You are here: Home / Archives for pay-per-click

Learn the customer’s language with exact keyword matching

September 28, 2007 By Leave a Comment

Pay-per-click is much more then paid advertising. Not only is PPC the best return on marketing spend available, but it is, or should be, at the heart of all marketing campaigns.

One example of using pay-per-click to help with other marketing campaigns is through Exact Match keyword targeting.

Often advertisers get caught up in internal jargon. Within the industry it may be an acceptable form of communication. However, it is the customer that pays the bills.

To obtain accurate results from pay-per-click, having various match types is essential. By bidding on all variations of keywords advertisers are able to see which keywords customers are typing into a search query. Google, as an example has four different keyword matching options (broad, phrase, exact, negative), each with their own advantages and disadvantages. For example Broad Match, the default setting, includes all variations of the keyword in the query. Broad Match as it stands is full or problems.

However, Exact Match is the most targeted option available. It only shows ads when the exact phrase is used. Exact Match will provide instant feedback into the language of the customer. It is not to say there is not a place for other match types. Ideally, all variations should be tested. In fact, Exact Matching will inevitably bring in fewer visitors than other forms of matching. However, Exact Matching is a great way to gather instant customer analytics.

With pay-per-click, there is very little guess work in marketing. However, the trouble arises when traditional advertisers do not understand or believe in the power of pay-per-click marketing. Many companies still see it as separate advertising model and fail to tie the relationship back to traditional off-line campaigns. By analyzing pay-per-click reports advertisers can pull dramatic customer analytics. With that knowledge all marketing campaigns can benefit, thus eliminating traditional guess work from traditional advertising


** Find more articles from John W Ellis at http://www.johnwellis.com/

Filed Under: john ellis, marketing, pay-per-click

Separate Content from Search – An Effective PPC Habit

September 13, 2007 By Leave a Comment

Contextual advertising places paid listings on relevant sites that are not search engines. Google, for example, has a network of what they call “high-quality partner sites”. Contextual ads give advertisers a chance to reach potential consumers at a different stage of the buying cycle. It also allows additional ad format other than the typical text ads, such as images and videos.

Google’s content network has come a long way over the past several years. Two years ago, I would not have recommended content advertising. Now, I can definitely say it’s worth checking into.

However, it is still very important to keep content ads separated from search ads. Because the stage of the buying cycle is completely different, the only way to get accurate statistics is to separate content from search.

It’s normal to expect lower clicks and lower conversion rates in content advertising. However, that gap is decreasing.

The separation provides much more insight into what is working, and more importantly what is not working. Plus, it allows marketers to create unique creative for these different websites.

It was a mistake for the search engines to have ever positioned this type of advertising as search. It never was and should not have been bundled with search. However, as mentioned, content advertising has come a long way. I was definitely against it, but now I am a believer.


** Find more articles from John W Ellis at http://www.johnwellis.com/

Filed Under: adwords, Google, john ellis, pay-per-click, ppc

SES San Jose: In House: Big PPC

August 23, 2007 By 1 Comment

An interesting session I attended at the Search Engine Strategies conference in San Jose was ‘In House: Big PPC.’ This featured several search engine marketing professionals from large corporations. Fox Interactive Media, Intuit, Adobe and a couple of agencies were on the panel.

It was refreshing to learn that even larger, world-wide companies have the same struggles. Although, I thoroughly love my job and my company, there are many unique issues when combing multiple products and brands under one SEM account. It was refreshing to hear that the grass is not really greener on the other side.

For example, when asked about web analytics all three major corporation said they have mixture of various programs for different products and brands. They have product lines that had little or no web analytics. There was also very little combined reporting. They are all wishing, and in some cases working on a combine solution for all of their sites. However, that did not sound like that was happening very soon.

The goal for Fox, Adobe, and Intuit is to combine all search engine marketing efforts of all brands, product lines, and business units. The idea is to not have internal bid wars and messaging conflicts in search marketing efforts. However, one of the struggles was figuring out how to pay for search engine campaigns when all of these business units have their own budgets and accounting codes. There was no clear answer on this topic. They all acknowledge it is a unique, large in-house, problem. Again, that was oddly refreshing to hear that they struggle with that as well.

I also learned from Bill Macaitis, VP of Online Marketing & SEO/SEM at Fox Interactive Media, that he is hiring. He asked several times for contacts and business cards for those who may be interested. I wanted to pass that on to all my search marketing pals.

** Find more articles from John W Ellis at http://www.johnwellis.com/

Filed Under: john ellis, pay-per-click, Search Engine Strategies, SEO In House, SES

Google changes the top ad placement formula

August 9, 2007 By Leave a Comment

Google just announced they are “improving” their top ad placement formula, which should eliminate advertisers buying their way to the top of the paid rankings.

Find the original post here: Upcoming change to the top ad placement formula

These new changes take affect “within the next few weeks”.

Google will use actual cost-per-click, along with max CPC bid and quality score to calculate the top position. Although, Google has been using quality score for some time now, this new formula will emphasis it even more. (Another reason to avoid bid management software.)

These new changes give the advertiser a better opportunity to reach the top spot.

Although I appreciate the effort, as an advertiser, I am not sure how much this really affects me. As I have stated before, it is often the better investment to avoid the number one position. Unless this change will bring in a higher quality visitor, I can not see this really affecting my changes anytime soon.

Again, it is not to say it is not a good move by Google. Anything that will give all advertisers a fair chance is an excellent move. Ideally, this will prevent some advertisers from buying their way into the top position and that’s a good thing.

** Find more articles from John W Ellis at www.JohnWEllis.com

Filed Under: adwords, Google, john ellis, pay-per-click, ppc

Pay-Per-Click is Customer Analytics

July 19, 2007 By Leave a Comment

I was recently asked to contribute to The DM News Essential Guide to Search Engine Marketing. Below are some highlights from the article …

Pay-per-click advertising is, at its basic level, paying for ad placement in search engines.

That is pay-per-click for the basic user. Unfortunately, most PPC advertisers are basic users. Pay-per-click is much more then paid advertising. Not only is PPC the best return on investment available, but it is, or should be, at the heart of all marketing campaigns. Pay-per-click can provide customer analytics through ad testing, geo-targeting, match types and discovering SEO targets. PPC advertising provides an instant view into the mind of the customer at an extremely low-price.

Ad Testing
Ad rotation gives the advertiser great insight into the mind of the customer. For instance, do customers click more on ads that offer “Free Shipping” or “Free Item with Purchase?” Another example, do discount mentions convert better than guarantees?

Geo-targeting
Geo-targeting resolves any geographic uncertainty about customers. For example, more customers from Region A may click on ads. However, more customers from Region B may actually convert and purchase.

Learn the customer’s language with exact keyword matching
Exact Match is the most targeted option available. It only shows ads when the exact phrase is used. Exact Match will provide instant feedback into the language of the customer. It is not to say there is not a place for other match types. Ideally, all variations should be tested. In fact, Exact Matching will inevitably bring in fewer visitors than other forms of matching. However, Exact Matching is a great way to gather instant customer analytics.

Discover highly targeted keywords for organic search rankings
Instead of creating search engine optimization initiatives to tackle hundreds of keywords, the top converted pay-per-click keywords are targets. Site content, link building, and various other search engine optimization techniques can push these elite keywords. Advertisers do not have to waste time trying to get rankings on keywords that do not convert. The numbers are provided; it does not matter where the competition is ranked. By following the pay-per- click keyword statistics advertisers are able to get instant customer analytics to use for search engine optimization efforts.

With PPC, there is very little guesswork in marketing. By analyzing pay-per-click reports advertisers can pull dramatic customer analytics. With that knowledge all marketing campaigns can benefit, thus eliminating traditional guesswork from traditional advertising.

** Find more articles from John W Ellis at http://www.johnwellis.com

Filed Under: john ellis, pay-per-click, ppc, Web Analytics