Google AdWords is the Internet Company’s biggest advertising product. Under this source of revenue, Google offers potential clients advertising in the form of rich-media ads, pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, site-targeted advertising and cost-per-thousand (CPM) advertising, with pay rates differing depending on whether the distribution range is local, national or international.

If you’re wondering what Google AdWords looks like, all you need to do is search for a keyword on Google. You can then take note of the text-based advertisements strategically placed along the results page. Typically, these advertisements usually only consist of one eye-catching headline followed by two text lines. Occasionally, images are also added with sizes complying to the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) standard.

Why PPC?

Of the four types of advertising forms offered by Google AdWords, pay-per-click (PPC) is the most popular. Essentially, PPC involves creating a text-based advertisement which is then displayed in websites via AdSense and on Google search pages via AdWords. Like its namesake suggests, Google is only paid each time someone clicks on the PPC advertisement which brings them to the landing page of your website.

The reason why PPC is the most widely used form of advertising on Google is simply because anyone can afford this mode of advertising and you only pay when someone clicks on your ad. At the same time, the affordability of PPC does not dent the fact that anyone can unleash their creativity by attracting new site visitors with less than 25 characters of title space. In the event that your advertisement gets a lot of attention, rest assured that you won’t be forking out your life savings to Google as you have the option of selecting the maximum amount you are willing to pay per click as well as the maximum amount of money you are willing to spend on a daily basis.

PPC also offers website owners the right to manage their advertising as well, in the sense that you also get to choose your targeted language, country and location you would like your advertisement to appear most frequently on. In other words, AdWords PPC allows you to target a niche group interested in your product or services, as opposed to randomly promoting your company to the entire World Wide Web.

As something cool on the Internet can become a faux pas seemingly overnight, investing in AdWords allows you to reach your audience in an instant. With the right keywords, PPC via Google AdWords can help generate targeted traffic within minutes of opening said account whereas other traditional forms of advertising will require days (or even weeks) to process and publish advertisements. In contrast, PPC empowers the owners to adjust their ad campaign based on the changing interests of its audience.

The PPC Campaign Structure

Of course, with everyone else jumping on board the PPC bandwagon, it is of the upmost importance that you separate yourself from the rest of the pack with a winning AdWords structure as the quality of your advertisement practically determines how well your account will perform on the Google search pages.

Step One: Choosing Your Campaign

There are about half a dozen ways to run your campaign. While most people base their advert on products and services offered, others focus on location whereas there are also those who concentrate solely on performance and bidding, branding, seasonality and keyword match types. Whichever focus group you select, be sure to plan your ad groups to run parallel to your campaign as well. For instance, advertising stiletto heels and bondage skirts to eighty year old retirees will certainly not generate you large volumes of revenue. At the end of the day, all of your marketing strategies (i.e. your campaigns, ad groups and keywords) must all be tightly relevant to each other to better your chances of running a successful advert.

Step Two: Check Your Settings

Having the wrong settings for your PPC might not cause your campaign to fail, but it might also cause some loss of profits. The most vital setting you must correct is the Location and Languages mode for obvious reasons. If you have Search Network enabled, you might also want to adjust the advanced location options as well that can be used for targeting and exclusion.

You can then decide on where you would like your advertisements to be displayed on the Internet via the Networks and Devices settings. On the Search and Content Network, you have the option of selecting between only appearing on Google searches versus debuting on Google.com as well as all other partnering sites.

Step Three: Choosing Your Devices

Under the Devices Settings, you can decide on whether your PPC appears only on desktops, laptops, mobile devices or all of the above. Unless you are intent on focusing on a mobile phone campaign or desktop/laptop exclusive campaign, we usually recommend advertisers choose all of the above for wider viewership.

How the Bidding Model Works

The Bidding and Budget setting is most certainly the most important in terms of monetary gains. Setting a budget for your PPC is a pretty delicate matter as an over exposed advertisement can cause you to use up your entire advertising budget overnight whereas a barely seen advert will not allow your campaign to reach its full potential. To determine the ideal daily budget for your campaign, all you need to do is divide the total number of days in that month by the number of campaigns you own. You can then reallocate accordingly once the account is running actively.

According to AdWords Help, the key to a successful bidding model is in increasing your maximum Cost-Per-Click (CPC). Hence to increase your CPC, you are literally obliged to outbid other advertisers. The good news is that even if your bid is several dollars (e.g. $5) in difference from the second highest bidder (e.g. $0.58), you will only be paying an extra penny higher than the second highest bidder (e.g. $0.59). Of course, this also means that competing advertisers may purposefully push your bidding price upwards simply by setting their bids constantly below yours.

For the bidding virgin, we recommend that you first start out by focusing on manually bidding for clicks as this allows you best control over your budget. In due time, you might also consider conversion optimization offered by Google, although those are usually best suited for campaigns which generate over 15 conversions every month.

Here’s a great video on the bidding model:

If you have any questions about PPC we’d love to talk!

What do both of these types of companies have in common? Internet Marketing is a great option for either to accomplish their goals.

In the not too recent past, when someone wanted to purchase a product, they looked up a company in those big books with yellow pages. Ma Bell was required to deliver one to every household and everyone used them and companies paid big bucks to be in them.  Many states are now passing legislation that makes phone books an “opt in” or available only upon request.  Subsequently, according to All About Market Research, internet search usage has grown 30% each of the past two years. So, what are companies to do about this growing trend?

Why should you use the internet to market your company? A few simple reasons:

• Marketing investment (like SEO services) for your business is Tax Deductible.  (Not too late to take advantage of this tax benefit)
• The vast majority of your customers use Google and other Search Engines to do research, get information and/or find needed products/services.
• To be front and center where and when your customers are looking for you.
• Easily measure success and track results of your investment.
• Establish Credibility for your Brand.
• Social Media and email marketing provide a venue to communicate with and stay in front of your potential customers proactively.
• Most cost effective form of advertising available.  (Best bang for the buck)

 1 – It’s where your competitors are. Have you checked online to see where your competitors are and where they rank in comparison to your company on the search engines?  It only makes sense that if your competitors are actively marketing their companies on the internet to potential buyers and you are not, your competitors are going to get the business.  A marketing budget is a Tax Deduction as a business expense.

 2 -The ultimate marketing goal for any business is to locate potential customers and convert them into customers. The most effective way this is accomplished by being listed in the search engines for the specific products and services you offer.  A high percentage of your potential customers are using Google and Bing to find what you provide. Is your company high on the list?

 3 – Internet marketing provides the ability to measure success and assess performance and accomplishments.   If you don’t know what’s working and what’s not working, how can you improve upon results?

 Internet search activity is “trackable.”  Using analytics, one can determine if potential customers are visiting your site, how long they are staying, where they are coming from and which ones emailed you. In addition, if they “convert” or contact you, the method they used to find you can be identified and scaled.

 If your company is doing the “same old, same old” it will get the “same old, same old.”  By tracking and measuring the results, your site can be updated in real time, rather than waiting for the next printing. Staying on top of what your website is offering is an excellent marketing strategy.  Updating your site with special offerings to customers – i.e. discounts or incentives can be seasonal and reactive to current market conditions.

 5 – A good website helps to establish your brand. Even if your company is not looking for potential clients on the internet, a good up to date and professional website is still your best marketing tool. Potential customers look to the internet for information and education. What better place that your company website?

 6 -Your website will tie well into social media. As a business owner, you do not  have to make posts every day on your company Facebook page or Linkedin pages, but these should tie in to your company brand. The use of social media in the past twelve months as a marketing tool has grown by leaps and bounds. Participating in a minimal social media campaign is another sign of “staying current” and can generate leads for your company with nominal involvement.

 7 – Internet marketing provides the best bang for the buck.  A good SEO company can drive leads to your site at a fraction of the cost a company may spend on print advertising. Again, internet marketing is flexible and trackable, many times providing almost immediate feedback.

 For more information about how your business can best utilize the internet to gain exposure, credibility and new potential customers, contact Website technology Services, Inc. at 404-348-4921, or visit us online at http://www.webtechservicesinc.com/free-marketing-analysis-request  for a free internet marketing analysis.

Careful though – just because you rank on the first page does not mean people are actively searching for that particular phrase. What you need is visibility – or  appearing on search results where people are actually looking. We have quite a few clients who think their potential customers type in a set of words or phrases to find them, and when we give them the data it often times does not match what they expected to see.

Real Life Example

Let’s say you own a real estate company. You sell and rent property. Would you know how your potential clients are searching? Also would you have an idea of frequency? Noone knows the exact number (unless you own every result on every search) but Google provides a tool that gives us estimates that are very accurate.

I bet you can think of a few phrases, and you’d probably be right – like “Atlanta real estate” would be obvious. What about “Atlanta buy new house”?  The former is searched for around 8,000 times per month. The latter? zero.

Here is some real quick keyword research on the subject:

data source: Google Adwords Keyword Tool

These numbers are based on 75 key phrases totaling 30,000+ monthly searches.  Would you have guessed these results? I hope you would not be guessing! Understanding your market search behavior, or the key phrases your visitors use are a critical part of your internet marketing campaign. Focusing on the wrong ones, or key phrases people don’t search for, can be very detrimental to your return on investment, not to mention the success of your business.

Looking for the data? Click here for an excel spreadsheet.

In Closing

Don’t assume – get some data before you pat yourself on the back for ranking for your company name. You may just be missing out on some closely related phrases because you don’t know people are looking for them. Especially big ticket items like roofing – if you rank for roofing do you also rank for leak repair, reroofing and roofing contractor? Even on a low-traffic query one closed lead can make a significant impact.

If you have any questions we’d be more than happy to help! Contact us today

The study was performed on 24 participants between the ages of 15 and 54, using “heatmap eye-tracking” technology, which measured exactly where the participants eyes wandered on the computer screen, and the amount of time their eyes spent on a particular point. The participants were asked to do eight searches, four with Google and four with Bing.

Organic Versus PPC Chart

Some results differ, but here is a basic example:

Click here for a larger version

And The Results

Organic Results

Specifically speaking, the results showed that all participants, whether using Google or Bing, viewed their organic search results. Each user took around 15 seconds to view their results using Google, while it took Bing users merely 10.7 seconds. Considering Google’s obvious domination on the web, this four second difference is very interesting. User Centric explains that their participants might have a had more difficulty finding their information on Google, but they’re not yet sure why.

Paid Ads

Perhaps the most telling data concerning the success of ad placement among the two search engines was that only around 20-30 percent of participants even glanced at ads that appeared on the right side of the screen. Not to mention that these glances, on average, lasted for less than a second.

Around 90 percent of the participants using both search engines, viewed the ads that appeared at the top of the screen, but to the contrary, only 17.5 percent of Google and Bing users took a peak at the “filters and refinements” section, found on the left side of the screen.

Source: Eye-Tracking Study: Everybody Looks At Organic Listings, But Most Ignore Paid Ads

Takeaways

• Organic gets a lot more attention than PPC
• PPC ads on top are seen a lot more than on the right, however the time spent is similar between both PPC positions.

Final Words

While organic listing get the lions share of clicks – we recommend doing both organic and PPC campaigns concurrently. Often times they compliment each other because each user is exposed to your brand a lot more. While it appears the interest is low in PPC, we’ve seen an upwords of 2,000 clicks per month for a single local-based client. There is no question either type of campaign is viable, and if done right will yield a positive return on investment – especially done together.

If you’d like to find out more about PPC and Organic Search Marketing, feel free to contact us!

In the view of the search engines, namely Google, these major publishers were exploiting the search engine algorithm, or system they use to rank websites.

Why does a lot of content = success? Churning out mass content, then getting that content to the first page of many highly searched terms, like “how to ride a bike” results in a lot of visits from search engine viewers. When you insert ads into the mix, the result is advertising revenue. Lots of it. As an example, Demand Media is one of the largest content farm websites – is worth an estimated 925 million dollars.

Why does all this matter? Because of this situation (and/or the resulting negative press), Google “fixed” the problem, by making a significant change to their algorithm. By significant I mean 11.8% of every search query. In comparison the “routine” updates their algorithm goes through on a monthly basis affects very little results at any one time – probably less than 2%.

This one is huge. I can’t even begin to speculate how many websites and people this has touched. If you’re interested in exactly what they did to change the system, you can read Danny Sullivan’s summary. He’s the authority in our book.

Moving Forward

The point here is that a tactic being leveraged has been targeted by Google and some really big players have been de-valued. Do you have to worry about your site falling into the “content farm” classification? Probably not. But what is important here is the overall implication to this significant update – that low quality content is not a viable long term strategy. Here are some estimates that show just how much of an impact this update may have made.

To avoid your content from being considered low quality, Google simply recommends that your content be as “high quality” as possible. Google also states that having low quality content anywhere on your website, can hurt your rankings, as well. What exactly does low quality mean?

1. Make sure all grammar, spelling, punctuation is accurate, and take sincere note of sentence and paragraph structure. Does the structure flow in a way that is easy for the user to read? Google has quite a few linguists. I can see more focus by Google being placed on the readability and quality of content in the future.
2. Where did you get the facts for your content? Are they from valid professional sources, or from another site that might be considered a “content farm?” Linking to trusted sources is a best practice.
3. Offer other types of media – images, documents (pfd, word, etc) and video are all forms of content that would help add layers of quality to your content.
4. Most importantly, is the content at all useful? Does it give insightful and helpful information, or does it tell the user something he or she probably already knows? Make the content compelling to give the user a reason to read the whole article.

How This Update Affected Our Sites

Most of our sites are actually doing better! Since the huge content sites were knocked down a peg, we’re seeing more of our content (blog posts) ranking in how-to type queries that in the past we weren’t seeing. Here’s a typical example, comparing before/after the change:

Traffic up 23% for this particular site! The majority of the increased traffic has been irrelevant (like general roofing DIY traffic) however we have seen some jumps in conversions, meaning the sites have seen improved rankings for highly relevant (keyword + market) queries as well.

(note: the chart does not reflect a significant amount of time – this is because the update just happened, and this is all the data we have so far)

In Closing

With Google’s increasing algorithmic sophistication, the best policy is to create high quality content that people will find valuable. this is not a new concept by any means, however the update was a great reminder that:

• search engines are becoming more and more sophisticated
• doing what’s best for your users is the best policy

If you’d like to find out more about internet marketing, please feel free to contact us!

This local listing (in this case, a “7 pack”) takes up a large chunk of this search engine result page. One of the very first things we do for clients is create this local listing account and promote it to gain the maximum amount of visibility possible. Virtually all geographic searches will have some form of the local listing pack.

Enter Enhanced Listings

Google has recently added features to the local listing center that enable you to enhance your listing:

Local customers already search Google for the products and services you offer. By creating a free business listing, you can make sure they can find you. When you add an enhancement to your listing, you can highlight what you most want your customers to see. For example, you can add a coupon for new customers, highlight a video overview of your store, or even link to your menu. You decide what what’s most important about your business and make sure it stands out.

Here’s an example of a listing that has enhanced their photos:

Make no mistake, that little bit of highlighting can potentially make a world of difference. $25 is a drop in the bucket compared to potentially increasing the amount of clicks on your ad. What’s one extra lead worth? Probably much more than 25 bucks.

And the big question…

No, this does not appear to affect the positioning of your local business listing. You’ll still need a good internet marketing company to accomplish high ranking.

The Benefits

• You can easily and inexpensively highlight your listing on Google Maps and Google.com from the Local Business Center.
• Potential customers in your local area will see what you think is most important or unique about your business.
• You can track the effectiveness of your enhancement with your Local Business Center dashboard.
• You will be charged a low $25 flat monthly fee, with no bids and no keywords required.
• There is no additional work or ongoing management needed.

What you can Enhance

• Website for your business.
• Photos of your business.
• Videos of your business.
• Coupons for your listing.
• Menu for your restaurant.
• Reservations page for your business.
• Driving directions to your business.

And the Catch

These enhancements aren’t available to everyone just yet:

Enhanced listings are being offered in limited areas, but we hope to expand soon. Because this is a limited trial, it is subject to change. We’re using your feedback from this trial to improve our products and services and help local businesses grow!

Unfortunately, as far as we can tell, Atlanta GA is not one of the areas currently being tested. This gives you time to look at your existing local listings and decide if you are where you want to be. If you aren’t – we’d be more than happy to help. Take the first step toward securing your internet marketing success and contact us today!

Additional Reading

Official Google Enhanced Listing Answers

Here’s a quote:

Now when you search using Google, we will be able to better provide you with the most relevant results possible. For example, since I always search for [recipes] and often click on results from epicurious.com, Google might rank epicurious.com higher on the results page the next time I look for recipes. Other times, when I’m looking for news about Cornell University’s sports teams, I search for [big red]. Because I frequently click on www.cornellbigred.com, Google might show me this result first, instead of the Big Red soda company or others.

Overall, this is a big deal! One of the biggest problems for search engines has always been providing results for general search queries. Google is using your search behavior to solve the problem.

What This Means to You

Not a whole lot for the average searcher. If you often click on Amazon results you’ll end up seeing Amazon pop up a lot more during product searches. The same goes for your favorite news outlet. If you really like the Huffington post and click on it often, you’ll see more stories in the search results from the Huffington post.

This also is Google’s way of understanding very broad searches. Let’s say you really like basketball. In the past 180 days you’ve visited 3 dozen basketball-related sites. Now, when you type in “traveling” you should get a definition of traveling as it applies to basketball as opposed to a very general query relating to travel. This is the overall idea of the technology.

What This Means to your Business

Let’s say you’re a Personal Injury Attorney and you have a great site that gets a lot of relevant traffic. Should you be worried that this change will dramatically affect your bottom line? Not really. If a visitor clicked on your competitor more than once in the past 180 days, it’s likely that either:

• They typed in the same query to find the same website (maybe for a followup, or to get a phone number)
• They are searching through the search engine result pages to find other attorneys, ie “shopping around”.

In the first case the person was already a client, and in the second case the person will most likely eventually click on your site because they are looking around. If someone is doing comparison shopping they’ll likely find you either if you were pushed down a spot or two on the first page, or if you’re on the second page.

This change may drastically affect ranking reports, or reports that indicate where your site is ranked for specific keywords.  Since everyone will potentially see slightly different results, it reduces the accuracy of an already diminished metric. It has already been diminished because people have been using personalized search for a while now. This change is a shift from the minority to the majority.

What This Means to WebTech Services

Not Much! Our focus is to create valuable websites that are optimized for search. We research which phrases people are using to find products and services, build sites around that language, market the site, and finally analyze the user behavior to both increase conversions and user engagement.

While we do utilize ranking reports, we use them as a general progress indicator of how we can improve our sites.  We use them to look at what search engines think of our sites overall, and use them to try and detect patterns.

If you are interested in learning more about us and what we can do for your company, please fill out our contact form or call today!

More Reading On This Subject

• Google Now Personalizes Everyone’s Search Results
• Google’s Personalized Results: The “New Normal” That Deserves Extraordinary Attention

There aren’t many occasions where search engine optimization would be a bad thing – in fact most companies would benefit from increased traffic to their website.  Here’s a quick list of questions that you’ll want to ask yourself before taking the plunge with an Internet marketing company:

1. Do you have time? It takes about 6 months before you’ll start seeing organic results. Don’t worry, we’ll send you reports and keep you in the loop as much as possible. The problem is that it takes time for the search engines to find, process and apply what we’re doing to the search indexes (Google, Yahoo and Bing).
2. Do you have a specific set of phrases in mind you want to rank for? They may not be the best goals. Sure you’re a car salesmen, so naturally being #1 for “cars” sounds like the perfect position for your site to be in. Not really. For one thing, it’s going to take a lot of time and money climbing to the top of that very competitive search engine result page. Two – a person typing in “cars” may not be a potential customer looking for you. It could be a little kid looking for movie spoilers or someone looking for music lyrics. The bottom line here is to have an open mind – optimizing your site for certain phrases is merely a means to an end. The goal is ranking you where people will find you to buy from you.
3. Do you have other marketing channels? As great as SEO is, let’s not place all your eggs in one basket. Sure SEO can account for a large portion of your ad budget – but it should be one of many channels you’re using to drum up business. The search engines have final say where your site is positioned – not an SEO company you hire. More important, never rely on one single source of marketing.
4. Have you done your homework? Before hiring anyone to alter or market your site, make sure they know what they’re doing and will be watching out for your best interests. The SEO industry, like any other, has its share of snake oil salesmen and people looking to make a fast buck.

Ask your SEO prospect the following questions:

1. Do you use submission software (or automated software) in any step in your internet marketing process, for instance to create social bookmarks or submit your site to directories? This should be an absolute NO. Just about all automated submission software is bad news.
2. Can you measure and report on the ROI (return of investment) of your marketing campaign by tracking phone calls and email lead submits? This should be a YES.  How else would you know that SEO was an investment as opposed to an expense?
3. Can you show me previous client work? What was their goal; what did you do for them?  The prospect should be able to show you all of these things, which will give you an idea as to what they can do for you. Call a client, have a chat, see if they’re happy.
4. And finally, are you willing to work on this? When hiring an SEO company, you’re hiring someone that will be representing your company and culture. You’re going to have to do some work to not only help this person understand who you are, but be prepared to work with them as a team. The best writers in the world may not properly represent who you are, so you’re going to need to pass that knowledge along. Don’t think it’s as simple as throwing money at an agency and waiting for results. While some agencies will let you do that, they aren’t representing your interests as well as they could.

In the end, the more prepared you are for this relationship; the better off all parties will be at managing expectations, and eventually, being successful.