What is PPC?

Pay-Per-Click is a paid form of advertising, popularized mostly by the "search engine". The concept is fairly simple. Businesses bid to be placed at or near the top of the search results for particular keyword phrases. The bidding is done on a "per-click" basis, meaning that a company pays a specific amount every time the engine sends them a visitor. In addition, the top results on Overture also show up in the results of many of the popular search engines (usually listed as "sponsored" or "featured" results). Google has a similar version of PPC (AdWords Select) that has taken over some of the engines that used to display Overture results..

Advantages

Pay-Per-Click campaigns have some advantages over traditional search engine optimization. The implementation of a pay-per-click campaign is relatively quick- it can take just a few minutes to start getting targeted traffic, versus sometimes months for standard SEO campaigns.

Limitations

Of course, there are limitations to this type of advertising. New bids can lower the positions of other firms, and many will react by raising their bid to regain a previous ranking. Monitoring of positions becomes crucial. These campaigns can also become prohibitively expensive, depending on the competitiveness of the keyword phrases and the aggressiveness of the competition. In addition, many of the "savvier" search engine users have learned to recognize PPC results as paid advertising and bypass them without consideration.

Selecting Keyphrases

As with typical search engine optimization, keyword research is critical to the success of a PPC campaign. Unlike typical search engine optimization, there aren't practical limits on the number of phrases to target. Usually, there is no extra cost to add as many keyword phrases as possible. This makes the keyword selection process easier, since there is not a good deal of resources committed to optimizing a site for a particular keyword set.

Monitoring and Analyzing

It is crucial to the success of any PPC campaign that it be monitored regularly, since positions can and do change every day. Since the top three Overture or Google AdWords results are what typically show up on most partner engines (some display more), the competition for these spots can be fierce, and bidding wars are common. If the price gets too high, it is usually prudent to withdraw and pursue a different keyphrase (the only way to really "lose" a bidding war is to pay too much for each visitor!). Apart from position monitoring, it is important to track and analyze the effectiveness of individual keyword phrases on a monthly basis. Viewing click-through rates and studying visitor habits can lend valuable insight into their motivations and habits, and help to further refine a Pay-Per-Click campaign.

CONCLUSION

Pay Per Click campaigns can bring large numbers of highly targeted visitors to your website. Depending on the nature of your business it is crucial to have a successful PPC campaign if you want to succeed online.