Scenario: beating a competitor that is #1 in Adwords

[emaccenti]

I recently published a salesletter that sales an ebook about a specific niche. I got many suggestions by analyzing and reverse-engineering a good competitor and I think i've ended up with a salesletter + ebook that has AT LEAST same quality, so I expect it will convert AT LEAST the same.

Today I HAPPILY discovered that this competitor is bidding enough to be #1 in adwords for the main niche keywords. I say happily because this probably means that he is making enough money with it: his ebook is sold since 2004 so chances are he has been advertising in adwords for a long time.

As I said my saleseletter + ebook structure is almost the same, so I now want to promote in adwords following his path. In other words, I can take advantage from HIS experience

My idea is to start bidding high to be #1 or #2 with a similar ad so that I can rapidly understand how many visitors he is getting, what's the CTR and, probably, what's the conversion rate. Question: how long it takes before I can also understand how much he is really bidding, if i'm getting similar good CTR? I expect that first clicks will be paid a lot because Google hasn't background info about my campaigns. Generally speaking, after how much time / after how many clicks my cpc will be adjusted by Google to reflect my average good CTR?

PS. on a 24 hours test i've verified that #1 position CTR with an almost identical ad is over 5% so I can already say the he is at around that CTR with his campaign.

[jam2005]

So, you copied your competitor's product and ad and now you want to copy his marketing strategy. Am I reading this right?

Differentiation is an important key to beating your competition. More of the same won't make any of you money. All it will do is drive profits in the 'niche' down until no one is making money.

[emaccenti]

no! i have a product for the same niche, probably better, this is what i said.

I just want to get as much information as possible from his successful campaign.

[AdWordsAdvisor]

...As I said my saleseletter + ebook structure is almost the same, so I now want to promote in adwords following his path. In other words, I can take advantage from HIS experience...

Hi emaccenti - just my personal opinion here:

I'd love to see you devote the same time and attention (even passion) to deeply understanding how AdWords works that you currently devote to figuring out how to reverse-engineer one competitor's practices.

I think you'd find that the long-term gain inherent in doing this would be substantially more valuable to your bottom line, over the long run. ;)

AWA

[vincevincevince]

To actually answer the question: In my limited experience, things seem to settle down in weeks and not months. On the other hand, you should be optimising your copy and bids during that period so it may string things out a little longer before you get things stable.

On the other issue which seems to be attracting comments: Duplicating a competitor's strategy to the greatest extent legally possible is a tried and tested method for getting a headstart in almost any industry. It will hurt your competitor's profits but that, I'm afraid, is life!

[Hiccup]

Hey AWA, how about answering his question instead of your opinion on his methods? (which everyone and their dog already does anyhow)

[cline]

How AdWords works depends considerably on the what the competitors do.

[deep_alley]

I am sure history is going to account for a lot. I know of instances when advertisers have been bidding very low on certain words, with good positions, which are very expensive and competitive today, just because they have been running them for years.

I don't think it is possible to figure out the exact amount your competitor is paying by actually running an account and looking at your spends.

And yes, as some one rightly said, by being in position 1 and pushing your competitor down, there will be some amount of volume drop for him.

[sharewarepro]

>Question: how long
>it takes before I can also understand how much he is really bidding,
>if i'm getting similar good CTR? I expect that first clicks will be
>paid a lot because Google hasn't background info about my campaigns.
>Generally speaking, after how much time / after how many clicks my
>cpc will be adjusted by Google to reflect my average good CTR?

You'll never know.

You can't know his CTR, bids or QS.

And I don't recommend trying to beat him by copying him. At best you'll always be one step behind him.

Write better ads. Work the system better.

Copying is a poor substitute for out-performing.