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Creating an Effective Pay-Per-Click Campaign
by Angela Wu ©Copyright 2003

Optimizing your website for the 'traditional' search engines 
can be a daunting task, and one that many people are either 
unable or unwilling to attempt. Fortunately, pay-per-click 
search engines (PPC SEs) allow us to specify exactly what key 
phrases we want to be listed under -- for a price.

In brief, you simply "bid" on the key phrases you want. Your 
bid indicates how much you're willing to pay for a click on your 
link - in other words, every time someone clicks your link, you 
pay 10 cents or whatever you bid on that particular search term. 
The highest bidder gets placed at the top of the search results, 
the second highest bidder gets the next listing, and so on. It's
a quick way to get exactly the search terms you want.

Obviously you want to maximize the effectiveness of your 
pay-per-click campaign since you're paying for traffic! 
Here are a few tips to get you started:


1. Know Your Website's Conversion Rate

What percentage of unique visitors to your website actually 
make a purchase? For instance, a website that makes 1 sale for 
every 100 visitors has a conversion rate of 1%.

Although the quality of visitors you get from a pay-per-click 
search engine may be higher or lower than what you normally get 
through other marketing means, knowing your CR will give you a 
"baseline" to help determine how high you're willing to bid.

For example, let's say your conversion rate is 1%. Based on this, 
you need 100 clicks on your link to make 1 sale. That's $10 if 
your bid is 10 cents/click. Figure out whether or not your profit 
margin is sufficiently high enough to justify the cost. If so, 
are you willing to go spend even more to get your link displayed 
higher in the search results and possibly generate more clicks 
and sales? Will the additional sales justify the extra cost?


2. Target the RIGHT Key Phrases

The goal is to drive traffic and sales to your website. Choosing 
the right key phrases is therefore critical: if you choose a 
search term that no one uses, you won't get any traffic. If you 
choose the wrong key phrase you may end up with visitors who 
aren't really interested in your products and services. Use 
Overture's Search Term Suggestion Tool to help you research the 
appropriate key phrases for your business:
http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/


3. Qualify the Visitor Before He Clicks On Your Link

You pay every time someone clicks your link, so make sure he's 
a qualified visitor! Make good use of your title and description 
to encourage visitors who are specifically looking for a product 
or service like yours, while discouraging people who are "just 
curious".

For instance, you may sell professional website templates -- but 
some people are only interested in fr^e templates they can use 
for personal websites or small projects. These are the people 
you *don't* want to attract.


4. Spend Time Writing Good Titles and Descriptions

Create titles and descriptions specifically for each of your 
search terms. They should "speak" directly to the type of 
visitor you're catering to. For instance, if you sell a variety 
of golf clubs, you might bid on "used golf club", "discount golf 
club", and "ladies golf club". Use each of these terms in the 
title and description to help catch the prospect's attention.


5. Send the Visitor Directly to a "Sales" Page

Instead of linking to your home page where the visitor may be 
presented with a variety of choices, link to a page which asks 
the visitor to complete just one action. That doesn't necessarily 
mean you have to send them to a page where they're asked to make 
a purchase; you can also direct visitors to your newsletter 
subscription page, or a page where they're asked to answer a 
survey.


6. Consider Using the Smaller PPC SEs

Overture is the best-known and most popular of the pay-per-click 
search engines. However, you can still benefit from the smaller 
ones as well, such as 7Search or FindWhat. Even though you may 
not get the same amount of traffic as you would from Overture, 
your money isn't "wasted" since you still only pay for actual 
clicks on your link. In fact, the bids are usually far lower on
the smaller PPC SEs. Take advantage of the cheaper traffic.


7. Find the Bid Position that Offers the Best Value

Many people try to get the #1 listing for their search phrase. 
While the links in the top three positions may get the most 
traffic, you can still get good traffic from links on the first 
few pages. Some people even argue that these visitors are more 
qualified -- they took the time to read your link and are 
interested in what you have to offer. They didn't just click 
your link because it happened to be the first one.

Another thing to watch for are "bid gaps". As an example, at 
the time of writing, Overture showed the following bids for the 
search phrase "golf clubs":

Position #1 - 54 cents/click
Position #2 - 50 cents/click
Position #3 - 41 cents/click
Positions #4 and #5 - 40 cents/click
Position #6 - 33 cents/click

Most of the above bids are separated by several cents per click
... if you wanted position #3, you could bid 42 cents (be sure 
to read the bids above AND below the position you want... 
otherwise, in this example you could end up paying 49 cents/click 
for position #3!). However, position #6 is available for a mere 
34 cents. That may not seem like much when you're just looking 
at a single click, but that's a difference of $8 for every 100 
clicks! Your savings can add up quickly. You have to decide 
whether the extra cost is worth being higher up in the search 
results.

Pay-per-click search engines may not be the cheapest way to 
promote your online business, but they can be a very effective 
part of your overall marketing plan. Remember that it's not how 
much you spend that's so important, but rather how much return 
you get on your investment!

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Angela is the editor of Online Business Basics, a practical guide 
to marketing a business on a beginner's budget. This guide offers 
loads of instantly useable tips and links, in a down-to-earth 
style that even marketing "newbies" can understand! A helpful 
Online Business Dictionary is included too... visit: 
http://onlinebusinessbasics.com/article.html
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