CCL Internet Marketing - Pay Per Click (PPC)

Should I use Pay Per Click (PPC)?

You've probably seen the "Sponsored Listings" at the top and right hand side of the Google search listings (Yahoo also have a version called "Sponsored Results"). These are called Pay Per Click (PPC). Companies pay each time a prospect clicks the link, this is called a clickthrough. We recommend PPC in the short term alongside an ethical, organic search marketing campaign. PPC results are almost instant. Any company can design an advert (or have a SEO company do it for them) and have it listed under Google's Sponsored Listing very quickly. The downside to this is that you will always pay for this type of listing. Organic optimisation takes much longer to take effect but the results are longer lasting.

Therefore, at computercoders.co.uk, we recommend that you use PPC whilst your organic search campaign takes effect (i.e. whilst you achieve the desired listing for your keywords/keyphrases) then either reduce or stop your PPC campaign based upon your metrics. That takes us to the next point, the should always measure your results. With PPC we recommend that you try lots of keywords at the start, then focus on the ones that are giving you the greatest returns. Find out which keywords are expensive and reduce your budget on those and find out which keywords aren't working at all and remove those altogether. As with any internet marketing plan you should be measuring your results against the baseline throughout your campaign.

Interestingly, running a PPC campaign alongside an already established organic keyword listing is not a bad idea either as research shows that searchers opinions are reinforced when they see a first page listing for a keyphrase as well as the PPC advert. For example, if you were on page one in Google for "Internet Marketing in Barnsley" and you also had a PPC advert for "Internet Marketing in Barnsley" a searcher would be more likely to clickthrough to your website than if you were just organically listed for the keyphrase.

Remember, internet marketing is a growing market. Your customers are online and this is an increasing trend. Many companies are now using part of their sales or marketing budget to promote their business online and organic search marketing and PPC are both fantastic ways of achieving this.