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Once you have mastered Google AdWords basics, you can move on to some of the more advanced strategies to optimize your campaigns and improve your ROI. As I mentioned in the previous section, AdWords rewards smart marketers. The more you know about how AdWords works and how to use it to your advantage, the more you’ll be rewarded.

Ideal Bid Position
Many new online advertisers assume that the best position for an ad is at the top (#1 spot). This may be true if your goal is to get the most clicks, but if your goal is to maximize profits, you should consider lower ad positions. The problem with the top ad position is that you will often attract more browsers than buyers. This is because people will often click on the first ad without even reading it. They assume that the first result returned is the most relevant to their search. I refer to this as being “click happy”. When your ad is in a lower position, there is a better chance the user will actually read your ad copy first; instead of indiscriminately clicking on your ad. Another good reason to avoid the top position is that it costs more. In essence, your paying more money for less value. Positions 2-10 cost less money, and often convert much better.

Bid at the Keyword Level
When you’re setting up your campaigns in Google, you create groups of related keywords known as Ad Groups. Each Ad Group has it’s own ad copy, keywords, and maximum cost per click (CPC).
Here is an example of how a Google account is structured:

After you have set a maximum CPC for your Ad Group, you’ll have the option of setting a maximum CPC for individual keywords within the Ad Group. Most advertisers overlook this and use the default maximum CPC for all their keywords. I highly recommend that you specify separate bids for each keyword in your Ad Group. This will allow you to more accurately control your costs, and determine your ROI. To enable separate keyword bids; navigate to the Ad Group, select your keywords, and click on the “Edit Keyword Settings” button.

Update the Search Bid for each of your keywords, and then click the “Save Changes” button. If you don’t specify a bid for a particular keyword, the maximum CPC for the Ad Group will be used. Use Dynamic Keyword Insertion To increase the click-through rate of your ads, I recommend that you use dynamic keyword insertion. When you set up your Ad Groups, you write one ad for an entire group of keywords, as shown in Figure 5.3.2.b. The problem with this is that since you only have one ad, you can’t use your all of your keywords in the ad copy; this then negatively effects your click-through rate. To get around this problem, Google created dynamic keyword insertion. This allows you to dynamically insert your keyword into your ad copy when a user’s search query contains that keyword. To use dynamic keyword insertion use the following syntax in your ad:

{KeyWord:Default Ad Text} acts as a place holder for your keyword. When your ad is triggered for a keyword in your Ad Group, {KeyWord:Default Ad Text} is replaced with your keyword. If your keyword exceeds the character limit, the Default Ad Text is used (you specify what the default ad text is).
For example, if you were using dynamic keyword insertion and somebody searched for DaVinci Code, {KeyWord: Default Ad Text} would be replaced with the keyword DaVinci Code as shown in this example:

Many new advertisers will create separate Ad Groups for each keyword, rather than use dynamic keyword insertion. This creates unneccessary Ad Groups, and also makes your account difficult to manage. For large groups of related keywords you should always use dynamic keyword insertion. Create Multiple Ads
Google allows you to create multiple ads for each Ad Group. This is a very powerful feature that allows you to simultaneously test different versions of your ad copy. By running multiple ads you can quickly determine which ad copy has the best click-through rate. You can also run tests to determine which ad copy results in more sales.

In the present era of globalization the role of the Internet is not restricted to merely exchanging information and social networking anymore. The Internet is fast becoming the world’s largest market place where people from the most diverse and bizarre paces are now coming together and exchanging goods and services for money.

In any market be it the virtual market place of the internet or the physical market place of the real world, one needs to advertise to make one’s presence felt.

In the real world there are a number of gimmicks and strategies that manufacturers can use to increase their market share. But in the virtual world the options are limited. Although the reach is world wide but the avenues are limited.

One option that is very popular is the Pay per click option that is on the rise among all classes of businesses especially small businesses.

What is pay per click and what are the reasons behind the popularity is some thing that we will attempt to explore here.

First what exactly is the pay per click concept? This concept is perhaps as old as the internet itself and is the most popular concept.

Pay per click advertising is a technique that works by taking a specified sum of money for listing your advertisement on any of the major or minor search engines. As a net savvy techno freak you would have seen such sponsored links when you would have performed searches on Google.

These sponsored links usually appear at the top, bottom or, as in the case of Google, the right hand side of the search engine results page. These sponsored links are referred to by many monikers. Some of the more popular ones are Paid Listings, Sponsored Listings, or Featured Listings.

When you sign up for a pay per click program the Pay per click search engines require that you pay a pre specified amount to have your advertisement listed on the major search engines. You would also be required to bid on keywords that are related to your business. For example, if you are a T-shirt manufacturer then it would be in your favor to have your link displayed whenever someone searches for shirts or even apparel or maybe even casual wear.

Once you have finalized your bid and the deal is done you don’t need to pay any money upfront. The best part about pay per click advertising is that the bid amount is to be paid by the advertiser whenever a visitor clicks on the advertisement and no money needs to be paid up front. Hence, this is also known as a “cost per click” program.

The terms Pay per click and cost per click are oftentimes used interchangeably to describe Pay Per Click web advertising. Although Pay per click refers to the payment method and Cost per click refers to the cost factor involved in each payment.

Now that we have seen what exactly Pay per click is, we now examine the reasons that have contributed to the popularity of Pay per click among small businesses.

The reason behind the rise of Pay per click is very simple. A small business basically wants more customers. The widespread exposure is achieved through the simple act of setting up a website with a shopping cart option. Translating that exposure into sales is a bit difficult.

You would do well to remember that although organic Search Engine Optimization may generate traffic, it is not “instantaneous.”

By making use of search engine marketing programs such as pay per click, you can receive the desired results and clicks a few days instead of months.

Therefore owing to the twin advantages of more customers and faster results pay per click has become very popular today with small businesses.