Getting More Website Visitors - Turn On The Traffic Tap

He's a bit short of work at the moment and could do with some more orders right now. He knows that if people go to the website there's a good chance they'll buy. But how can he get visitors right now?

Pay Per Click Advertising

When Stan searches on Google trying to see where his own website comes up, he notices some of his competitors appearing at the very top of page 1 and also down the right-hand side. On closer inspection he can see that these are adverts. At the bottom of the right-hand column he finds a link suggesting he can put his advert in. Clicking this takes into the Google Adwords page.

What Is Pay Per Click Advertising

Pay per click advertising (PPC) let you bypass having to list well in the organic search engine results. You are able to sponsor the search phrases you want to be found for by paying a fee for every person who clicks the advert and visits your website. Hence the name pay per click. It's a system you can turn on and off, just like a visitor tap!

Stan Decides to Give It a Go

The Google Adwords page quoted a freephone number to help set up your account. Stan give it a ring, but as soon as the Google rep started talking about spending a few thousand pounds per month he quickly put the phone down. It all seemed a bit too expensive. Stan's main concerns were...

• I can't afford £3000 per month, especially since I don't know what return I'm going to get.
• £2 for every visitor? What if nobody buys anything?
• At £2 per click what if my competitors sit there clicking my advert. I'll be bankrupt by the end of the week.

Stan Has a Chat with His Website Designer

When Stan chose his website designer he was careful to pick one who could support him beyond building the website. He mentions his Google Adwords experience and gets the following advice...

• Pay per click advertising is all about targeting. If your phrases are two broad, e.g. car parts, dresses, accountants, you'll get loads of click throughs but few people will actually buy. It's the same if you target too large an area, e.g. the whole UK when you can only serve a 50 mile radius.
• Sponsoring buying phrases works best. These are the phrases people type in when they are actually looking to buy. For example "where to buy ABC123 widgets". Sponsoring "ABC123 widgets" could be people searching for general information.
• Being very targeted will bring in much less traffic, but the traffic you get will be much more likely to buy. This keeps your costs down by filtering out the budget wasters - people who click but are never going to buy from you. It also keeps your conversion rate up - the percentage of people who buy from the advert.
  
• Sitting there, clicking on someone's advert is called click fraud. All the top pay per click advertising systems are well aware of this and easily filter it out.

Stan Has a Second Go

With his website designers help Stan has a go at setting up his Google Adwords account. Using the keyword tool and the traffic estimator (free Adwords tools) he's able to quickly build a nicely targeted advertising campaign. He's chosen a range of search terms which suggest people looking to buy his widgets and which Google knows are being used by real people.

To begin with he's set his daily budget to a medium level to get some traffic and see how well they perform. His website designer has set up Google Analytics so he can track the people clicking on his adverts to see what they do on his website. Once he knows its profitable he'll turn this budget up.

Using Pay Per Click Effectively

Using pay per click is a great way of getting some instant traffic. If you're careful in the way you set up your campaigns you can get a very good return on the money you spend. It can be a bit daunting at first getting everything set up so it's a good idea to have a chat with somebody who knows what they're doing. It's also very important to have proper tracking in place so you can see how well your adverts are performing.

Compared to other forms of advertising pay per click gives you incredible control. You can turn it on and off, increase and decrease your budgets, and control where on the page advert appears at the click of a button. You can see exactly how many people you're getting and you can get a very good idea of how much they have spent.

If you need some help in this area just give me a call.
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