Pay per click campaigns
Pay per click (PPC) is a model where advertisers pay when their advert is clicked on. Pioneered by Overture (who were subsequently acquired by Yahoo! in 2003) and then Google, PPC is most commonly used by search engines to generate their principal revenue stream.
The search engines offer a bid-based model where an advertiser bids for their adverts to appear against particular search phrases. Subsequently the competition and cost-per-click for popular phrases within certain industries can be high.
Conversion is king
That said, PPC is all about conversion. If your landing page gets 25% of all visitors to provide a name and address, and that name and address is worth £100 to you, then you would, in theory, be happy to pay up to £25 for every click. This is because you know that you will bring in leads within your acceptable range (£25 X 4 = £100).
PPC can also be used away from the bid-based model and some content sites will offer PPC adverts.
Who provides PPC?
Today, Google AdWords, Yahoo! Search Marketing, and Microsoft adCenter are the three largest PPC networks, and all three operate under a bid-based model.
In more recent years PPC has been used for other display advertising as there has been a shift for banner advertisements moving away CPM (cost per thousand impressions) to cost per click.
A step further from CPM and CPC is CPA (cost per account) which has developed from affiliate marketing models. Each step along the chain towards the goal reduces the risk for the advertiser and it is our belief that in an internet world where all marketing is, or at least should be, accountable that advertisers will continue to increase pressure to move the payment closer to the reward and therefore de-risk advertising spend.
What does this mean for your business?
PPC can offer a large quantity of high quality traffic as you're able to stipulate the source and relevance of the traffic in real time. We would recommend that our clients start by being clear about what they are looking to achieve from PPC and, once decided, ensure that the steps that the visitor must take once they have clicked on the advert are as short and as obvious to the user as possible.
Tools like Google Analytics and Google Optimizer are essential with PPC marketing and we often find that setting up dedicated web pages for PPC campaigns will give you better results.
How we can help
We can help you with your PPC strategy and run campaigns for you. And if you're already using PPC then why not ask us if we can help you improve the returns you're getting? We think you'll be impressed by the results.
Usually the CPC can be lowered or the landing pages improved and we believe we can deliver a return on any investment that you're currently making in this area.
In fact, we're so sure we can help you improve in this area that we're willing to analyse your website for free and give you our recommendations and opinions. Call us or complete our simple form and we'll get in touch at your convenience.
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