Depending on what you’re trying to accomplish paid search can be your knight in shining armor.
Paid Search listings
Paid search is a method of internet advertising where you either pay for each click you receive, Pay Per Click (PPC), or you pay each time your ad shows up on a page, Cost Per Mil (thousand) CPM. These are the ads you see at the top and right of a SERP (Search Engine Results Page) and they usually say “Sponsored Links”. You can refer to the image at left to see an example. The most popular paid searches are: Google Adwords, Yahoo Sponsored Search, Bing adCenter, and Facebook.
It’s actually easiest to define when Paid Search is not a good match. If your not willing to spend at least $10 to acquire a sale or do not have the budget to spend advertising dollars towards the brand recognition of your company, then Paid Search probably isn’t for you.
There are four key areas we cover when we manage a Paid Search campaign
Financial Analysis- I’ll always start by asking you how much you’re willing to spend to acquire a lead. This could be the sale of a product, someone who signs up on a list, or even someone picking up the phone to call you. You really need to sit down and think about what that’s worth to you. Some industries, like cell phone companies, see a high long-term value in a customer since most end up staying with one carrier for years. So be sure to take the long-term value into account. Once you have this number, and a few other simple questions I’ll ask you, I’ll put together a Paid Search Analysis that will basically tell you about how many new customers you could potentially pick up. -I charge a nominal fee for this initial analysis which will be applied to implementing your campaign if you decide to do so.
Competitive Analysis- I’ll compare your website to your competition to determine the changes we need to make to landing pages (the page a searcher lands on after they click on your ad) to generate results. Think of it like a billboard, you only have a few seconds to grasp the readers attention and keep them on your site. This usually entails changes to the text, images, and basic flow of the page and its relationship to the website.
Strategic Implementation- After taking into account the cost of advertising and the competitive landscape I determine the best strategy that will achieve the highest results. At this point I’ll provide you a quote that will include an initial set-up and ongoing management fees. If you decide to go with the campaign/s, I’ll put the original analysis fee towards this quote.
Performance Optimization- This phase is very intense the first few months as I am continually monitoring the performance of the campaign and making any necessary changes to improve results. After the first few months, monthly optimization consists of monitoring and improving the performance of the campaign, monitoring the competitive landscape making sure you’re still competitive, and recommend any changes that need to be made to the page or site.
Paid search works! If your goal of Paid Search is anything but branding, I’ll guarantee that you’ll make the additional amount in revenue to cover my monthly management fees or I’ll work for free for up to 6 months. It’s in my contract!