Saturday, September 27, 2008

Dominate Pay per Click but don't break the bank

By Xerge Rio

If you're reading this, you already know that affiliate marketing is a tough game for anyone, but especially for the type of individual that wants to dip in and out of other markets and spread their assets across numerous different niches - that's always a always a good idea, by the way.

So unless you've already got a well trafficked website and/or a very large list that is highly specialized and relevant to the products you're aiming to promote, you've got a choice:

1. Begin working hard at building sites, hunting back links, writing a serious amount of articles, content and blogs...

...you'll see that eventually your efforts will pay off in spades. Just don't expect money - or indeed traffic - to come knocking at your door for the next 12 months...at least not consistently or in large volumes.

2. PPC traffic.

Well, PPC is the broker in this case and boy has it got some big affiliate checks waiting with your name on it.

In a world full of potential markets to dip into and make money, the first option is simply not viable for the hungry net-prenuer. There's too much work and time required, unless you outsource all of the work (which can often be a huge energy hog and often ends up in tears anyway).

At the same time, people may discuss with you that PPC is also a huge time and energy hog, and that PPC can also end you up in tears, in particular after the major PPC search engines such as Google are becoming so competitive and particularly about the campaigns you set up and run.

Now, if you want to get immediate traffic and make money from every corner of the internet, Pay Per Click is up to this writing, the ultimate way to tap into hot buyers overnight (plus you don't have to worry about your traffic levels suddenly falling like you do with free traffic).

So the real key is to beat the system, and make PPC easy to operate, without losing money and spending lots of time in the process.

In order to do so, you'll have to cover the next important aspects to making your PPC campaign an actual success...

1. Testing is really important

Test which keywords are bringing you money, test which way of presenting your offers - via your webpage/landing page, etc., otherwise you'll constantly be throwing money down the drain. Once you know what is working, you can dump the duds and save yourself thousands in wasted clicks.

Then, buy more clicks with your initial profits, or even use it to outsource any of your "nitty-gritty" work that you don't want to do yourself anymore.

2. Target desperate keywords that you find through keyword tools

It's far easier to target people who are in a desperate mental state than it is to target "tire kickers" who are just snooping around, with no credit card in hand.

3. Control your budget, but don't limit it

You'll learn that the safest way to save yourself wasted PPC cash is to keep a very close eye on your campaigns. The average mistake you'll see here is to cap your daily PPC budget

When you're doing this, you're basically telling Google not to show your ads very often. This will save you money, and will also restrict your exposure and will take you longer to find out of your campaign is going in the proper direction. It's better to stop the campaign manually when things start getting expensive (providing you're not in profit that is!)

About the Author: