Your Online Business Tune-Up: Get Your PPC on Track in 2010!

Pay-per-click advertising (PPC) has long been a favourite tool of website owners when they want to drive targeted traffic to their pages — traffic that converts to buyers.

Some marketers use PPC to send traffic to a site that hasn’t been ranked yet in the “natural” (unpaid)  search results, while others keep PPC in their toolbox even when they’re getting  decent organic traffic. As long as they’re making more money than they’re spending on their ads, they see it as a win-win.

If you’re looking to put PPC to work for you in 2010, here are some key things to keep in mind to…

Make Your AdWords Dollars Go Further

When you put up an AdWords pay-per-click ad the first thing you want to do is see where it appears on the results page, right? So you do a Google search.

Well those searches on your own ads can cost you money.

If you search for your ads over and over on Google, you’ll lower your click-through rate. (Because unless you’ve got money to burn, you’re not going to click on your own PPC ads!)

And a lower click-through rate can result in a lower Quality Score, which Google uses to determine where your ads appear on the page and how much you pay per click. So you…

New Pay-Per-Click Profiling

If you’re not in my demographic — you can’t see my ad!

New PPC demographic profiling.

If you have a website that sells a special energy elixir for men over 55, how do you make sure you’re not paying for 17-year-old girls to see it?

Google AdWords is now beta testing demographic bidding for PPC ads on the Content Network in the US and UK. The new program gives you three new PPC options to make your online marketing pay. 

You can now exclude any group by age and gender, so you’re not wasting money advertising to people who aren’t your target audience.

Please…

Google Slap Part 2

You may remember the first slap last year – now Google is at it again.. Story By Betsy Schiffman/ Wired Magazine

For Some Advertisers, Google Slap Means Plummeting Revenues 

Now Google is arguing that the plummeting click-through rates on its ads are a good thing.

The major change Google made in early March to its AdWords algorithm is resulting in a double whammy for some advertisers: The rates they’re paying for ads have rocketed while conversion rates for those ads have dropped.

Disgruntled advertisers have dubbed the move the "Google slap."

"If it were just a rate increase, I would have tolerated it. But…

Beat them at their own game

A pay-per-click spy tool

Pay-per-click competition tool — stay one step ahead

Shhh. Keep this one to yourself!

One of my favorite pay-per-click tools is a spy, and using it is as much fun as lurking behind potted plants and eavesdropping on top-secret conversations.

With a SpyFu subscription, you can quickly get a good idea of the maximum cost-per-click for a keyword. Or you can see what keywords the competition is bidding on — type in your keyword phrases, your competitor’s company name or URL, or your own niche area or industry. But you can also get some good started for free without a subscription!

For both your pay-per-click…