Use Google Adwords for Instant Results

Google Adwords can bring a stream of willing buyers to your web site, or it can blow your budget on nothing but tyre kickers. The difference is choosing the right keywords and paying the right price for them.

What is Adwords?

Google Adwords are the paid ads you see in the sponsored links column on the right hand side of the Google search results page. You choose a keyword (such as "lawn mowing wellington") and then bid against other advertisers. The more you bid, the more likely your ad will appear at the top of the search results. It’s an auction for the best ranking.

Your ad is displayed for free and you are charged when someone clicks on your ad (hence the term "pay per click" advertising). You can set daily budgets for your whole Adwords campaign or for each keyword so you don't overspend.

Natural Rankings vs Adwords

Natural Google rankings are the main search results you see in Google and your rankings are based on the information on your web pages. It can take months to tune your web pages and get your web site into the rankings. Your initial investment can be significant too because it can take some work to get better rankings than your competition. Keep in mind that all your competitors want the same #1 rankings that you do, and who ever does the most work is likely to get the best ranking. The advantage with natural rankings is that once you are ranked well you get free traffic, often for many years.

An Adwords campaign can be up and running in an hour or two and you are receiving traffic the same day. So your initial investment is small and results are immediate, but you have ongoing costs.

Optimising Adwords

Adwords becomes most cost effective when you optimise your bids. If you bid too high for a keyword you waste money. If you bid too low you get no visitors. If you bid on the wrong keywords you pay for visitors who do not buy from you. So Google gives you simple tools to check and tune your bids so you get the best value for every dollar you spend.

Managed Services

Many companies offer Adwords services where they set up your campaign and do everything for you. The problem with these services is that monitoring and tuning your results thoroughly takes time, so it's difficult and expensive for them to do it. So they don't do it and you don't get a great return.

DIY for Maximum Return

The magic recipe of 10 minutes marketing per day (or 1/2 hour per week if you're busy) works wonders with Google Adwords. You know your business well so you can quickly evaluate whether you are paying too much or too little for any given keyword. In 1 week Adwords will usually gather enough statistics to be useful and won't have time to damage your budget. So a quick weekly tune up will usually decrease your spend and improve your results. It’s doesn’t take long until you have a cost effective marketing campaign that runs on auto-pilot.

If you employ an administrator, they usually have a great head for numbers and this is an ideal job to delegate!

By-pass the Learning Curve

Try our Adwords quick start service - for $550 we'll walk you through setting up your first campaign and show you how to check and tune your bids. This training enables you to maximise the return on your investment.

And remember that if you are short on time this is a great job to delegate to your administrator.

About the Author
Since 1998, Phil Donaldson has helped hundreds of business owners understand, in plain English, how their web sites can help their businesses grow, and find the simplest solutions to do it.
If you'd like to apply this system to your business, but don't have the time or inclination to complete all the steps yourself then we can help. Contact www.anyware.co.nz for professional web design and search engine marketing services in Wellington, New Zealand.
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