Techniques for a Successful Pay Per Click Advertising Campaign

As Google has appeared to be the top hit among users of search engines, this article will focus on techniques used in Google Adwords. Google rates its ads on the quality score that they achieve. This quality score is a ranking system devised by Google to rank all advertisers equally, even if one advertisers' budget is much higher than another advertiser. However, you must provide quality content/products/services and an optimized Adwords account in order to get a higher quality score. Quality score takes into account many factors as following:

- Click Through Rate (CTR): This is equal to the number of clicks divided by the number of impressions.

- Max Cost Per Click (CPC): This is the maximum bid placed on any particular keyword.

- Ad Text: The relevancy of the ad text in relation to the keyword phrase typed into the search engine.

- Landing Page: The relevancy of the content on the landing page (where the ad points the user to) to the keyword used and the ad clicked on.

It is very important to maintain a high quality score to achieve the best Return on Investment (ROI). There are many factors that go into managing a Google Adwords Account that require careful consideration and adjustments to get the best results and ROI. These adjustments are as following:

- Keyword Selection: Find the correct keywords to target and those that give the best ROI.

- Keyword Matching: Make use of keyword matching options available including broad match, phrase match, exact match, and negative match. Employ embedded matching where necessary.

- Position Preference: Select the preferred preference of your ads to attract the visitors who are most likely to convert.

- Country / Region Targeting: Target your ads to specific country.

- Language Targeting: Target your ads to only people who speak a certain language.

- Start/End Dates: Specify start and end dates for your campaigns.

- Budget: Preset a specific amount to be spent daily on your entire account or across various campaigns.

- Ad Scheduling: Run your ads at certain times of the day, or certain days per week to maximize ROI.

- Google Networks: Choose to show your ads only on Google, Google’s Search Network and the Content Network.

- Keyword Bids: Manage bids on each individual keyword as well as setting the price for content bids on Google’s Content Network.

- Exclude sites: Exclude sites to show your ads on Google’s Content Network or chose those who wish to display your ads on.

- Campaign Creation: Create different campaigns to maximize your ROI.

- Ad Group Creation: Create unique ad groups for different products or services

- Conversion Tracking: Monitor conversions from a visiting to a paying customers or determine your own conversions such as a series of page views, signup to a newsletter, or a web site enquiry.

- Cross Channel Tracking: Track other online advertising campaigns through your Google Adwords Account, Yahoo Search Marketing, Banner Ads, e-mail campaigns, etc.

- Analytics Setup / Monitoring: Track your visitors with Google Analytics to view a huge range of information.

All this information is combined into a successful advertising campaign that will reduce the number of impressions, reduce your Cost Per Click (CPC), increase your Click Through Rate (CTR), increase your quality score, and increase your Return On Investment (ROI).