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PPC Search Engines: Which Ones Are Worth your Advertising 
Dollars? (Part 2 of a 3 Part Series)
by Merle
 
In Part 1 of this series, we discussed the basics of Pay Per 
Click Search Engines (aka "PPC"). In this instalment, we're 
going to discuss some of the major players in the industry
and what it takes to get started with an account of your own.

1) Overture.com 
Formerly known as Goto.com, they were the first PPC in existence, 
and still the best. You'll get maximum impact for your money with 
Overture. You can open an account using the "self serve option" 
for only $50.00. Minimum bid is 5 cents with a $20.00 monthly 
minimum spend. That means if you rack up less then $20.00 in 
clicks you'll still be billed for the $20.00. The amount you bid 
determines your ranking in this search engine. 

For maximum impact you'll want to try to bid into the top
3 positions (called "premium listings"), as these spots are 
shown on some of the major search engines such as Yahoo, MSN,
Altavista, Lycos/Hotbot, and others (usually under the
heading of "sponsored listings"). This makes for great
exposure due to these extensive relationships with the 
majors.

2) Google.com - Ad Words Select 
Recently joining the arena of PPC with their new program "Ad 
Words Select," Google is aiming to give Overture a run for their 
money. Their program works slightly differently then Overture's; 
in some ways it's even better. To open an account you'll need to 
invest $5.00 and create short text ads. When searches are done 
on Google for your keywords/phrases, your ads will show up in 
the right hand column on the results page.

Unlike Overture, the position of your ads is based on two 
factors: the amount of your bid, and the clickthru rate
your ad receives. Google recently made a deal with AOL 
to show the top 3 Ad Words Select listings on AOL
Search, along with Earthlink and Sympatico. This really 
extends Google's reach and gives your site a chance to
be seen by AOL's 33 million users.

Minimum cost per click is 5 cents and you can set up a 
maximum daily spend amount if you're on a tight budget. 
Ads can be updated or changed whenever you like by 
logging into the control panel. 

Beware of Google's Editors, who are a tough crowd to please
and will block your ads if they don't meet their "strict
guidelines." One thing they don't allow is all caps in your 
URL. For example, they won't let you put "YourDomain.com" in 
your ad because they feel this is "excessive capitalization." 
So you'll have to settle for "yourdomain.com." I told you they 
were tough.

3) LookSmart.com
They're not looking too smart these days after they angered many 
of their existing customers by changing them over from a 
pay-for-submission to a PPC model. They call the new program 
"LookListings Small Business." To open an account you'll pay a 
$49.00 set-up fee plus a refundable deposit of $150.00. Click 
thrus are all charged the same amount of .15, so your bid won't 
buy you any kind of position. You'll need to rely on relevant
keywords and a great title and description for best placement. 
Unlike Overture, you'll find no bidding wars here.

LookSmart's search engine partners include MSN, Netscape,
Altavista, Prodigy and CNN.com

You set a monthly spend amount and LookSmart emails
reports each month of all activities.

4) FindWhat.com
Launched in Sept of 1999 and serving up over 22 million searches 
per day. Since FindWhat is not as well known, you can bid on many 
keywords for much less than you would pay for them with Overture. 
To activate an account you'll need to deposit $25.00. Payment can 
be made by check or credit card. No minimum monthly spends are
required here. Minimum bid amount is 1 cent.

They do run an affiliate program whose sponsors show their
search results. Some of their affiliates and partners are:
Mamma.com, Dogpile, MetaCrawler and CNET's Search.com.
But to be shown on these sites you'll need to bid into the 
top 3 positions. FindWhat also has a reputation for offering
excellent customer service.

5) Kanoodle.com
Currently receiving over 410 million searches per month. Other 
sites that pull from Kanoodle's paid listings are MetaCrawler, 
Mamma.com and Netzero as well as 9,800 "other" search enabled 
sites. 

Minimum amount needed to open an account is $25.00. Minimum bid 
is 1 cent. Can be paid by credit card or check. With only 1 cent 
per click, you can bid on a lot of keywords and make your 
marketing dollars go a lot further.

If you're interested in checking out a few others, here are some 
that are not as well known but will give you free advertising 
money just for opening up a new account:

http://www.Ban-X.com    ($50.00)
http://www.CoreFind.com ($100.00)
http://www.searchanytime.com/ ($10.00)
http://www.stanico.com/  ($50.00)
http://www.najula.com/ - Buy 10.00 and they'll give you an extra $30.00
http://www.jjump.com - Whatever amount you deposit they'll match it.

Some other popular PPC's to investigate are:

http://www.7Search.com
http://www.Ah-Ha.com
http://www.Epilot.com
http://www.Sprinks.com

To get traffic to your website you need to utilize many 
different promotional tactics. Incorporating a good PPC search 
engine strategy will send you highly qualified traffic for 
pennies on the dollar, and the best part is you only pay when 
they "Click."

In Part 3 of this series (SiteProNews - July 22nd issue), we'll 
discuss some tools that will make managing your PPC bids a snap.

================================================================
Merle http://www.EzineAdAuction.com "Where some of the BEST Deals 
in Ezine Advertising are Made". Buy & Sell Ezine Ads in a live 
auction setting! Publishers sell off your excess inventory and 
Buyers pick up some Fantastic bargains. Free E-book on how to
write "glowing" ezine ads.....Download Now at:
http://www.ezineadauction.com/ebooks/greatezineads.pdf 
================================================================

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