The value proposition of Pay-Per-Click Engines

Have you heard of Pay Per Click?

If you're interested in getting customers to your website, you should know about it. Pay Per Click refers to a type of Internet search engine where advertisers wishing to be listed pay for that right. Yes, advertising on the Internet is reinventing itself and this is one area where you might actually win BIG.

Pay Per Click (PPC) search engine companies run auctions allowing anyone to buy the top positions for specific search terms. All well and good, you say, but I hang out on Yahoo and Google as my favorite search engines and so do a large part of the Internet world. If these PPC engines only get a small number of people visiting them, are they really that important? Well, they saw that question coming and have a pretty good answer for it.  All of the major search engines like Yahoo, Lycos and AltaVista are in on the game too. That's right, if you're on Yahoo and type in a search term, there's a pretty good chance that somebody is paying for the top listings that are displayed to you.

For example, let's say that you sell lawnmowers. What would you pay to EVERY person who clicks on a listing for lawnmowers on Yahoo? Five cents? Ten cents? A dollar? Of course, it's a question that needs some analysis but basically that's what these Pay Per Click engines are asking of you. How much will you pay?

And you'll not only be advertising for the word "lawnmowers". You'll also be using words like riding lawnmowers, lawnmower blades, lawnmower manuals and every other possible keyword or phrase that is appropriate for your products. Since you're not paying for the words unless somebody actually clicks on them, it makes sense to cover as many possible avenues as possible. Think like your potential customers…what words would THEY use to find products like yours? It's not unusual for advertisers to have hundreds or even thousands of keyphrases for a single website.

There are quite a few Pay Per Click engines, but as in regular search engines, there's only a few PPC's that amount to much. Currently, Overture is the leader of the pack but there's also FindWhat, Kanoodle, Ah-Ha and Google looking for market share. You can go to these PPC engines and search if you'd like, but the idea is to grab the results from the main engines.

Who's feeding whom?
Again, the only reason these PPC engines can make a reasonable go of it, is that they have strong relationships with big traffic producers like Yahoo, AltaVista, MSN and Excite. Overture feeds ALL of those engines and a bunch more so if you're interested in people viewing your listings, Overture is definitely one to consider. Google, probably the best regular search engine out there, is also trying to compete in the PPC arena and they have a partnership with AOL Search providing all AOL searchers PPC results. You can bet they're looking at the other search engines as well.

Why PPC over regular Search Engines?
So, why bother using these new PPC engines if the other engines are working just fine? Well, more and more search engines are going to some sort of pay model for websites wishing to get listed. Yahoo charges $299 a year for a listing and several of the other engines either charge yearly fees or are looking at other sources of revenue to drive their business model. Who better to ask than the advertisers? And even after you pay their fees, they may not guarantee you a position on their listings…they might not even list you at all!

PPC Engines take the guesswork out of placing you at the top of the page. Once you have the technique down, you can often get placed there in a matter of days if not hours. Regular search engines have historically taken weeks or months to position you and, even then, you're not sure where you will be in their listings.

Now, a popular keyphrase might have quite a few advertisers. If we take the example that we used before regarding "lawnmowers": the top position cost $.39 and there are more than 20 companies vying for some sort of exposure for that keyphrase. You can pay for the top spot or choose a less expensive position getting fewer clicks but allowing your advertising budget to last longer.

It can get costly to use these PPC's and remember: They get traffic to your website; they don't sell your product. Your website had better be working 100% and it better do a good job of selling your product or service. After all, you just paid somebody to come take a look. Don't drop the ball once they get there!

And you should try not to pay for exposure unless the searcher actually wants a site like yours. Each listing normally has a sentence or two of description, so you should design these descriptions to eliminate non-customers. If they're not interested in your product, you DON'T want them clicking: it'll just cost you money. With that in mind, you shouldn't get too general with the keyphrases. If you sell lawnmower blades, don't advertise on the keyword "lawnmower" unless you are prepared to pay for people who accidentally come to your website looking for a John Deere riding mower. Stick with "lawnmower blades" and other phrases that are more specific to your product.

These PPC engines aren't for everybody. Obviously, if your potential customers wouldn't use the regular search engines to find a company such as yours you'll have poor results. For example, if you run a small local plumbing company and get the majority of your customers through the yellow pages, the PPC will probably not work. But for those companies who can service customers nationally or internationally, this is a tool whose value might be high. It's worth checking out.