Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising is the fastest growing segment of online advertising. According to Forbes Magazine, by the year 2012, companies will spend $15 billion a year on PPC advertising. The beauty of this marketing model is that the advertiser pays only when a consumer actually clicks on the ad and, thus, through to his or her business’s Web site. In this respect, the customer can be considered a pre-qualified lead, since he or she has already shown interest in the product, first, by typing in the search term and, second, by clicking on the advertising link. Because of its proven effectiveness, the benefits of Pay Per Click advertisements is rapidly growing in popularity among businesses both large and small. It is projected to make up nearly half of total spending on digital advertising over the next few years.
The Role of PPC Advertising in Business Today:
In today’s increasingly Web-centric world, a well-managed and optimized PPC campaign can be the most cost-effective form of advertising. Many people see the opportunities of benefits of Pay Per Click advertisements. Indeed, search marketing is the fastest-growing segment of the advertising industry, accounting for roughly $20 billion per year, or more than 40 percent of all online advertising dollars.
Ironically, part of the reason for this is the global recession. In an effort to cut costs, many corporations are reallocating their marketing budgets away from television and direct marketing campaigns to methods that are more readily measurable. The statistical programs available make PPC advertising absolutely accountable and transparent in terms of tracing the actual return on investment (ROI) per ad.
The Benefits of Pay Per Click Advertising:
The benefits of PPC advertising make it arguably the ideal form of advertising in today’s environment. Despite the network or search engine used, PPC brings certain specific benefits for businesses small and large:
– You Get What You Pay For:
With PPC marketing you only pay for every time someone actually clicks on an advertisement. This differs from traditional online advertising where you would pay for the number of times your ad is viewed. Because of this you get a much higher percentage of targeted visitors to your website for each dollar spent.
– Immediate Results:
When you set up a PPC campaign through a site such as Google you can immediately get results as you will start showing up in searches in a very short amount of time. This is often the fastest way to get seen on search engines as it can sometimes take weeks to show up in the organic search results (normal search engine results).
– Target Your Customers:
By choosing which keywords and types of websites your advertisements are shown on you can specifically target your customers. You can also customize your campaigns to show certain ads or certain wording variations based on the site or search keywords.
– Specify a Budget:
Custom budgets can be created so that you can choose how much you want to spend on certain days or months. If you sell Christmas decorations you can choose to ramp up your advertising during the busy fall months leading up to Christmas time and spend less during the summer months.
– Track Your Results:
Your PPC campaign will include a result tracking service that shows you which keywords are being the most effective for each ad. You can even get more in depth and track if a product was bought from a click.
– Advertise 24/7:
Your ads will be shown to potential customers all day. This means that even if you are a brick and mortar store visitors can still be sent to your website when your shop is closed.
– Change on the Fly:
Finding that an ad is not generating results? See a word spelled incorrectly? No problem. Simply login and either delete that advertisement or make small wording changes and try again. You can compare with try asking your local newspaper to change some wording in the middle of a print!
After reading the benefits of PPC advertising you will see just how important a properly executed pay per click strategy can be to boosting your online sales. PPC can serve as an important market research tool, as it highlights precisely the keywords and phrases that attract the best prospects and sales. It also enables advertisers to easily identify new market trends.
