Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising is a system where you pay Google.com, or other companies, to place your ad on their site and you pay them a certain amount of money per click to do that. This means that every single visitor to your site could cost you several dollars each. This can add up very fast. There are businesses that spend huge fortunes on this type of advertising. But why? Can’t you just hire an SEO guy to optimize your site and get your web traffic that way? Wouldn’t that save you a fortune?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) can generate traffic for you. In fact, you could build a highly successful business using SEO and never pay for PPC ads at all. But it isn’t as easy as it sounds. SEO experts cost a fortune and the results may disappoint you. They might make you number one for some terms, but are those the right terms? How long will you stay number one? How long will it take to become number one? What does it cost to stay there? By the time you get to the top and stay there, you will be spending quite a bit on SEO work. It is probably worth the expense and trouble. I am not knocking SEO. I do that myself. But SEO is not the only strategy. It is expensive, has some risks, and may not work as fast as you want it to. SEO is one option and has it’s own strengths and limitations.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising seems very expensive when you think of it in terms of cost per click. But contrasting that with SEO, you know exactly how many visitors you get for your money. With SEO it is an unknown. With PPC, it is an exact science. With PPC, you also have the advantage of being able to totally change directions very quickly simply by adjusting your ads whenever you like. You can also start and stop ad campaigns when needed, so it is easy to manage your budget as needed.
Another very popular use of Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising is to do trial ads in order to test the effectiveness of keywords, of landing pages, and of the wording of your ads. It can help you optimize your print ads, online ads, and give you solid guidance on how to optimize your sites for search engines.
One more thing to consider when contemplating the decision to use Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising is that there are many businesses out there that spend a fortune on ads. I have worked with two companies that have a budget in excess of $1M/year on PPC ads. Why would someone do that? Because it works! PPC advertising can be highly effective when it is setup and optimized for your business.
There are tricks and strategies to help you get the most out of your Pay-Per-Click (PPC) campaign. This is why there are experts out there. Bad bidding on bad keywords with bad ads will give you a poor results. But optimized campaigns that are well tested and optimized can be quite profitable. If you are not getting good results, then make some changes and see if things improve. If you aren’t sure how to do “split testing” or how to evaluate your campaigns, then consider getting some training or hire an expert to help you.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) may not be for everyone. But for some, it is the only way to go. This is a hugely popular method of getting traffic and I encourage you to consider it.
