TGIF!
Aren’t you glad its the weekend again?
It wasn’t too long ago, actually it was just 5 days back… Monday night to be exact; I attended the opening of the new Rustan’s Supermarket at the Ayala Mall and bumped into a good friend of mine Charlene. She was hosting the event. Charlene and I did a few projects together in the past when I used to produce shows and ran a cable channel.
Anyways the very words she said that I remember distinctly were “Where have you been hiding?!”
It is true, I feel like I have been in hibernation the past 7 months. Considering that I used to be out often, the past 7 months have actually been spent wisely on learning new advertising techniques and getting to know the internet better.
I have been doing several things online, and I would like to talk about one thing that has kept me busy - Pay Per Click Advertising!
Pay Per Click Advertising Or PPC is a form of paid advertising on a search engine like Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc. It is a great way to get instant and well targeted visitors to your website who are more likely to buy the product you are selling or perform a specific action that you want them to do.
If you have done a search on any search engine, you notice that aside from the Top 10 ranked search results, there are text ads which are boxed up either at the top or at the right side of the page; those are paid ads. If you were to click any of those boxed ads, Google bills the advertiser for that click; hence pay per click. You pay if your ads get clicked. Typically once you click such as ad, you are diverted the website of the advertiser or a specially created landing page for the sales offer or the needed action.
Some people feel that Pay Per Click advertising is expensive; that is true… especially if you do not do it right, it could get to be very expensive for you. Pay per click involves a well planned strategy, a knowledge of the market you want to reach out to, careful keyword research and well written ads. One more thing, and probably the most important, constant testing and tracking of results -finding out what works and what works better and going with what is better. Better is what yields improved results.
The ultimate goal of a PPC ad is to get a click that translates into a specific action that you intend the visitor to perform.
Unlike traditional advertising, the Pay Per Click model can track the Internet users from initial search results to the actual online purchase; and you can closely monitor and run the campaign to get the best returns.
Here are some great features of PPC advertising:
- You pay only when your ad gets clicked, and the clicker gets sent to your website or the destination you intend for the clicker to be sent after clicking your ad.
- You can activate and deactivate an ad instantly through the search engine PPC advertising interface. It can be tweaked at a moments notice.
-PPC advertising is accountable, with specific figures you can base a return of investment upon. Broadcast or print media is unable to tell specifically how many newspaper readers read, radio listeners heard or TV viewers saw an advertisement or commercial. With PPC, you know exactly how many people have seen your ad, you can also tell how many reacted to it by clicking on it. Further, of the number that clicked on it, you can also determine the percentage or the number that translated into an actual sale on your site.
Pay Per Click advertising is actually an advertising placement based on keywords searched for in the search engine, and your ads only get displayed if the specific keyword or phrase you placed your ad with, gets searched.
The advertising placement is called a bid; that is a specific amount of money you are willing to pay for each click. If you place the highest bid for a specific keyword or set of keywords, then you rank number one in these paid listings. So, if you bid $.25 per click on the keyword “bicycles”, and that’s the highest bid, you’ll show up first in line; and if in one day 10 people click on the ad tied in to that keyword, you will get charged $2.50 for that day.
It is a very dynamic marketplace, the higher you bid, the higher your advertisement will be displayed in the list; however there are exceptions such as Google Adwords which has an additional criteria that determines your ad placement; more than just the cost per click, Google takes into consideration your ad’s click through rate, or the percentage of clicks against ad impressions or views. What factor can give you a good click through rate? Well written and compelling ad copy.
The search engine pay per click industry has grown into a multi billion dollar industry in just a few years, and the search engines have worked to improve features and aid in delivering the PPC ads. There are several advertising delivery options, like delivering to specific countries, regions or cities. Or choosing a language to deliver ads in; setting a schedule for ads to be displayed and so on!
Pay Per Click advertising works great for local based businesses who want to sell to a world market or website owners who simply want more visitors who would enjoy the relevant content found on the advertised website.
If you would like to know more about Pay Per Click advertising and how it may help your business, feel free to send me an email.
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