Google Adwords is 10

No, I do not want to "share my stories" Google

[timchuma]

I did not think it was that old to be honest.

I have only been using Adsense for about 3 years and only gave in to Adwords when Google offered free credit (I did put a small amount of my own money in.)

Not really the best for me as the keywords that got the most people to my site were the same ones they would use in the search anyway, the money I made off Adsense was not covering the cost of Adwords.

[Tropical Island]

I have been with AdWords since Feb. 2002

Without it we would never have survived in our tourism business.
I have cut back a bit in recent years trying to diversify our reach with sites like TripAdvisor, FaceBook and a slew of others however the majority of our budget still goes to AW.

They sent us a clever well done video this morning to thank us for our support.

[LucidSW]

I have been using Adwords since April 2002. That's when I first was made aware of pay-per-click advertising. As I recall, that's the month they became PPC. I believe the model was CPM only before that. Maybe Tropical Island can confirm if I recall this correctly.

[Tropical Island]

No, I started with basic PPC.
My account was opened on Feb. 28, 2002

I've spent about $50,000 on search and about $9,000 on content in that time which for our little business is shocking. Fortunately that represents only a small % of the business it has brought us.

[netmeg]

April 2002 sounds about right for me. I started with Yahoo / Overture first.

[fabulousyarn]

Tropical Island - you state something interesting here - can you expand on this statement - I, too, believe that the exact numbers and conversions adwords shows is not always definitive in terms of the business it brings in - but how do you view it:

"Fortunately that represents only a small % of the business it has brought us."

I still don't know how to do that cool boxed highlighty thingy.

[netmeg]

bracket-quote-bracket in front and then bracket-slash-quote-bracket at the end.

[fabulousyarn]

Nutmeg! THANK YOU! :)

bracket-quote-bracket in front and then bracket-slash-quote-bracket at the end.

[fabulousyarn]

Did I write Nutmeg! SORRY! Holiday Head here. Lots of pumpkin pie around. -j

Nutmeg! THANK YOU! :)

[Tropical Island]

Fortunately that represents only a small % of the business it has brought us.

We are fortunate that we actually get to meet our customers face to face - we have a B&B.

One of the comments we hear most often is that everywhere they went on the Internet searching about information on our area they ran into our listing whether it was natural serps or AW.

As you say the conversion numbers are not realistic because the potential client may run into the ads many times. They count as impressions but not conversions.

This is reinforcement of our marketing & reputation which together with many excellent reviews in sites like TripAdvisor & FlipKey makes it easier to close the reservations from potential guests.

It's interesting that we live in a market where foreign tourism has fallen more than 80% however we continue to have acceptable occupancy rates. Mind you most our competition can't see the forest for the trees. They only see the monthly expenditure - not the results.