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Google AdWords
Yet Another Promotional Tool

by
Jeff Colburn

Many people ask me how they can get their website listed on the first page of a search result on Google, or in the top ten listed sites. There are actually two ways to accomplish this.

The first, and easiest, way is to hire a firm that specializes in this kind of marketing. They can guarantee that you will be in the top ten, and maybe the top three, sites listed from a search. However, this service can easily cost $2,000 to $10,000 a month.

The other option involves lots of work. You will need to have good keywords, new relevant content added to your site regularly, put this content on free article sites, lots of links to and from your site (though Google may make this obsolete soon), put postings on forums that cover topics related to your website and you can use Google AdWords.

Basically, AdWords is a Pay Per Click (PPC) program that lets you bid on keywords. PPC means that a link that will take people to your site is put on a website that is set up with a PPC program. Every time someone clicks on the link to go to your site you pay a fee. That's where the term Pay Per Click comes from.

Setting up a PPC campaign on Google is pretty easy.

Target your customers by selecting from dozens of languages and almost 200 countries. You can narrow this down even more by selecting from a list of cities and regions.
Create the copy for your ad and select the keywords that will trigger the ad. Google has a tool that will help you select keywords.
Choose what currency you want to use, what you're willing to pay per click and how much you want to spend per day.
Create an AdWords account by providing your e-mail address and a password to Google. When you want to activate your ad, you log into your account and give Google your billing information.

Once this is done you can create multiple Campaigns (ads) and turn them on or off as you wish. Then, when someone does a search, the ads that bid the highest for the keyword used in the search are placed on a list on the right side of the search page.

The order is determined by the highest price paid for a keyword and the popularity of the ad. If two people bid on the keyword "Tennis," then the person who bid $2 per click will be placed above the person who bid $1 per click. If the $2 per click person reaches his budgeted maximum for the day, then his ad will no longer be displayed and the $1 per click person will move to the top of the list. Google does factor in the clickthrough rate, so if my $1 ad is below yours, but a lot more people click on my link, then my ad will be moved above your $2 ad.

So let's do the Yin and Yang thing to see the full story.

Advantages of Google AdWords:

It's easy to set up.
There is no minimum monthly fee.
Google offers many tools so you get the most for your money.
There's no contract. You can start and stop an ad whenever you want.
You can have your ad campaign up and running almost immediately after you create and activate it.
You can access reports that let you know how well your ads are working.

Disadvantages of Google AdWords:

Let's face it, it's an ad. Will anyone look at it or will they just ignore it like they do newspaper and magazine ads? Well, someone must be looking at them or people would stop using AdWords, but I don't think it's as rosie as Google would like you to believe.
Google offers so many help pages it can get confusing, at least to me. I'd like to see an Acrobat file of everything so I can download it to my computer.
You need to constantly monitor, change and fine-tune your ad and keyword selection.
AdWords is ONE thing you can use to promote your site, not the ONLY thing. Don't put all of your eggs into one basket.
Your ad will be small (70 characters maximum) so your copy must be perfect.
As this kind of online advertising becomes more popular, the price will go up. Bigger companies with large advertising budgets will be able to pay more per click than many small businesses.

So is AdWords right for you? That depends on many factors, but if you want to try a PPC program Google would be an easy and affordable way to try it out.

Do you want to learn how to make your website work for you and not against you? Then visit The Creative Cauldron NOW to find the answers to your questions, and achieve what you want in life. Go to www.TenCommonWebMistakes.com to download the FREE report "Ten Common Mistakes Found On Websites, And How To Fix Them."

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Google AdWords Yet Another Promotional Tool

Google AdWords
Yet Another Promotional Tool