Managing Your Pay-per-Click Advertising

If you use online pay-per-click advertising, a PPC management firm can be an important resource, helping you get the right message to the right place at the right time.

With PPC advertising, members of the desired target market are actively opting in to view your ad, eliminating much of the inefficiency associated with traditional advertising. The potential for PPC management to fine-tune targeting is perhaps the most intriguing aspect of online advertising.

PPC advertising works by paying a search engine to associate a given online advertisement with a relevant set of search words. So people who are interested in a certain subject are presented with advertisements related to that subject. In turn, the advertisers are only charged when a person clicks their ad.

While the concept of PPC advertising is simple, its nuances are many. This is why professional PPC management is so important. When handled actively by professionals who have been immersed in the business, PPC management can go a long way toward achieving PPC optimization.

PPC optimization has several components:

• Selecting the key words that are most often used as search terms for a given product or service
• Constructing an advertisement that attracts information seekers
• Measuring results of different approaches to actively refine campaigns
• Establishing metrics that go beyond just the number of clicks, to measure things such as time spent viewing an advertisement and likelihood of taking the next step

The following should be considered when choosing a PPC manager:

• Search word optimization services: Naturally, you know some of the common jargon associated with your industry, but understanding search-engine user behavior requires specialized experience.
• Speed and responsiveness: One of the appeals of online advertising is the ability to capitalize on opportunities almost immediately. This potential can only be realized if the PPC manager is correspondingly nimble in responding.
• Measurement and reporting: A PPC manager with well-defined metrics is more accountable and better able to make adjustments that help optimize results.
• Track record: It may be a relatively new field but some firms have been practicing long enough to develop a track record of success.

Ultimately, one of the things that distinguishes PPC advertising is its degree of interactivity. This gives it a dynamic nature that demands active management in order to get the optimal results. As Internet capabilities have found their way into more and more mobile-phone packages, the opportunity for people to use search engines has expanded considerably. Not only that, but often these searches are done by people who are out of the home or office and on the move, which can be an ideal time to direct them to local establishments.