[P126]Pay Per Click Engines

PPC and the Big Three

Don't stray far from the proven winners -- stick with Google, Yahoo and MSN for the best results. The Big Three are now offering very similar PPC services. These services all include being able to geo-target ads, set ads to turn on and off during peak times, and split test ad copy. Also, you have quality scores to optimize with each. The large majority of search traffic still belongs to Google, but each offers opportunities.

AdWords From Google

Google drives more quality traffic than ever, but you still need to be careful about monitoring your results with frequency. Either do this yourself or hire a professional PPC management company.

Keep in mind that pay per click with Google can sometimes be a challenge. Sure, the competition can be fierce in the PPC arena, and that can make things difficult. But the real challenge is how complex Google continues to get. "Quality Scores" play a major role these days and more bids come up "Inactive for Search." And there's more factors to consider in the making of a successful Google campaign. Don't be discouraged. If you make the effort to continually test and monitor your keywords, you can maintain a thriving account and avoid getting penalized. You'll also avoid seeing bid minimums raised or even being priced out. With a steady vigilance, you can finely adjust your ad campaigns to the point where you are actually paying lower prices, but getting higher ranks than the competition.

With any of the PPC engines, you need to make sure you separate out your content network advertising from your search advertising and track those separately. If you don't in Google, bad keywords are probably leaking your account right now.

If you are an advertiser with a large monthly budget, you just can't afford to ignore constant vigilance with Google -- it will cost you. Either spend more time on it, dedicate more staffing and hours or outsource it to a professional management company.

Yahoo Search Marketing: Still Essential

While Yahoo no longer dominates the pay per click arena as they once did, it's still wise to invest ad dollars with them. Yahoo Search Marketing (previously named Overture, which was previously Goto.com) made major changes last year in response to Google's moves in the PPC marketplace.

Yahoo also followed suit with their own "Quality Index" ... again, this is something that you have to work at. Quality scores must be dialed up with continual testing. Yahoo won't slap you with the frequency and force that Google does, but you will suffer if you don't do frequent split testing to refine your ad quality.

We recommend focusing on the three C's when it comes to testing that ad copy: Customer, Competition and your Company. Why are you better than your competition? Why are you more relevant to your client or consumer? Try varying your approaches with your ads. Once you've discovered one that really works, use it as a control and tweak your ad with little changes. For best results, continue the testing to drive up that Yahoo Quality Index.

MSN AdCenter

MSN came late to the party, but they shouldn't be ignored. We have seen some superb quality traffic and they even have some unique targeting capabilities. You can create the same geo-targeting type of local PPC campaigns as the others, but you can also take it a step further and target demographics of users. For instance, if you notice you have high conversions on your site for a certain type of visitor, MSN will allow you to crank up your bids when it identifies those potential customers using their search services.

An important new feature from MSN allows you to import your Google AdWords accounts with much more ease. Note: Make sure your Google campaigns are as optimized and finely tuned as possible, or you will be making the same errors twice by importing them. And unless you have time to monitor them both daily, it might better to smooth out your problems in Google first. If you have large Ad Groups with huge lists of keywords, you need to condense those down into smaller, more manageable ones. Doing this will allow you to pinpoint the keywords with more relevant ads. And, again, keep testing and re-testing your targeted ads over and over.

The Others

We've found inconsistent results from Ask and Looksmart. Some traffic will pay off for a short term, then tank with bad results a week later. As a result, your Earnings Per Click will die off...sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. Another hit or miss, is Miva. Keep your bids low and your management constant. A poor job managing your other pay per click accounts can be deadly with any of these others. You can find some good traffic there, but you have to boost your efforts on tracking and watch your results closely since things can turn bad fast. We recommend avoiding all the other pay per click engines.

You'll find that the PPC programs of Google, Yahoo, and MSN are probably more than enough work to keep you occupied -- especially if you are playing the game correctly. If you are not doing daily ad split tests, if you aren't keeping track of sales results down to the keyword level, if you are not searching for the money-making keywords that your competition is using, then you are not using the Big Three to the fullest potential. Invest your time, effort and money there before pushing on to others...you will get a better return on your investment.

Protect Your Investment

Ignoring the daily management needs of your PPC accounts will most likely result in bad keywords depleting your funds. On top of that, good keywords are getting more and more expensive because your quality scores are slipping compared to your competitors. Under-performing campaigns cost advertisers a huge chunk of potential business. It's up to you to protect your investment with effective, intelligent supervision of your in-house PPC marketing or by outsourcing this essential work to a professional pay per click management company.