Writing outstanding ad copy for pay-per-click advertising campaigns is critical if a webmaster wants to be successful. Why waste money on clicks from people who aren't going to buy what a webmaster has to sell? To be as targeted as possible descriptive titles and effective ad copy are needed. Since the webmaster is paying for each click it's very important to have ad copy which conveys the right message to the right person. The challenge is the small area available from most advertising networks like Google (AdWords) or Yahoo! (Overture).



Successful PPC advertising campaigns should be made of at least 3-4 different versions of an ad for the same product. Advertising via PPC is not a "one size fits all" procedure. A webmaster should make sure he/she defines the right target groups before getting into the process of writing the ad copy. Studies have shown that if important keywords are included in the ad title and the body the conversion rate is going to be higher. This is going to be a challenge in many cases as the ads in pay-per-click search engines offer limited space. Google AdWords as an example allows for the following character limits"

Headline = 25 characters

Line 1 = 35 characters

Line 2 = 35 characters

Display URL = 35 characters

Other advertising networks have very similar limitations in place. The art of writing successful ads is also the art of fitting a message into these limits. The key to writing successful PPC ad copy is to write something that will stick out from the competition. An ad should pre-qualify the visitors. Well written ads are clear enough so that a potential visitor can already decide if he wants to click or if the offer does not really apply to him. The webmaster would waste a lot of money if the ad does not allow to make a decision if the advertised product or service will be of interest for the potential visitor. This pre-qualification through the ad copy may lower the click through rate, but a webmaster will be getting higher quality visitors in return.

Each PPC ad should be combined with a targeted landing page. A webmaster should not send visitors just to the homepage as the homepage could be too generic. Using the homepage as landing page has been proven to get lower conversion rates. A landing page should be the matching counterpart of the PPC ad. Highly targeted and filled with keywords and information relevant to the ad and the product a webmaster is trying to sell. The landing page should be easy to navigate and the 'sales message' needs to be highly visible. If a visitor needs more than 3-5 seconds to find what he is looking for, the chance to convert the visitor into a sale is going dramatically down.