What Is a Pay Per Click Ad?


Defined Tag: Pay Per Click Ad.

A pay per click ad campaign is the means by which you can make your ad appear in targeted keyword searches, such as those which appear in the tables at the side of Google's search pages.

So, how do you go about getting a pay per click ad? Firstly, you will need to create an account with each campaign service you want to use, the two biggest being Google Adwords and Yahoo! Overture. Keywords for your site should be carefully chosen as those which will activate your ad when the keyword is searched for but which will not all be so common as to be in high competition. Some more specific keywords should also be included for each pay per click ad.

Each keyword is given a cost per click, or bid, which is paid each time the ad is clicked upon. Common keywords will demand a higher cost per click than less common ones. The pay per click ad service you use might recommend costs per click but ultimately it is up to you to decide how much you are willing to pay. Before adding a large amount of money into your per per click ad account, it is worth adding a small amount and monitoring carefully for the first few days to see how fast that budget diminishes – it may go faster than you expect!

One of the biggest problems facing site owners with a pay per click ad campaign is click fraud. This is where competitors repeatedly click ads in order to drive up bid amounts. It costs you money per wasted click, but it might be because they hope to drive you out of the running in competing for the same keywords. Click fraud can be monitored by your pay per click ad campaign provider, or by using specific fraud applications, found easily by searching for “click fraud” in a search engine. It might be recognized by your ad randomly receiving an unusual amount of clicks over a very short period of minutes or hours. Your pay per click ad campaign provider may not charge for all of these clicks and may or may not do anything about it.

Regardless, a pay per click ad campaign can be very effective in bringing new visitors to your site and can help boost a new site. Decide on a budget and stick to it while getting to know how to monitor your pay per click ad and analyze the reports regularly to keep its performance optimized.