How to Make It Work

Pay Per Click (PPC) involves buying sponsored ads on the major search engines on a cost per click (CPC) basis (you only get charged whenever someone clicks your ad).

I’ll use Google AdWords PPC service as an example: you create an account, contruct your ad (you can make a text or image ad), add all the search keywords that you want to trigger your ad to show; and bid a maximum amount you’re willing to spend per click for each of these keywords.   There are more settings available to fine-tune your ad, but this is the core concept.

So, someone who is looking to buy baby toys goes to Google, types “baby toys” in the search box, and sees this:

The listings you see in the cream colored rectangle and the ads you see to the right are sponsored ads; the rest are natural, organic listings for the keyword “baby toys.”  If you can’t see the highlighted number in the top right corner, it says there are about 60.9 millions results for this keyword.  If you were to click any of these ads, the owner of the ad will be charged what he bid to get his ad to show.

Originally intended as a service for “regular” business owners that would allow them to get immediate exposure on Google (as opposed to the long turnaround time of organic, natural listings) PPC has morphed, and continues to morph, into an internet marketing playing field.   Originally (the years 2003-2006), it was a gold mine as quick  thinkers noticed the opportunity before them, put up ads and drove cheap traffic (1 to 10 cents per click) to affiliate offers they signed up for (offers where they would get a commission if they made a sale).  So if their sales commission was $2.00 and the click cost $.05, multiplied by 100+ sales a day, you can see how it can add up considerably.  In fact, $10,000 a day pay days were possible back then from PPC if you were good at it.

But now, things are very different.  The almighty Google (and other search engines) caught on to what was happening, and changed the rules.  Now you need to work 10 times as hard to have a successful PPC business, and because many people are doing PPC marketing, you’ll be wasting lots of money on useless clicks as your competitors click your ad to “compare notes.”  You’ll need to have a clean, optimized website or landing page with great content; a good standing in your AdWords account, preferably an aged domain, and the cojones to outbid your competitors for several weeks to push your ad to the top 5 spots.  I mean $1.00 or more a click, for most worthwhile keywords like insurance quotes and any electronic gadget like iphone.  You will have days of a $250++ AdWords bill and one sale for $5.00.  The idea is to keep spending so that your ad matures, and stays on top even as you lower your bids.  But you have to weather the storm and pay the piper; and even then, it’s not guaranteed that your site will get to the top 5 even after two weeks of bleeding money.

And it doesn’t stop there.  For some unbelievable reason that I don’t understand to this day, Google actually allows queries into its AdWords system and discloses advertisers’ strategic PPC information to those interested.  Greedy, opportunist software developers create “spy” applications that identify successful AdWords ads (there are hundreds of thousands on the Google network) by tracking how long the ads show up on Google for certain keywords.  The assumption is that older, aged  AdWords ads are generating a lot of money, otherwise the owners would have taken them down.   The software then STEALS the campaign settings:  the exact ad text, all the keywords, all the bids, just about everything.  You then create your own AdWords Ad by copying a “successful” one, changing the ad text slightly, saving you (supposedly) a TON of money and time testing one of your own.  In other words, these applications allow people to ride on the backs of others and cut in line.  This is not my cup of tea.  The spy software applications I know about are Google Cash Detective by Frank Kern, PPC Bully, and Hexa Track.  I list these to prove my point; you can check them out at your own peril.  I don’t want to provide the link because I can’t stand what these guys are doing, and I hope you agree with me.

In the end, what these applications do is create more intense PPC competition, and you know who the winner is?  Google.  More competition = higher minimum bids (this is just like supply and demand in economics– as demand goes up, the price goes up until a new, higher market level is established).   So instead of being charged $1.00 a click, it’s now $1.50 a click– cha-ching! for Google.  This is probably why Google gives out peoples’ PPC information; it makes PPC marketers fight over each other for its business.  The affiliate payout remains the same, but the cost for acquiring the sales rises.  Not a good thing for any type of business.

I complained to Google about this when I was big into PPC, but got no response.  After all, it is essentially stealing proprietary information, because it takes a lot of time and effort to make a successful PPC campaign.  Especially finding the high-converting keywords and key phrases that result in sales.  I would be extremely pissed if someone used one of these applications to steal MY PPC campaign, especially if it cost me several hundred dollars in PPC costs to test and tweak.

So, you can probably guess what my opinion is of PPC as an internet marketing business.   I may dabble in it here and there if I see a new opportunity, but I won’t spend the majority of my time doing PPC.  If you want to try it out, visit the PPC page on this site for general guidance.