Everyone with a business and a website wants their website to be prominently featured on the search engines. Pay Per Click advertising is a way to ensure that your products and services are found by people who are searching for information related to those products or services. Google is a perfect example.
If someone is searching for topics on weight loss for women, for example, on the left side of the page of results will be a list of websites, and on the right side of the page will be a list of pay per click advertisements geared specifically to the keyword phrase "weight loss for women". On Google you can recognize these by looking the words "Sponsored Link" in small print at the top of the page area.
The advertiser is charged only when someone clicks on their advertisement. That is where the phrase PPC or pay per click originates. To make sure that their advertisement appears in the most relevant searches, advertisers will research and come up with a list of keywords that are most relevant to what they sell. Now, PPC advertising can be highly a highly effective way of making money, but it's also a great way to lose a lot of money if it isn't done right.
Here are five ways to get off to the right start before setting up and launching your PPC campaign:
Pay Per Click Advertising: Five Best Business Marketing Habits
1. Pick Best Keywords
Make sure that the web page that you send people to from the PPC ad is well designed and optimized to convert visitors. And if you don't know what that means, do research into optimizing a sales page or landing page BEFORE you start a PPC campaign. You are paying good money to send people to your website, and you want to turn those advertising dollars into profit. Your home page is most likely NOT the best page to send them to; you want to send them to a site page which has been specifically and professionally designed to sell.
If possible, split test several pages; most PPC campaigns allow for this. To split test, you change one variable on a web page and see which one converts most successfully. Experiment with different headlines, with different offers, with different color schemes - but only change one element at a time, test it for a few days, and then move on to new tests until you've come up with your winning formula.
2. Research Keyword Quantity and Quality
Make sure that the keywords that you select have enough monthly searches. Several thousand searches a month is a good target range. Google has a free keyword research tool which is excellent, and there are a number of reputable paid tools as well.
3. Control Your Costs
Keep an eye on keyword costs at all times. Profit with a PPC campaign involves a careful balance of expenses versus profit. If one of your competitors is outbidding you on a keyword, don't cling to that one keyword if it gets too expensive. You should have a list of dozens or hundreds of keywords. Don't be the person who gets caught up in auction fever and ends up spending far too much just for the sake of winning the auction. You may spend so much per keyword that your campaign stops being profitable no matter how much you earn.
4. Test Headlines and Copy
Test different PPC ads to see which ones convert the best, which ones get higher click rates, and so on. PPC is all about continually testing, tracking, and refining. If you test - track carefully and test long enough.
5. Strong Spending Limits
Set a small daily limit in the beginning and experiment for at least a few weeks before you start pouring a lot of money into a campaign. This will help you identify successful keywords and successful PPC advertisements. And never forget to set your daily spending limit on your ad campaigns, or you could wake up the next day and find that thousands of people have clicked on your ads - which is only helpful if your home page is successfully converting enough visitors into sales.
If not, you could be clicked into bankruptcy, or at least a huge PPC bill.
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