Ppc, ppl, ppa

[saiwong]

Hello,

I am interested in getting more sales and have been looking at
Pay Per Click, Pay Per Lead and Pay Per Aquisition. I am most interested in Pay Per Aquisition since I can directly match it to sales
but it seems that you need a history of Pay Per Clicks and there is a auction bidding mechanism (where the highest bid wins). As a new start-up I have no history and I am not interested in Pay Per Click because I've heard so many bad stories about false clicks. Also just because someone visits your website does not mean they become a customer.

Could someone recommend a good Pay Per Aquisition serivice ?

I can track the number of customers either
(a) trying out my software via 30 day evaluation key
(b) purchasing my software via full activation key

[Dotwhack]

I wouldn't disregard PPC. If done properly it can generate sales cost effectively. Yes there are a lot of horror stories about it being a waste of money etc but I must stress this is usually because people try to run the campaigns themselves without really knowing what they are doing. I have run many profitable campaigns for various clients.

With Google Adwords, you can also do conversion tracking to attribute the sales to the PPC account. Yes you will be paying per click but you will be able to see how many of those clicks convert into sales (and then amend your ppc campaign accordingly). All you need to do it add the conversion tracking code onto your website on whatever page you feel is the one only seen by completed sales (i.e. the thank you for your payment page).

If you do re-think PPC and need some help, just let me know.

[SimonM]

As DotWhack says, don't discount PPC. Obviously click fraud does take place, but if this is a genuine concern then Google Adwords does allow you to only show as-results on their search pages rather than on the Google content network (i.e. other peoples blogs and homepages).

Including the ads only in the search results means that there is no incentive for anybody to make false clicks as the only people that make money here are Google.

Written properly the ads can be very effective, although I would suggest speaking to a PPC expert such as DotWhack. It is very easy to track the success of your campaign and very easy to fix your budget to something reasonable.

[saiwong]

Thanks for the feedback.
The option to have PPC only via search engine results sounds a good method to avoid click-fraud.

Been reading up on this subject. Many terms sound similar like Adwords and AdSence.

Am I right that Adwords is the actual advertisements that you see .. and Adsence is a web-based program that people use with their websites to show the AdWord advertisements to make some extra money ?

I used a Keyword tool on Google and some of the keyword groups are very expensive. Some over 3 UK pounds per click. Do you have to have alot of money to use AdWords ? I am just a startup with not alot of funds. Can I use Adwords on a small budget ?

What would you estimate a typical small, medium & large monthly budget be for AdWords ?

[SimonM]

Hi, you can certainly use adwords for any size budget. Effectively written ads and carefully chosen keywords are the key to it's success. Looking at 'long tail' keywords / phrases is a way to get cheaper PPC. But the number of searches for this phrase and therefore impressions will be lower.

I would suggest either buying a book on adwords or employing the help of somebody like DotWhack to manage the campaign for you. I am speaking from experience when I say it is easy to waste a lot of cash on Google adwords if you do not do it correctly. Likewise, I am speaking from experience when I say doing it correctly can make you a lot of cash too.

HTH

Simon

[Mike Seddon]

Hi Saiwong,

You've already had some great answers so there is probably no need for me to add anymore but let me lend my voice to the arguement that PPC should not be written off just because of the horror stories you hear.

It IS very easy to lose a lot of money on PPC if you do not really know what you are doing.

My advice is that if you choose to learn PPC (Adwords being one of the better ones to learn for a variety of reasons) then I would do it with a very small daily budget. Basically learn fast, spend slow.

Most people tend to concentrate on learning how to drive traffic to their website using Adwords. That's actually the wrong place to start.

You need to start at learning how to convert your traffic into sales first. So keep your daily budget small, your traffic under control and learn to convert that traffic first.

In otherwords, learn about the buying behaviour and relationship between keywords, ads and landing pages.

Once you have that worked out then you can start to ramp up the volume of traffic to your website.

In fact if you get the conversion down to a very successful level you can afford to outbid your competitors on keywords without even trying to learn how to lower your bid prices!!

Of course if you have conversion worked out AND you learn how to get lower bid prices then you get to have a very successful business.

Hope that helps.

Mike

[BDR_London]

I agree Adwords is a great way to generate sales quickly if done correctly.

but have you thought about running an affiliate program, these are run on a cost per aquisition model. So it makes them very cost effective. Affiliate marketing is ideal for anyone who's product is delivered by the web like yours.

[saiwong]

Hello,

Thanks for all the comments. Seems like mastering PPC is a non-trivial
matter, so I've ordered a couple of books on Adwords to educate myself. (I wonder how long they will take to deliver because of the postal strike ?)

Also before PPC idea I was originally thinking of getting afficilate programs were other website owners would advertise my product on their websites. I did contract some Affiliate Program companies but they said that since I am a new small business with no long term sales history they would not consider me yet. I would have to wait many more months until I've gained a sales history before I can be considered.

[SimonM]

Do be wary of affiliate schemes, as you have very little control over how your affiliates generate traffic to your website. Remember their main aim will be to generate traffic and they can use any methods they like without worrying about ruining your brand.

They are also likely to have a reasonable knowledge of SEO techniques which introduces more competition for your chosen keywords and phrases for organic searches.

Again, I am try to scaremonger here but it is something to be aware of.

Simon.

[DavidMorning]

If you do a ppc campaign, make sure to have some analytics software set up so you can track conversions. That way you can tie your ppc budget to your sales and work out if it's making you a profit, or how you can refine it better so that it does. I think google analytics even has parts that link up with adwords (although don't quote me on that). It's free anyway, so I'd recommend a look.