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My reason for asking is that since I optimised a companies ranking to top on many searches they are now also paying for adwords which also appear top of adwords. They are arguing that the adwords may provide more traffic hence my commission is now being questioned.
I strongly believe the vast majority of users simply find the results within the main results section!
If this is an old topic (sorry) please post link!
My own experience is: 50:1 in favour for mid to top page 1, for the regular results.
Of course it is a whole lot more difficult this way and with the uncertainty of success.
But for me at any rate, the regular listings win hands down.
..since I optimised a companies ranking to top on many searches they are now also paying for adwords which also appear top of adwords..
There you have it.
Tops on both.
Check both statistics (adwords and normal for the specific search queries).
You are the one who can show them.
It can actually give you a real value of what your work was/is worth for those words.
Google will not tell how many people actually do not click on anything (or how many do click on one or more of the results of SERP's).
When I'm buying Adwords for a term that's doing well in the regular listings, I often bid lower just for that term, to keep it on the page but not at the top. It's easy to do with the Power Posting features.
Why is it nearly impossible to track ad words...? Well for us we sell big ticket items.. and it is normal pratice for people to print out the product page they are interested in, take that to a committe, get approval done, pass that on to a PO officer... who then calls requesting the item... you can see we cannot possibly tell the origin of the first contact.
JP
steve128
I would guess about the same. With that in mind it annoys me that this company is paying out £8000 UK pounds($12,000) per month for adwords and paying me £0.00 ($0.00).
vitaplease
Are you saying google provides the statistics for who clicks on regular results? I know adwords are tracked because that's how they get paid but I need comparisons for how many people, given a results page, click adwords. Personally I never click adwords, they tend to be far too generic for my specified searches!
buckworks
I am sure adwords work very well (look how much the company is spending above!). My point is ... who clicks adwords when the regular search results are good?
Your employer is foolish. Regular search results produce much more traffic than Adwords.
mfishy
Hard to say for sure, but people DO click Adwords even for sites that rank well in the free listings..
You should be able to deduce the proportions with info from your log files. Find out how many people came in from this or that search term in Google, then compare that with the Adwords activity for the same term(s). That should tell you what proportion clicks the free listing or your Adword box.
<<Since it is nearly impossible to track with 100% certantiy if an ad word click converted...>>
I thought you might be interested...
You can track AdWords results a multitude of ways (i.e. sale# 1019 came from Campaign: AdWords, and Keyphrase: Widget Outlets). The big problem for me is then comparing that to what AdWords cost me for that phrase, for a given time period. But that's another project.
The key is providing AdWords listings with URLs that include information about the campaign and the keyphrase. So, an AdWords URL would look like...
[widgets.com...]
Then, extract that information for each visitor. You could write it to a cookie and then extract it to the database upon conversion.
Maybe someone knows a stealthy means of tracking ALL visitors from all possible sources; paid or otherwise? Gets me thinking.
Ab4rney
As for ratio of traffic from general vs. AdWords; Tell your client that AdWords is no replacement for good general SEO. The two must co-exist, if they are both working. Which I'm sure they are.
I tried again, and still didn't get 0.5% clicks so Google suspended it.
If I try it again and fail they will bill me another $5.
So far, the $5 setup fee was the most expensive part of the adword, since no one wants to click on it.
Also, be sure to make use of the negative keywords. You can keep your widget ad from showing if someone searches for "free widgets" "used widgets" etc.
Regular SERPS result in around 10 times of DIRECT SEARCH ENGINE hits to a SELLING page (as opposed to INFO page) than the Adword ad.
But.. here is the interesting bit, those that come from Adwords are far more likely to enquire and take some action and convert!
The results for us are fairly unequivocal IN OUR CASE - e.g. high priced internationally targeted consulting service (ie: products or services are not sold directly on line, but are sold after a process from enquiry to signing a contract - the internet promotion is meant to attract interest enough to get targeted prospects to make an enquiry and start the process - generally 7 to 10% convert once they have made the enquiry)
I do seriously think that those that click on Adwords are predisposed to buy, those that click on regular serps are looking for info, but are still one step away ( a LONG step ) from actually buying. This could be because many are looking for reference or educational material as we publish a lot of free info, news, and articles.
To us, PPC has more ROI for commercial selling sites ( at least until Adword costs go up much higher), and SEO has more ROI for information sites. This is what google wants im convinced. It is maybe also what the consumer wants. And in the end the advertiser.
For us it is now vey clear given the results of our analysis.. 100% SEO for information sites and pages - 100% Adwords for Selling sites and pages. We are keeping our strategy completely separate for each.
