search engines. Advantages first :-

1. Only when someone clicks on your advert are you required to pay.

2. Can be an inexpensive method of attracting targeted traffic to your site.

3. Outbid the competition and that top advertising spot can be yours, no matter how small your business.

4. Some PPC search engines enable a campaign to be up and away in minutes. Not very long after you could be taking orders.

5. If your advert is not successful you can cancel or amend your listing with immediate effect.

6. You can test your advert, making amendments quickly and simply.

However, be aware of the disadvantages :-

1. Not everyone who clicks on your advert is a potential customer. You will have to pay for these junk clicks though.

2. The cost per click can escalate if you and and your competition become involved in a bidding war over that top spot.

3. Your advert may be subject to a strict review prior to approval. This can delay the start of the campaign considerably, and you may not like the final advert they approve.

4. A poorly worded or, even worse, misleading advert could generate traffic but not make sales. Unless you've placed a restriction on your advertising budget, your business could quickly be on the road to insolvency.

So how do you tip your toe in the water with PPC advertising? Before you do anything else research the keywords that your target market are searching on. You wouldn't want to bid for traffic on an irrelevant keyword would you? The methods for carrying out this research are a fully fledged topic in their own right, which I'll cover in a future article.

Another essential piece of knowledge you require before entering the bidding fray, is the monetary worth of a visitor to your website. By this I mean the average revenue generated by each visitor. This will be your guide to how far you can push it in the bidding process.

If you want to use PPC advertising to test your sales copy on a new site with no visitor knowledge, then monitor your costs versus sales closely. A daily budget is advisable at the outset. Limit your spending to something you can afford to lose if the worst occurs and you don't make any sales. Raise this as appropriate once you can see the sales conversion rate.

You're almost ready to get going. What I've provided here is an overview of PPC advertising. Use this as the first building block in your quest to master the PPC search engines.

Wishing you every success with your online advertising.

About The Author.

Mark Vandorone offers specialized online advertising campaigns at http://www.fivemarketing.com. Not happy with your results from the Pay-Per-Click search engines? Pay Mark a visit at: http://www.fivemarketing.com or contact him by e-mail at:
support@fivemarketing.com

Combing The Power Of Google Adsense And Email Marketing

By Scott Patterson

In the past year, Google Adsense has become the "It" way to make money on the Internet.

But even if you already use Google Adsense on your site, you are probably leaving money on the table. Let me explain why.

Most people create a site, slap some content and then wait for people to click on their ads.

But once people click on an ad, they are gone..probably forever!

One method that smart Internet marketers use to maximize their Google Adsense is to harness the power of their email list. By getting people to subscribe to their list, website owners can continue to make money from their readers.

By utilizing the power of their email list, website owners can dramatically increase their Adsense income.

Here is how you can do the same. In the following article, there is a step-by-step list of how you can harness the power of your list to create a steady stream of Adsense revenue.

The first step is to create a topic that is in high demand. A good topic would be something that people have an interest in, or information that can help your readers personally or financially.

Your next action would be to create content for your site. The idea is to write or use information that would provide value to the reader. All your articles should help improve their life in some manner. You can create content for your site in a large numbers of ways. This can include:

· Your own web articles
· Guides, product evaluations, and "How To's"
· Blogs and RSS Feeds
· Public domain works
· Private label rights
· Hiring a freelancer to write your content

Obviously creating content for your site is an ongoing process, so once you've created at least 10 pages of quality information for your readers, you should create your web pages and optimize them for Google Adsense.

As you are designing your pages for Adsense, you should keep one thing in mind- Your primary goal is to get people to click on your Adsense ads.

So don't give your readers too many options. As a result, it is important to keep your web page simple. To do this, you should include do the following:

. Place the article on the web page
· Ad all three Adsense blocks in prominent places
· Make sure that the ad blocks look like standard text, with the no borders and blue links
· If you have to have other links on this page, include them at the bottom where there is a less chance of being clicked on

After designing your web pages, you need to create an autoresponder sequence for your email list. The primary focus for each email is to get people to click on your Google Adsense pages. So it is important to create and intriguing title. Then in the email, write a little bit about the importance of the article and tell your subscribers how they can learn more by clicking over to the site.

Once you've created your sequence of bringing readers to your Adsense pages, you should start promoting your lists. You can do this by articles, PPC, ebooks, viral marketing and SEO. The more people usually means more money, so you have to continuously work at marketing your website.

Once you have finished creating your Adsense and email system, you should go back and continue to add more content and market your site. By having a large selection of information and more readers, you'll discover that your Google Adsense income will grow exponentially.

About The Author:

Scott J. Patterson is a self proclaimed Dunce, yet in a recent month he earned $12,124 from an online businesses. To find out how YOU can do the same, grab his free ebook- A Secret Guide to Online Businesses http://www.dunce-money.com/adsense-email

How To Build An Adsense Empire Using Private Label Right Articles

By Stephanie Hetu

Private label right articles are hot at the moment. Why? And how they can help you increase your Adsense revenues?

PLR articles are sold as content you can call your own. This usually mean you can rework it, you can repackage it into an ebook and sell it, you can use it as is on your site and sign as if you wrote it yourself, etc. The only thing you can't do is to submit it to various article directories for backlinks. Overall, PLR articles great for webmasters because they can save a whole lot of money with them!

Think about this for a moment: ONE good article can cost you anywhere from 10$ to 20$. If you are an Adsense junkie like I am, you probably create a few new Adsense websites each month, and you pay big bucks for fresh optimized content that will bring you in decent Adsense revenues. So, a few dozens articles each month can easily cost you 500 to 1000$!

By using PLR articles instead, you can pay a fraction of the price and get tons of content for new sites.

There is a trick though. If you just take PLR content and publish it AS IS, you will not be able to get good rankings in the search engines for it. But, if you modify them just a bit, you can get fresh content for pennies.

Now, how do you use it to create a little Adsense Empire? Here are a few steps to follow:

1. Find a profitable Adsense niche.

2. Select the highest paying keywords in the niche you found.

3. Select the best SEO keywords in this niche (the easiest words you can get good ranking for).

4. Find optimized PLR articles for your keyword list.

5. Build the site.

6. Submit the site to directories for backlinks.

7. Publish articles for reprint on other sites to get tons of backlinks.

8. Add a few articles each month in order to grow your site with fresh content.

9. Start a new site!

And if you have access to a good collection of private label rights articles, you can use them to do exactly that: build new Adsense sites each months! You will save a lot of time.

To get the best out of the PLR articles, you must modify them a minimum to make them your own. This way, you will be able to get the best of both world : optimized content for your Adsense site unique content that will allow you to rank well in the search engines!

About The Author:

Who else wants 18 High Paying Adsense websites in 6 months? Discover the Ultimate Adsense Combo: High Paying Adsense Keywords + PLR articles optimized for each keywords! Limited availability, you have to act fast. http://www.AdsenseQueen.com

Pay Per Click

By Richard D S Hill

Pay per click or PPC advertising is possibly the easiest and most effective way to market your business online. Getting your website listed in the search engines is vital due to the fact that the majority of website traffic (statistics say over 80%) comes from the search engines. Effective PPC management begins with devising a strategy to drive qualified traffic to your website.

PPC (PPC) advertising is simply advertising your website through the use of the search engines' "sponsored listings". When using PPC you bid on keywords or keyword phrases that your
targeted prospects may use to find whatever your website offers. Yahoo! Search Marketing (formerly known as Overture) for instance, only considers the bid amount in ranking a site. The most popular PPC Google Adwords uses bid value and your success (click through) rate.

To develop a your PPC strategy and plan, you must conduct market research. This should consist of identifying your target market (preferably a niche market), identifying keywords that
your target market uses to search for what you are offering, and analyzing the keywords and alternative keywords that will appeal to your target market.

During your keyword analysis, you will want to find out how popular keywords are and what the average bids are for certain keywords you are considering for budgeting purposes since defining a budget is a necessary part of PPC management.

Budgeting for PPC advertising involves not only determining how much money you can spend on your campaign, but basing that on the monetary value of a click to your website since you are paying per click.

Your conversion rate, the number of unique visitors divided by the number of sales, plays an important role in determining the value of a click to your site for PPC advertising budgeting
purposes as does the average net profit per sale. By dividing your net profit per sale by your conversion rate, you can accurately determine the value per click to your website. The price per click that you pay for your PPC advertising should not, of course (!!!) exceed this value.

So if your selling a product that gives you a £10 profit, and a particular keyword takes 50 visitors to create a sale you would bid no more than £0.20 per click to break even.

A few tips about PPC if you DIY.

1. Don't put more money than you have to into your account - sounds obvious but..!

2. Test, test, test have at least two separate ads for the same product at the same time. Drop the lower performing adverts and add a new one until you are satisfied with the results.

3. Make sure to keep up with your results daily at the very least and adjust your strategy according to results.

4. Continue to look for new keywords and as you find new ones lose the poorer performers.

If you approach PPC advertising logically, follow the direct marketing mantra of test, test, test, monitor results regularly and make adjustments only according to results PPC advertising is a powerful tool for driving profitable traffic to your site.

About The Author:

Richard Hill is a director of E-CRM Solutions and has spent many years in senior direct and interactive marketing roles. E-CRM - http://www.e-crm.co.uk - helps you to grow by getting you more customers that stay with you longer. We provide practical solutions that pay for themselves. We help you to make sure that your marketing works.

6 Steps To Picking Profitable Adsense Keywords

By Greg Lietz

Knowing how to find the best keywords for use in your Adsense ads is not a straightforward process. Finding and implementing high profit, low competition keywords in your ads really is the trick for making Adsense payoff big.

After I had tried several things to pick out good performing keywords, I wrote down this process that should yield profitable, low competition keywords for your Adsense ads. This process is not perfect, but when you analyze it and try it for yourself, you can see that it makes sense. Adsense that is.

Step 1
Research some keywords for your niche that have a high CPC value. To do this, first find your keywords using the Google Adwords keyword tool or another tool that will give you niche specific lists of keywords. Save those keywords into a spreadsheet program as a csv file. Copy and paste those keywords into Google's Traffic Estimator (you will need an Adwords account). The traffic estimator will give you the estimated clicks per day and the average cost per click (CPC) for each keyword. Copy and paste this information back into your spreadsheet file for later reference.

Step 2
Multiply the average CPC by 30% to get an estimate of your maximum earnings per click. The higher the average CPC, the more likely the CPC for the 2nd - 8th positions are high as well. You want this higher average CPC to start because if the CPC starts to drop off significantly after the 3rd position, your chance of getting high click earnings as an Adsense publisher will be diminished.

Step 3
I use a tool called Adword Accelerator to help with estimating the 1st - 8th position CPC values. This tool will estimate the CPCs for each position and allow you to see how much the CPCs drop off after the first position. This dramatically helps your analysis for picking the most profitable keywords. If the CPC values stay close to the each other and to the value of the first position, then you will more than likely have a profitable keyword.

Step 4
Now determine which Adsense ads occupy which positions. You can do this by searching on Google for your keyword and looking to see which Adsense ads are generated in the search results and in which order they are. Another way to estimate this is to use the Adword Accelerator tool. It has a feature whereby Adwords ads are dynamically displayed for a given keyword you input into the tool to check. If the Adwords advertiser has used "Adwords for Content" in his advertising, these ads will be the Adsense ads someone else is displaying on their website.

Step 5
Compare the ads you found in step 4 to the results of using the keyword check function at the website http://www.adsensecheck.com. If the advertisers you find by doing this closely match those you found in step 4, you will more than likely have a profitable keyword.

If the advertisers are not he same, then the advertiser is possibly not using the "Adwords for Content" mode of advertising in his campaigns. This means that the keyword may not be the basis for the Adsense ads and may not be profitable.

Step 6
Now you must get the traffic. If you decide to get traffic using the Adwords approach, then just use the keywords in your Adsense ads that scored well from the above evaluation. Then, use lower cost per click keywords in your Adwords ads. The difference between the earnings from the click you get on your Adsense word from the cost of the click you pay on your Adwords word will be your profit.

If you are planning to use search engine optimization techniques to get traffic to the website where your ads are, make sure the keywords you choose have the highest KEI possible. KEI is the ratio of the number of searches for a keyword to the number of competing sites having the keyword. The combination of a high KEI and a high score from the above evaluation will yield the best profit results.

About The Author:

Greg Lietz is a freelance writer and internet businessman. His main website is
http://www.theonlinebizplace.com where he provides content about internet based business opportunities, web site marketing strategies, writing articles and starting your own online home business.

What Is Pay-Per-Click? When To Use It - And When Not To

By Robert Fuess

The only way to really guarantee top placement is to use pay-per-click advertising. (This is an advertising mechanism in which you pay for every click of a potential customer.) Most search engines offer this on a bidding basis, and if it generates more money than you spend on it, it can be sound business advise. In most cases, you would DO THIS LAST - after you optimize your web site and implement other promotional techniques. If you do an effective job with your website optimization and promotion, you may already come up top naturally and not have to use pay-per- click for several keywords. (This is expecially true for MSN or Yahoo.) Or if you choose to make a big (temporary) advertising campaign while you are optimizing (and have the money for this), then you may consider this.

Some keywords will cost more than others, depending on competition. Some will generate more paying customers than others. Do the math as you go along. Figure out the return on investment. This is seldom a one shot deal and often takes a few months of tweaking to get the optimum pay-per-click bid amount for the different keywords.

YOU WILL FIND SEO COMPANIES THAT GUARANTEE YOU TOP PLACEMENT FOR
YOUR FAVORITE KEYWORDS. THIS IS HOW THEY DO IT. They use pay-per-click as part of the package and point to the pay-per-click listing, showing you your top placement. The natural links are normally much cheaper in the long run, since once you achieved a top ranking without pay-per-click you will have a steady stream of customers without having this kind of per-click fee.

Google is, of course, an exception. For the first year you will not likely rank for most of your desired keywords despite any valiant efforts on your part. During this period, I would encourage using Google's pay-per-click (AdWords). Although Google is the slowest to recognize your natural ranking - it will give the greatest return in the long run. While you do this - use the information they give you while you manage your pay-per-click keywords. See what is used most often - and what gives you the most sales (conversions). They have tools to help you with that.

ANY SEO FIRM that promises or guarantees top placement for competitive keywords is either selling you pay-per-click or is being boastful. Be wary with your money. You don't need an SEO expert to sign up for pay-per-click. You may use one to help you find the right keywords or perhaps to handle optimization techniques. If they are selling you a package, pay-per-click is often a justifiable part of it. However, don't let such a promise be a decision factor in selecting an SEO expert.

About the Author:

Robert Fuess is a veteran website designer who specializes in making dynamic search engine optimized websites. http://www.SpiderwebLogic.com http://www.SchoolAndTeacher.com

How To Turn Around an Unprofitable PPC Campaign

By Kalena Jordan

Did you know that 80% of new advertisers fail to achieve a Return on Investment from their Pay Per Click (PPC) campaigns? I didn't either because I just made that up. But seriously, I bet the percentage is very high. I seem to be spending more and more time helping clients and Search Engine College students to tweak their AdWords campaigns these days. Unless they live and breathe search marketing, I think it is difficult for most people to allocate the time and resources necessary to maintain a successful PPC campaign. Plus there are just so many little tricks and secrets that most people don't know about. I've heard so many horror stories about PPC campaigns hemorrhaging money in the hands of new advertisers and I've seen a few shockers first hand.

As one of their first assignments, our PPC Marketing students at Search Engine College are required to set up a new Google AdWords campaign, complete with carefully considered strategies for keyword selection, ad copy and matching types. More often than not, what they come up with is a campaign that is destined to fail. I then spend the rest of the course teaching them what's wrong with their campaign, how to correct the errors and how to make sure their campaign has a good chance of succeeding.

But it's not just first-timers that make mistakes with Pay Per click advertising. I'm often asked to review PPC campaigns for my clients, some of whom have been advertising for years. I often cringe at what I find when I login to their account. Campaigns that have been unprofitable for years are left to flounder and waste thousands of dollars because the staff are too busy to manage them or are simply ignorant of what it takes to fix them. Unfortunately, the "Set and Forget" mentality is alive and well in PPC.

The Unprofitable Campaign

Take last week for example. A client asked me to take a look at their Google AdWords campaign because although it brought traffic to their site, it didn't seem to be resulting in any direct business. They had decided that PPC was simply unprofitable and they were ready to abandon it as a marketing channel. I logged into their account and had a good look around. It wasn't the worst campaign I've seen but it was pretty close.

Here are the problem areas I discovered and rectified:

1) Not Enough Ads

This was the single biggest problem with the campaign. There weren't anywhere near enough ads to cover the number of keywords the client was targeting. Some ad groups had 18 keywords and only 1 ad! Ideally, each keyword should have it's own ad, sometimes two, because it is important that each ad is laser-focused on the keyword and includes repetitions of that particular keyword. You should always create multiple text ads for each keyword so that you can measure which ads work best. Not everyone will click on the same ad so you need to create and test multiple ads with different wording to see which convert best. AdWords will gradually show only the best performing ads over time.

2) Using Ads That Don’t Reflect Target Keywords

One or more of the ads didn't use the keyword in the ad headline. For example, one Ad Group targeted the keyword phrase 'bridesmaid dresses' but that specific phrase was not in the headline or ad text. The single ad they had in place actually related to wedding dresses so it wasn't relevant to be triggered for 'bridesmaid dresses' and related keywords. The client had tried to cover all bases with a single ad, but this was never going to be effective. To entice people to click, they need to see the keywords they've just searched for appear in your ad. You should always use your target keyword in your ad headline and first or second line of ad text.

3) Not Using Enough Ad Groups

This was the second biggest problem with the campaign. There weren't nearly enough ad groups to cover the keyword themes the client was targeting. Many of the keywords in each Ad Group required dividing into several other Ad Groups based on unique keyword themes. For example all "bridesmaid" related keywords and ads needed to go in their own Ad Group, while all keywords and ads relating to 'used wedding dresses' needed to go into their own Ad Group and so on. Then several new ads needed to be drafted for each new Ad Group to laser-focus on those keywords as described above.

4) Not Using the Quality Score Column

The client didn't have Google's Quality Score column showing, so it would have been difficult for them to know the quality score of their keywords so they could tweak bids and ads. I switched it on immediately. To find the Quality Score, look at the Keywords tab and click on "display columns". This column will show "Poor", "OK" or "Great" for each of your keywords. The better your score, the lower the minimum bid Google requires you to pay for each keyword.

5) Opting into the Content Network

The client had opted into Google's Content Network as well as the Search Network. Using the Content Network will almost always produce a lower ROI and higher click charges because the network includes many personal and irrelevant web sites that show AdSense ads. These often have content only loosely related to your subject matter but it is often enough to trigger your ads to appear as a contextual match. In my experience, Click Fraud also seems to be more common in accounts that utilize the Content Network. I advise my clients to avoid the content network like the plague unless they have an e-commerce style site where they can expect some drive by sales. Needless to say, I flicked the Content Network off on this campaign pretty quickly.

6) Not Using Content Bids

The client had opted NOT to use Content bids, even though they had opted into the Content Network. If you must use the Content Network, you should always use separate, lower bids for your keywords on that Network because the ROI is so much poorer. The number of clicks you are likely to receive on the Content Network is much larger, but of a much lower quality and less likely to convert so you shouldn't pay as much for them. You can set your maximum bids to a lower amount than the search network by opting in to use Content bids.

7) Not Using Position Preferences

Still under Campaign Settings, the client had NOT enabled Position Preferences. This is a powerful feature of AdWords that gives you the ability to tell Google what positions you want your ad placed in for particular keywords. For example, you can set it to positions 1-3 for some keywords, meaning that you want your ad shown in ranking position 1 to 3 for those keywords or not shown at all. For keywords where you don't need to maintain top positions, you can set it to 1-10 to indicate to Google that you want your ad shown in whatever position is available for the bid amount you've set. This is a particularly useful feature for more competitive keywords, where you can specify lower positions for your ads where keywords have too high a price tag for positions 1-3. Obviously if your bid amounts aren't high enough to secure you the positions you want, your ads won't be shown, but this still gives you more control over when your ads appear and how much you spend.

8) Unnecessary Use of Multiple Campaigns

The client had actually created two campaigns, but they both had the same regional target markets and other settings. There is generally no need to set up multiple campaigns unless you have totally unrelated products or services, you are targeting different regions/countries and/or you have multiple advertising campaigns with different start and end dates.

9) Not Using Targeted Landing Pages

Some of the ads created by the client had destination URLs that led to pages on their site specifically relating to those products/services, which is ideal. But most ads led to the generic home page of the client's site, which was never going to be effective, especially now that Google takes landing page relevancy into account when determining a keyword's quality score. The destination URLs for all ads and keywords should be reviewed to ensure they are laser-focused to the search query. If there aren't suitable landing pages for a keyword or phrase, the development of tailored landing pages for each keyword set or Ad Group should be considered.

10) Incorrect Use of Keyword Matching Options

Most of the client's keywords were set to broad match. Broad match means that you want your ad shown for variations of your keyword/phrase. So if you target 'wedding dress' using broad match as my client had done, it means you want your ad triggered for ANY searches using those two words in any order. So your ad will automatically be shown for 'hideous wedding dress', 'I need a dress to wear to my friend's wedding' etc. To avoid your ad being shown for inappropriate search queries, I highly recommend using "phrase match" and/or [exact match]. You can read more about the different keyword matching options here.

11) Not Using Negative Keywords

The client was not using negative keywords. The use of negative keywords is a very powerful but often overlooked feature of a PPC campaign. A negative keyword is a keyword that prevents your ads from being shown for irrelevant search queries. Adding a negative keyword to your campaign means that your ads won't show for search queries containing that term. For instance, the negative keyword "–free" tells the PPC system not to show your ad for any search query containing the term "free". This feature is extremely useful because it helps you rule out any searchers who are less qualified and less likely to be interested in your offering. For example, if you run an e-commerce site selling DVDs, you probably want to add "-free" as a negative keyword so that persons searching for "free DVDs" don’t see your ad. You should always include some negative keywords in your PPC campaign to ensure your ads are not triggered for inappropriate search queries.

12) Not Using Tracking URLs

Tracking URLs were NOT being used. As with any advertising campaign, results need to be tracked to determine overall ROI. Pay per click campaigns lend themselves to this because you can add a simple piece of code to the end of your landing page URL and most site statistical packages will allow you to track click-throughs. This code is called the tracking URL and looks something like this: http://www.mysite.com/mypage.htm?source=adwords-mykeyword. Everything from the question mark onwards is the tracking code. Many of the larger PPC providers provide automatic tracking of your ads, but the statistics you get are not always detailed enough or, in my experience, accurate. I recommend implementing your own tracking code to the end of the destination URLs of all your ads, based on keyword, ad group name or unique ad creative. You'll then need to set up your web analytics program to be able to track these individual parameters to determine which keywords, ad groups and ad creatives are the most effective.

13) Setting the Daily Budget Too Low

The daily budget was set too low. Because the client had been targeting very generic keywords using broad match and had also opted in to the Content Network, their ads were attracting thousands of irrelevant clicks (including some fraudulent ones!) and the costs of the campaign were skyrocketing. To try and curb this, the client had lowered the maximum daily budget for the campaign, meaning their ads were only being shown for around 2 or 3 hours per day until the budget was used up. What they should have done was to use more targeted 2 or 3 word keyword phrases, used phrase or exact matching options and opted out of the Content Network. That way, their ads would be shown 24 hours a day to a more targeted audience, they wouldn't miss out on any traffic, they would reduce the amount of click fraud they were experiencing, yet they wouldn't exceed their maximum daily budget.

14) Not Using Conversion Tracking

Finally, I noticed that Conversion Tracking had NOT been switched on for the campaign and no conversions were being measured. This is because what constitutes a conversion for the client hadn't been determined and conversion tracking code had not been integrated into the site. Not using conversion tracking makes it very difficult to measure the effectiveness of the PPC campaign. PPC advertisers should always define a successful conversion and establish conversion goals and targets prior to campaign launch. A successful conversion might be a sale, submission of an enquiry form or a newsletter subscription. Tracking such conversions is a simple matter of embedding some javascript tracking code into the conversion page. Tracking this data lets you identify how effective your PPC campaign is in isolation from your other marketing efforts.

The Turnaround

So what were the results of my investigation? Well, after I pointed out the problems to the client and made the changes, the campaign made a complete turnaround. One week after my changes, the campaign was experiencing Click Through Rates of up to 40 percent and the client began receiving higher quality traffic, more enquiries and a huge increase in conversions as a result. The turnaround has renewed their faith in Pay Per Click and they are now excited about increasing their PPC marketing efforts.

If you ensure your campaign avoids the 14 common blunders listed above, you too will be well on the way to a profitable PPC experience.


About the Author:

Article by Kalena Jordan, one of the first search engine optimization experts in Australia, who is well known and respected in the industry, particularly in the U.S. As well as running a daily Search Engine Advice Column, Kalena manages Search Engine College - an online training institution offering instructor-led short courses and downloadable self-study courses in Search Engine Optimization and other Search Engine Marketing subjects.

Using Blogs For Affilate And Adsense Profits Combined

By Chris Taylor

How do you set up a blog for effective affilate and Adsense profits?

Here is the low down of how it's done and some of the in's and outs of rss.

For this example I will use web hosting as the affilate product we selling on the blog.

1. Rss is great for getting the robots to visit but it will not get you visitors until

*You have quite a number of pages
*Have decent page rank.

2. Best blog platform. http://www.wordpress.org

3. Blog page - index page.

*A two column blog I find works the best
*The sidebar should be on the right hand of the page for SEO purposes
*Heading for your affiliate reviews shouls be first. something like "In-Dpeth, Top 5 Cheap Hosting Reviews". Two links underneath, one going to reviews and the other to "why our reviews are more relaible than other sites"

4. Reviews of your products.

4 to 10 reviews, make them long and give info of what benefits one product has over the other and a rating for different aspects. Do not put adsense on your reviews page.

This site does it really well - http://www.keywordworkshop.com and it's a blog to boot.

5. Next heading in the sidebar - "Articles"

A link going to current articles followed by a search box for your articles. Each article page is where your Adsense sits and here are some good tips.

*All links including Adsense, one color underlined.
*Research has shown the normal blue and darker blue get's the best hits
*Adsense in the middle and at the end of all your articles. You will get less click troughs with Adsense in the borders

6. Next heading "contact Me"

Blurb. A little confused with all the info, so many choices or an aspect of one of "hosting reviews" (Linked to your review page. Feel free drop me an email any time.. blah blah

Then more headings after this is you wish. "My fav top ten hosting tips articles". "Top 5 Domain Name Website Reviews"? and so on.

The way I see it, is if they are customers coming for information on a given product, service or business area, why not stick some products up and make some more money!

If they are just interested in the articles monetize those with Adsense.

And then if for any reason you have a bad Adsense month, the affilate income is there as a backup.

The final tip is to keep your blogs clean so people can easily find the information they are looking for whether that be a product or articles. Heres one of my article directories as an example.

http://www.thewebtrafficco.com/adb/

About The Author:

Chris Taylor is the director of Catdynamics, an established online company which specializes in all areas of online business implementation, internet marketing and search engine optimization - http://www.catdynamics.com/web-master-affiliate-program.html

PPC Advertising- Considerations Before You Begin With Pay Per Click Advertising

By Sean Milea

Important Pay Per Click Considerations For Business Promotion

Pay Per Click publishing holds unlimited potential for increasing your profits. The format of PPC publishing is quick and simple. However, to use pay per click effectively you need to be aware of several issues. If you fail to plan ahead, you may not only not reach your target goals but you could also waste a great deal of money in the process. There are few key points one must keep in mind in order to reap its maximum benefits.

First of all, it is imperative that you have a comprehensive marketing plan and strategy. This will give you a better understanding of your goals and allow you to create the most appropriate plan of action. The plan must encompass all aspects of your project.

Second, it is essential that you keep in mind the fast pace of Pay Per Click publishing. It may be in your best interest to engage the services of a professional. Today, there are many people whose focus is exclusively PPC publishing. Their services are usually most equitable. Otherwise you definitely need to educate yourself on pay per click strategies before you start spending money.

Another key point to remember is that the fast pace of PPC publishing demands your consistent attention. Close monitoring of your set-up alerts you to potential situations which could require changes to maintain optimum benefit from your project. The quicker you are aware of what is happening, the more quickly you are able to respond.

Finally, keep an eye on the other guys. While you do not want to copy their work, you can benefit from their experiences, both good and bad. Not only is it acceptable to adapt successful ideas from others to benefit your own endeavors it is the key to being competitive. It is also prudent to use their misfortunes to prevent your own by making changes to your plans to prevent following in their misfortunes.

About The Author:

You can get a free copy of our latest ebook "The 7 Keys To Business Success" by clicking here: http://www.bizraves.com/is . Sean Milea is writer for BizRave Inc. http://www.bizrave.com

Adsense And Adwords Are Two Different Sides Of The Same Coin

By Dave Mallegg

Adwords are simply the keywords that visitors put into Google to search for information on that keyword or phrase. Your pay-for-click ad on the right side of the page that appears is called an Adword, because your ad appears when the visitor searches for information on that keyword.

When the visitor clicks on your ad, you pay Google (adword). If, when your visitor arrives on your site, they click on any ads you have on your site, you get paid by Google under a pay-for-click program called Google Adsense.

LOCATION OF YOUR AD

The best location for your ads on your own site would be the top right side. This is because the visitors' eyes tend first to look up and right, so you want the most important information in that location.

RESEARCHING KEYWORDS

The real goal is to obtain the maximum click conversion and not only the optimization search engine ranking. This is not only about high ranking to get visitors to click on your ad, but it is about your visitors later clicking on your ads that appear on your site. Therefore, you must chose keywords that relate the best to clicking on your ads and not just a high ranking. The highest paying keywords do not automatically guarantee you will make the most profit. You must test this and track the results.

IMPORTANT POINTS ON CONTENT

Your purpose of having your visitors click on your ads is always the primary purpose. The content in your article must be sufficiently relevant that it puts the visitor in an emotional state of mind of being inquisitive or in a buying frame of mind.

TYPE AND FORMAT OF YOUR AD

All ads on your website must match and conform to the general broad design, color, image and level of quality of your site. They must harmonize, yet they can still attract attention by "standing out".

BE CERTAIN TO AVOID THIS

When you have ads placed on your site and you get paid for visitors clicking on them, you must strictly adhere to the Google policy and general common sense to never have family and friends click on those ads just so you can get paid. This is the fastest way to have Google terminate you and likely never to able to deal with Google again. Google is watching for this, as it would destroy this valuable advertising concept for everyone. The pay-for-click is a fantastically effective method of getting your word out to visitors who are searching for your information.

These basic guidelines and rules will help your journey to use Adwords and Adsense to build traffic and profits in your chosen niche.

About the Author:

Dave Mallegg is an International Business Advisor and Internet Marketing Expert. If you are interested in learning how to get Google ads free visit: http://GetGoogleAdsFreee.com . Also, check out the New Strategic Internet Profits Blog at: http://infomakeovermiracle.com

Maximizing Your Online Income With Google Adsense

By Christoph Puetz

When it comes to making money as a publisher from Google Adsense, some webmasters have difficulties getting their ad displays right and therefore leave a lot of money on the table.Google Adsense is by far is the most popular contextual advertising program used by online publishers worldwide. Adsense has variety of revenue generating products starting from Pay per click ads, Adsense for search, referrals for Firefox with Google toolbar, or other Google products (a complete list is available when you log into your Adsense account). Many webmasters think that just copying and pasting the Google Adsense code into a web page will create a huge amount of money, but that assumption is a mistake. Here are some tips to increase your online income from Google Adsense.

1. Make sure the ads that are appearing on your site are related with your current content. When placing the Adsense code into the page for the first time, it can take a while until targeted ads show up. If after 24 hours still not matching ads show up, you should look into section targeting with Google Adsense. Section Targeting helps Google to pick the right keywords on your website to deliver better matching ads.
2. Keyword Density. Experiment with the density of keywords on your website. If you use the proper keyword density in your content, your website will attract better targeted ads. the result will be that your visitors are far more likely to click on a relevant ad.
3. Use Online Keyword research tools like Overture Keyword Tool, http://Wordze.com, the Google Keyword Research Tool, or Wordtracker to pick the best keywords for your website. The reason for this is that you want to get as many visitors as possible to your website. Keywords that are searched for often are good to have on your website. You will also need these keywords for link building and SEO so that your website ranks for those important keywords.
4. Experiment with different ad formats and colors. No "one size fits all" exists when it comes to Google Adsense. Testing is needed to optimize your income. Try ads with borders and without, too.
5. Embed your Adsense ads in your content. Use CSS to have the content flow around the ads as that can improve clicks to your ads significantly. Make sure that the font used on your website matches the font used by Google Adsense.
6. DO NOT place any image near your ads to attract better click-thru's. This technique was allowed for a while, but recently Google Adsense updated the Terms of Service and by placing images near the ads you would violate the TOS. However, you still find websites out there that have not been updated to reflect this change. These webmasters are risking their membership in Google Adsense.
7. Rotate Google Adsense Ads Colors to reduce common Ad Blindness. To prevent regular users from ignoring the ads, you can rotate different types of color palettes for your Adsense ads. The best way to do this is to use an ad or banner rotation software like OpenAds (formerly known as PHPAdsNew).
8. Track your ad performance. Google gives you the ability to track ads by website or by custom channel. Up to 200 custom channels can be set up. Again, testing is critical for your success.

About The Author:

Christoph Puetz is an experienced Internet Entrepreneur. Part of his online income is made from Google Adsense, but he loves to diversify his sources of online income. He writes about SEO, PPC Advertising and Google Adwords on his Make money online blog. http://www.webhostingreport.net

The Essence Of Google's Pay-Per-Clicks Advertisement.

By Ejike Arinze

Ten years ago two brainy grad students from Stanford created what has become a household name synonymous with the internet. Anyone who has ever looked for information with the internet has heard of Google. It has become so popular that it has become more than a website, but it's a verb. Instead of searching for information on the internet, web-heads now "google" what they want. Not only has Google turned into arguably the most popular search engine in internet history, but it has also turned into one of the wealthiest, thanks to savvy marketing techniques such as adwords pay per click advertisement through Google.

How does this work exactly? Businesses seeking to reach a broader audience on a shorter marketing budget simply visit the adwords website through Google. They sign up through Adwords and fill out the advertising information. Then they wait. Anytime one of the qua trillion Google users' types in information relevant to that business owner's particular ad, the ad will pop up. If the information is not relevant, the ad will not pop up. Google contrived one of the most genius concepts with Adwords, however. Instead of a business simply paying for ads which may or may not work, the business pays for each click. Thus those who simply gloss over the business's ad will not cost the business anything. But those who inquire by clicking on the ad, those with the potential to become genuine customers, will be the ones the business pays for.

Furthermore, Google does not require a business to go into debt when people click like mad on its advertisement. In fact, the business can set a strict budget and bid for what they believe the ad should cost per click. Then Google will limit the availability of the ad according to the business's budget. Businesses do not pay when the ad simply appears. They pay when consumers click on the ad.

Some might wonder exactly how well Google's method of advertising has worked. Dozens of businesses attest to their successful marketing practices thanks to the pay per click method. This method has turned into one of the most viral marketing methods of internet marketing sales. Companies testify regularly to how much less this method of advertising has cost them and how much their business has grown because of this method. It's a no brainer for them to keep on advertising with Google's Adwords pay per click ads.

The essence of Gogole's Adwords pay per click ads depends on the popularity of Google. Currently, there's no problem with that. How often do we hear someone say, "I'll just Yahoo that when I get home"? Instead, we refer regularly to "googling" things, and we're not talking about how we look at them. Adwords is a form of e commerce marketing where companies have discovered that when they drop other avenues of marketing to focus on this route, their revenue goes up. As stated before, advertising with this method is a no brainer for those wishing to take their business to a global level.

About the Author:

The Author is Ejike Arinze. Are you looking for a simple to follow homebased business that yields a 4-Figure Income/week effortlessly? And also improve on your academic and personal development? Then look no further. Join
http://www.beyondfortunes.com/pips.html

The How To's Of Making People Click

By Carl Hendricks

1. Use reverse psychology on your banner ads. You could tell people not to click on your banner ad. For example "Don't Click Here If You Are Comfortable With Your Looks".

2. Make your banner ad words as attractive as possible. Use words like ultimate, powerful, sizzling, hot, etc. Your words should relate and highlight your total offer.

3. Offer a discount offer on your banner ad. People are always looking for good deals. You could offer a percentage discount, dollar discount, buy one get one free discount, etc.

4. Use a testimonial on your banner ad. This'll give people proof they aren't wasting their time clicking on your banner ad. The testimonial should include enough information so they understand the offer.

5. You could have a famous and respectable person on your banner ad representing your product, web site or service. People will click because they'll trust them over you.

6. Use a strong guarantee on your banner ad. You could include the guarantee as a headline for your offer. It could read double or triple your money back guarantee, lifetime your money back guarantee, etc.

7. Tell people to click on your banner ad. Newbies to the internet may net even know they can click on banners. Just having the phrase "click here" on your banner will increase your clickthroughs.

8. You could advertise a trial or sample offer. This will tell people there is no risk or obligation if they click on your banner ad and try out your product or service.

9. Tell people the major benefit of your product, web site or service on your banner ad. It could be benefits like make money, lose weight, increase energy, save money, save time, etc.

10. You could advertise a free offer on your banner ad. People love free stuff. The freebie should relate to your target audience. If the freebie is attractive to them they will click.

About The Author:

Carl Hendricks is the owner of http://www.cehmagic.com He writes about internet marketing and self improvement.

PPC - The Moderation Key

By Scott Lindsay

Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising is often viewed as a quick way to get traffic to your website. After all, the advertising itself is just a few words so it shouldn't take too long to put it together, get it online and wait for the customers to be delivered to your website on a silver platter. Right?

Maybe not.

Many businesses use most of the words available in their word count to place the name of their business and they don't take advantage of researched keywords. PPC advertisers could be paying more money for their ads then they need to because they haven't investigated less popular keywords that are just as effective and provide a similar return on investment (ROI).

In most cases you can even take advantage of a negative keyword. What this means is if you have a company that sells a variety of nuts, you might consider placing a `- cashews' if you don't actually sell cashews. Essentially this eliminates the PPC advertising to show up on any sites that feature cashews.

If you fail to use the negative words effectively you could have a significant number of cashew fans clicking on your `nut' advertising only to be disappointed that you don't carry their favorite. The end result is that you had to pay for clicks made by potential customers who found themselves disappointed.

You should also err conservatively on the cost of attracting new customers on your ROI estimate. Don't bid higher on PPC advertising, on an overall basis, when it seems you are not likely to gain a return on your advertising investment.

You should also take your time in the development of the language for your PPC advertisement as well as effective using both positive and negative keywords. You should keep in mind that PPC advertising should be viewed as a short-term solution to your long-range objectives.

By utilizing strong search engine optimization (SEO) strategies you are likely to see much better site visitation and a more motivated customer base. The reason for this is that when you improve your SEO strategy you also tend to improve your site ranking. Most people use search engines to locate the products they want. If they can find your site easily in a web search why would they need to pay attention to peripheral PPC advertising?

PPC advertising can be effective, but the need for this type of advertising should be short-term and used in moderation.

About The Author:

Scott Lindsay is a web developer and entrepreneur. He is the founder of HighPowerSites and many other web projects. Get your own website online in just 5 minutes with HighPowerSites at: http://www.highpowersites.com. Start your own ebook business with BooksWealth at:
http://www.bookswealth.com

Adsense & The Secret Of Being Rich

By Virginia Sanders

Building a virtual online empire is easier now than ever. There is a creative movement going on that will inspire you to create your own Adsense empire that will lead you to riches.

Whether Google realizes it or not, they are part of a bigger plan that will provide the vehicle for thousands of individuals to obtain wealth from the Internet. There is an unlimited supply of Internet opportunities available to you today that will lead you directly to wealth.

The task of building hundreds of Adsense enabled sites is so easy that even an adult can do it these days. There is software and step-by-step instructions that teach even the most novice entrepreneur how to create and optimize Adsense sites for maximum revenue.

Adsense sites act as mini business entities or sales agents that generate income for you twenty four hours per day.

Google has provided everything you need to build an online empire. You can become the Donald Trump of the online virtual real estate world. The best part about Adsense is that you really don't have to compete to win; you just need to be creative.

In the online search world, Google is King. Google is king because they chose to share their wealth. The one remarkable decision sealed their position online and created massive income for the company.

Whether you know it or not Google and the universe desires you to have everything you want to have. Nature is friendly to your plans to be rich.

All you have to do is to plug into the substance and the heart of the Google Adsense Program to create your online fortune. You do not have to take anything from anyone. You do not have to cheat or to take advantage or try to manipulate the Google Adsense Program.

In fact, there is a backlash happening to those individuals who created Spam sites that were created to manipulate the Google Adsense System. These sites will be kicked off the Internet and out of the Google Program on June 1, 2007.

So with Google, you just need to do things in a 'certain way" and you will derive huge benefits and riches from the Adsense Program.

You, as an Adsense Publisher will become a creator of websites that are full of unique and quality content. Your reward for creating these content rich sites is a big check from Google each month.

You are going to get everything you want in a way that will positively affect anyone that you touch. Every individual will have more than what they have now because of you.

Google has created this system and an entire organization and the whole universe on Adsense for the primary purpose of enriching your pockets.

Google is sometimes criticized for its hard stance on certain issues. Google can change its mathematical algorithms at a moment's notice and affect the income of thousands of publishers.

However, Google plays a necessary role in your path to riches. In order to become rich in the scientific way, you will rise above the competition.

You know that there is no limit to the number of advertisers that Google will enlist that need your websites to advertise their products and services.

You have to understand that there are countless millions of dollars worth of advertising that is transacted on websites everyday.

Google has kindly decided to share this wealth with you. You also must understand that the money you need will come, even as Google has created this opportunity for you, there are millions of surfers waiting to click on your particular ads on your specific website.

About The Author:

Virginia Sanders is considering being a life coach after reading The Science of Getting Rich. She believes that Google Adsense is part of a bigger plan to help you and anyone who wants it the vehicle to riches. Create Your Adsense Riches http://www.rewritepros.com/articlesitepowerkit