PPC simply stands for Pay Per Click, a form of internet marketing that you only pay for when one of your ads is clicked. It's a great way of attracting potential customers or service users to your website instead of waiting to be found amongst the millions of organic search engine results.
There are many different types of PPC around these days. It is most commonly seen on large search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo; however, it has more recently spread to social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. While social media PPC takes a different format, the fundamentals are the same: you only pay for the ad when somebody clicks on it.
For the purpose of this blog post, we're going to look at the basics of search engine PPC. Search engine pay-per-click advertising essentially allows you to bid for your ads to appear at the top of Google's results page so that, when someone types in a search query that is relevant to your service or products, your ads will be triggered.
For example, if you need to buy a sash for your friend's hen night, you might head to google.co.uk and enter the phrase hen night sash.
After entering the search query, you will be taken to the search results page, and this is where you will find adverts and organic listings for companies who are trying to solve your problem. As you can see from above, the first three listings (framed in red) are adverts, with Google Shopping results on the top right and more adverts underneath them.
Note: The results framed in green are Google's organic listings - this is where our SEO team will help you to appear!
At this point, you spot an advert from a company (
Henstuff) selling
Hen Night Sashes from £0.75. When you click on this advert, you will be taken to that company's website, and they will have to pay a small charge to Google.
A lot goes into building a successful AdWords campaign. First, you must research the keywords that are most relevant to your business; then, you must select the right keywords for your campaign (ideally, you want to target cheap keywords that will attract lots of customers to the right stage of the buying process). After that, you must organise these keywords into relevant ad groups and create landing pages on your website that are properly optimised to drive conversions. If done properly, all of this work won't go unrewarded - a carefully-targeted campaign will see you pay less every time your adverts are clicked, meaning higher profits for your company.
Would you like to try pay-per-click advertising for your company? Here at Designer Websites, we have a team of PPC experts who will help you to get the best possible results from Google AdWords and other platforms. Get in touch today!
