Dave Greiner - May 2005
In his last article, Ben gave you a quick introduction into how search engines such as Google work. He also explained just how hard it can be to achieve a good ranking for the type of keywords you might be targeting.
As a follow up to that honest, but depressing article, I want to talk about a great alternative you might like to consider that can put you at the top of the results in less than 5 minutes.
Those Google guys are smart. They realise that only a very small number of us can get in the top results for any search term. They also realise that some of us will be willing to pay for that chance. Luckily for us, paid search engine advertising on Google, also known as Google AdWords, can be very cheap and very effective.
Before I walk you through the process, click here to open a new window showing AdWords in action for someone searching for a shiny new Backpack. They're the "Sponsored Links" down the right hand side of the page (highlighted in red in the image above).
From as little as 9 cents a click, your product or service can appear in the top results in Google. As I mentioned before, creating an account takes less than 5 minutes. Here's what you do:
Head over to adwords.google.com and click the "Click to begin" button.
Your choose who you want seeing your ad, from the entire world right down to your own suburb. Let's say the majority of your target market is in Sydney, and then you can set it so your ad only appears to anyone who searches Google in Sydney.
This is where you get to input the four lines of text for your ad. The length of each line is restricted, so the challenge is to fit your best marketing message into a short amount of space.
On the next screen you are asked to create a list of keywords you wish to use for your advertising. These are the words that will allow your ad to be displayed when someone uses Google to submit a search request. You want to make your keywords relevant to your ad and to your site, so that users will be more likely to click on your ad.
After you enter your keywords, Google asks you to specify the maximum amount of how much you are willing to spend per click. Their system will only charge you one penny more than the next highest bidder. The minimum amount to spend is $0.05 per click.
The more popular a keyword is, the more you may have to bid to appear on the search results. If you are fortunate to be advertising a product or service that is not normally advertised on Google you might only have to pay five cents per targeted visitor to your website. The costs can be much higher if you are willing to pay for a top listing in a competitive keyword space. Google will suggest an amount to pay to be the number one listing, and will estimate the number of clicks your ad should receive per day for the amount you're willing to pay.
The next step allows you to specify a total daily budget for your campaign. This feature allows you to enter the maximum you will pay to advertise on Google each day. Say you're paying 10 cents a click and you set a daily budget of $10, after 100 clicks, your ad will no longer appear for the rest of that 24 hour period. Once you entered all these details, the final step is to create your account and enter your contact details.
Remember though, that those 100 clicks I just mentioned are 100% targeted at people searching for your product, making AdWords one of the most targeted forms of advertising in the world today.
The best part is, you can create an account in minutes, give it a try for a week and if you're not happy, just close your account. Give it a go, you've got nothing to lose and potentially a lot to gain.
We've had experience running a number of successful AdWords campaigns for ourselves and a number of our clients, so don't hesitate to contact us if you have any questions or would like a hand getting started.