Google AdWords:
Search Engine Advertising That Makes Sense
By now, if you're not familiar with the search engine, Google, you ought to be. By far one of the most popular search engines on the Web, Google also has one of the easiest, low-cost and most advertiser-friendly ways to purchase keyword search term advertising. Since it has been well-documented that search engines are the number one source of traffic to a web site, this is a form of advertising most won't want to overlook.
Last Fall Google first launched its AdWords "self service" advertising program and swiftly won rave reviews. AdWords is a wholly automated, instantaneous way of purchasing Google's search engine keywords. Unlike some of its competition, Google does not serve banner advertisements with its search engine results. Instead Google supplies two types of paid for TEXT links: premium sponsorships and AdWords.
To see what we're talking about, go to Google and search for the term "checks." Running across the top of the page, you'll see two premium sponsorship links; running down the right-hand side you'll see three text boxes. These boxes are the AdWords program.
Setting up an AdWords campaign takes only about 5-10 minutes, and Google offers a great little tool for previewing this service. Go to the AdWords page and select "Create and Preview Ads" in the upper right-hand corner. Since you're only composing text, you actually create your ad right then and there. They even walk you through the process by providing you with fields and character line limits. Once you've written your ad, press "Show This Ad." After previewing your ad, select "Continue" and Google will let you input the keyword search terms through which you want your ad to appear. Google even allows you to match keywords, keyphrases, exact queries, or negative keyword matching so that you don't waste money paying for less targeted searches.
After you select your keywords, click "Update Keyword Estimates," and Google will give you an estimate of your advertising costs per day, week, and month based on the number of impressions they have typically been serving during that desired time period. If these figures sit well with you, at that point you proceed to set up a new account and voila! You have a search engine ad campaign running.
The amazing thing about Google is that in five minutes you can set up and activate a live advertising campaign on one of the Internet's most popular search engines. If you wanted to go through all of these steps on another search engine it could take a week (or more!) to negotiate a deal with ad reps!
Even more interesting is result of a minor case study of our own. We've been running a campaign for one of our clients using Yahoo keyword banners and Google AdWords, and the Google AdWords are generating equal or better click-thru percentages! Better still, we're paying an estimated $15 CPM (cost per thousand impressions) for the Google AdWords as compared to the $70 CPM or so that Yahoo charges.
Some other benefits of Google AdWords include:
- No Monthly Minimum - Other sites will try to get advertisers to commit to monthly minimums of up to $3,000. Google has has NO MINIMUM!
- Instant Ad Tracking & Reporting - Much like other search engines do, you can view instant reporting, broken down by impressions and click thrus, simply by logging onto Google AdWords.
- No Insertion Orders - No messy paper pushing.
- No Obligations - Google AdWords can be cancelled at anytime.
- No Ad Reps - Eliminate the hassle of pushy ad reps trying to talk you into buying more ad space.
Are we saying, "Pull all of your advertising dollars and go with Google?" Well, no...but if you are looking at hiring an Optimization Specialist or are looking for a Guaranteed way of getting your company on the first page of some search engines, then you need to look into these programs. It's money well spent!
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