Pay Per Click
Pay Per Click
Managing Pay Per Click
The internet is filled with millions of websites. So how do you get your website noticed? It can be a major challenge to find ways to get your site to stand out from the crowd. While there are nearly as many traffic generating methods as there are competing websites, most of these methods can take months, if not years, to mature. The quickest and most effective way to create and control your website traffic is through a well-managed pay per click advertising campaign.
Pay per click campaigns are incredibly powerful marketing tools. These campaigns allow for intense customization. These precisely targeted campaigns come with many advantages and challenges. With Pay Per Click (also referred to as PPC) you have total control over your traffic. PPC Traffic can be targeted to specific keywords and niches and you can begin getting Traffic immediately. This immediate Traffic can turn into immediate profits and will help build your brand quickly.
The advantages of a PPC campaign, however, can come with some major challenges. In order to create a profitable PPC campaign you need to be flexible and able to consistently make wise decisions. Campaigns need to be constantly analysed and adapted to ensure you are targeting profitable keywords. If you allow your ads to be run on websites with related content you will also need to manage what websites your ads show based on conversion and profitability. This formula gets even more complex as you determine what the most profitable ratio of cost per click and volume is for your products and/or services.
One of the advantages of Pay Per Click is that you can decide how much you are willing to pay per visitor. Once you know your per visitor budget, you can use this information to find relevant content or search terms that will drive carefully targeted Traffic to your website. You can set the flow of Traffic to your website depending on what you are selling and how much Traffic you are looking to generate. This control allows you to test and hone your PPC campaign (and your website content) to maximize results without wasting money.
The process used to optimize your campaign can be an incredibly delicate balance. Because of the complexity of managing the benefits and challenges of a PPC campaign it is recommended that you use a pay per click professional to manage your campaign. The vast majority of self-funded campaigns end up being unprofitable. This is because it can take an incredible amount of skill and experience to find the right keyword terms, the right price per click and the right content optimization on your landing pages.
The first challenge in pay per click marketing is finding the right terms to target. This is critical as each term can have vastly different results. Simply changing a single word from singular to plural, for example, can dramatically influence the amount of Traffic and the quality of Traffic brought in by that specific keyword. These subtle differences can also make another major difference - how much you will have to pay for that Traffic. Take for example the keywords “dog training” and “training dogs”. These terms are incredibly similar (only the order and one letter is different!) yet they have completely different results. At the time of this writing, the term “dog training” has an AdWords cost per click of $1.21, while “training dogs” averages $1.56. 35 cents may not seem like much, but it can add up over the course of hundreds, or thousands, of clicks.
Let’s look at that example a little further. Which keyword is better? Some might argue that “dog training” is better because it is less expensive per click and gets higher Traffic. This might seem logical on the onset, but it isn’t that easy. To determine which keyword is better you would need to test the results.
How high do you need to bid for top placement on these keyword terms? How much Traffic can you generate based on your budget? And, most importantly, how does the Traffic from each keyword convert? Finding the answers to these questions is critical to PPC success. This research involves extensive testing and tracking for each term and click to evaluate conversion rates, lifetime customer value and costs. A professional PPC manager with a proven track record and results would be able to quickly run tests and analysis hundreds of potential keywords in order to find the targeted Traffic that has the lowest cost to revenue ratio.
A professional Pay Per Click manager can also give you valuable input on how your website is performing. What do customers do once they click over to your website? What keyword is generating potential customers and what keywords are generating costly visitors that leave before even looking at your content? Using this data they can recommend ways to increase the retention rate of visitors, improve repeat visitors and reduce your campaign Traffic bounce rate.
As you can see, managing a PPC campaign can be very time consuming. Time you are spending on tracking, testing and analysing PPC data is time you are not spending building your business. Outsourcing this task to a professional will allow you to focus on what you are most passionate and skilled at: managing and growing your business.
In spite of the challenges and commitment required by PPC campaigns, it is still a very clear and effective method to drive Traffic and increase profit. Google brought in over $28 million in advertising revenue for the year 2010. Businesses are buying Traffic through PPC at exponentially growing rates. Businesses and websites are using this as a primary advertising method for one simple reason. It works! As more and more companies begin to realize the potential provided by PPC, more are getting into the fold. This increased competition is increasing cost, no doubt, but it is also providing great potential.
Working with a team of trusted professional PPC managers will allow you to find the right balance of keyword targeting and landing page optimization. This partnership will provide a huge advantage over your competitors and will allow you to create an online marketing campaign that is successful and profitable.