ppc - the beginners guide

Im an optimist, but an optimist who takes his raincoat

[claimsweb]

Hi,

I operate a 'home made' website that effectively supports my small business offering legal advice to accident victims. My chosen profession is an extremely competitive one as you can imagine and not particularly popular (I wouldnt blame you if you're reaching for the back button as you read)
3 months ago I started with PPC using the three main UK services - Google, Ove and Es. The latter two I found expensive but fairly rewarding, Google however seems in a league of its own but again can be pricey if you allow a high daily budget and cpc which is necessary for positioning.

I have no choice but to stick with ppc and need to ask a few simple questions about who offers you the best value for money, is there anything else I should be doing like signing up with Teaoma, inktomi for inclusion or should I really stop playing at being an idiot webmaster and pay someone to do it? (this latter option aint really an option right now but Id like to know anyway!)

There must be loads of users stalking these pages who would love to hear from you experts on these issues - please help us out!

[vibgyor79]

What works for me and my product/service may not work for you. So its difficult to say that a particular PPCSE offers better ROI. AdWords is great for certain keywords and Overture is wonderful for others.

I suggest you do some experimentation - sign up for good PPCSEs and see if it works out for you. Moreover, experimentation is not very expensive (but is definitely time consuming)- you can start off a campaign with a particular PPCSE for $25 to $100.

Ashwin

[buckworks]

To get better productivity from AdWords, look for ways to tweak your ads to improve their clickthrough rate. Google considers a better CTR as a sign of good relevance, and rewards it with better positioning in the AdWords even if the bid is lower.

Example: someone bidding 5¢ and having a 2% clickthrough can compete strongly with someone else bidding 10¢ but only having a 1%. The math would be more complicated at other bid amounts, of course, but you get the idea.

Also, if you have several ads in your rotation and over time one clearly has a better CTR than the others, Google will automatically start to favor it. Test several variations of your ad and see what happens.

[claimsweb]

Thanks for the advice

Ive set up a second ad on Google and used differing keywords with tweaks here and there and I'll see how it goes. Google's telling me I need to spend $630 a day to maximise my clicks - if only!

Whats the view on Teoma & Ink - worth going for purely for completion or not really worth the money?

Martin