enetwal – Page 5 – Micro Business Specialist

5 Tips for Successful Niche Blogging

To be successful with niche blogging you’ve got to have a plan and then work that plan. As an affiliate marketer, you’ve need to systematically work toward your long term objectives.

A strong sense of focus plus the commitment to succeed as an affiliate marketer will liberate you from your regular job and set you on a course to success. But with no one else cracking the whip over your head, you need to do it yourself.

The acronym for FOCUS, stands for: “Follow One Course Until Successful.” When you learn to focus and keep your eyes on the prize you can be very successful with affiliate marketing.

1. Choose the right WordPress theme for your niche profit blog.

Perhaps that heading should read, “Choose the correct blogging platform.” That is WordPress.

There are hundreds, no thousands of free WordPress themes you can use for your affiliate niche profit blog. Take the time to seek out the best affiliate marketing WordPress theme you can find.

Quality themes are optimized to boost your blog’s CTR (click-thru rate). They also will make AdSense ad code placement easy, and more effective.

2. Major in marketing

A large portion of your time should be spent in marketing your niche profit blog. At the outset, you should define your overall marketing strategy and then break it down into steps that you can perform daily.

Keep a spreadsheet where you can track all of your marketing activities. Use a blog analytics program so that you can track and measure the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns.

Never stop learning about the many ways that you can market your blog and get more exposure in the marketplace.

3. Follow a Mentor

On the face of it, affiliate marketing seems fairly simple, but there are a lot of challenges to overcome before you find success.

When you follow someone who has already ‘been there and done that’, you save time and effort by learning from the mistakes that others before you have made. You can also emulate their success and achieve your goals much more quickly than you would on your own without guidance.

4. Be willing to invest in your success

So often new affiliate marketers always look for the free option. They want free tools and free software and then they wonder why they are not as successful as they could be.

You must be willing to invest in yourself in order to achieve your goals, and you must be willing to invest in yourself if you want others to take you seriously.

Yes, the free options save you money, but investing in the best tools can give you a competitive advantage over all of those marketers who are only using the free tools.

5. Keep learning and taking action on what you learn

The Internet is full of distractions and shiny objects that lure you and distract you from your chosen path. These can cause you to lose the focus that we mentioned earlier.

While it’s true that the internet world is constantly changing, it’s also true that the basic principles of marketing remain constant. Resist the temptations and focus on your work. Keep your eyes on your goals.

Being successful in an online business, just like anything else in life, is about 80% mindset and 20% implementation. If you’ve got a mindset that is focused on success, then everything else will fall into place for you.

When you are ready to get serious about affiliate marketing with a niche profit blog, you’ll want to visit, Passive Niche Profits, where you will discover many other tips and strategies like these to help you make money online.

[tags]passive niche profits, niche blogging, successful niche blogging, blogging[/tags]

Killer Content Can Catapult Your Success

The newly released Killer Content program designed by Socrates Socratous has been released today to the general public. It has caught my attention and is well worth a serious look by anyone looking for an effective strategy to make money online.

It’s called Killer Content, and it merits that attention in two ways. First there is a huge amount of content, but the fact that it is organized into 980 different niches is outstanding. It makes it possible for new or established marketers to readily assemble useful killer content that will meet their needs in any of these niches.

Well over one hundred and fifty thousand articles are indexed into easy to access content you can use to create articles, blog posts and even entire final products. Better yet, it is easily searchable by keyword which greatly expands its value to the niche marketer.

While the content is powerful and makes it possible for anyone to quickly assemble useful material in hundreds of profitable niches, the built in automation features of the program make it a real, “Wow!”

It includes a state of the art search engine, built in custom spinner, automatic push button ebook creator, Multi-site timed autoblogging, dummy-proof web 2.0 dashboard, training, copyscape integration, and more. Of note they are planning on adding new content on an ongoing basis and have a dedicated 6 person support team to help even the newest internet marketer learn how to maximize the potential of this power game plan.

If you are looking for a solid game plan that you can ride to financial success you owe it to yourself to give this a serious look.

To learn more go here now: Killer Content

[tags]Killer Content, Socrates Socratous[/tags]

Are you graphically challenged?

You’re not alone. Many people have difficulty when it comes to creating quality graphics for their web sites and other online properties.

That’s why I recommend people invest in a solid package of pre-built graphics they can use as needed, when needed.

Here’s a good one you can start with that’s really inexpensive and will get you off to a good start.

Grab it now, so you will have it when you need it.

Marketing Graphics Toolkit

I’ve used various packages myself in the past. This one is about as cheap as they come. As such this is great for those who prefer not to pay $100 and hour or so for a graphics artist to design their pages.

Now if you have a high priced product or a high profile site you want to knock the socks off visitors, you should really consider hiring professional artists. But for most run of the mill projects a set of graphic tools like this is more than adequate to the task.

Marketing Graphics Toolkit

[tags]graphics, graphic tool kit, [/tags]

Learning about HTML – HTML Tutorial for Beginners

In high school some multiple decades ago, I learned a bit of Spanish, I was even president of my High School Spanish Club. Now what I retain today is just a smattering of words, enough to get me by looking for the bathrooms etc. So when traveling, my best bet remains to carry a Spanish English dictionary.

The same is kind of true with my internet experience and my lack of familiarity with the basic HTML. As time has passed, I’ve mastered most of the basics that I need to set up and make changes to web sites, and related HTML documents. But in the beginning, I found myself constantly googling for help every time I needed to remember some code to insert an email or create a bulleted list. It was a hunt and peck way of learning about html.

Now Google is great, but it sometimes took me two or three listings to actually find what I needed. Then a few weeks later, I would need to search it all over again as I lost my short term memory some time ago.

Eventually, I came across a useful summary of the main basics of HTML that focused on the essentials. That was many years ago now, but I still from time to time find myself digging out my copy which I keep near my computer.

For me, it is easier to find something from a printed manual, and that’s what I did. I bought the report and then printed out the back portion of it because I am too cheap to print the whole thing. This has been a lifesaver for me for years now and I have since shared this same volume with hundreds of people. The book by Terry Jett is called HTML in Simple Terms.

I don’t know that this is the best volume on the topic, but it has been everything I have needed and may be all you need as well.

I think it is a solid html tutorial for beginners. If you have found yourself searching for some HTML “how to” information you may well want to grab a copy for yourself. You can get your own copy and begin learning html basics in no time by going to http://www.askearlabout.com/html-in-simple-terms/index.html

[tags]learning about html, html tutorial for beginners, learning html basics, learning html coding, learn html coding, learn html basics[/tags]

Internet Marketing: The Basics – Where to Start

I am preparing a new email sequence for a list that will include many new aspirants to internet marketing. In doing so, I am thinking about the essential truths I can share with them, as an older brother or uncle might.

Many who are exploring internet marketing are doing so from a position of need, meaning that they have little in excess resources to apply to the game. The good news is that it is possible to learn virtually all you need for free if you set your mind to it. There are some inescapable expenses which include computer/internet access, web hosting and an auto-responder.

The critical first step, the crossing of the Rubicon for many emerging marketers – passing from thinking about it to doing it – is the acquisition of an auto-responder service. This monthly cost represents a financial commitment that is purely business oriented. It is potentially a very powerful and lucrative tool, if you put it to good use. As you will never stop hearing, the money is in the list. And the list is on the auto-responder or it’s not worth having.

The hardest part of any list is the first several hundred list members. It’s often slow going at first, which is all the more reason why you want to start building your list as soon as possible.

As your list grows, your ability to grow your list does as well. Joint venture opportunities begin to present themselves. One big break through for me occurred when I learned about Ad Swapping. I was able to multiply my list from 1500 to nearly 7500 in less than a year.

Even now I participate in a swap group at Ultra Swaps. Once you have a list of 500 or so, you should focus on doing swaps. But I digress.

The real message I want to share is, you are probably not in business until you get that autoresponder set up. Once you do, you will need to learn how to maintain it and make it work for you. You could wait till you got that all figured out, or you can take a plunge get the service and learn as you go.

I am a strong believer in taking the plunge. You ain’t never gunna know it all.

Get your auto responder, start paying a monthly bill and make it justify its cost. Yes you will need to learn and do a lot of other things to make it work. But you need to do that anyway, if you are going to be in business online. This just gets you off the dime and on your way.

Now I actually have two different auto-responders, which isn’t necessary. Of the two, I would recommend you go with Aweber. If you are already with one of the other big names, don’t worry, most of them do a great job as well.

Once you start with an auto-responder company you are pretty much signing on for life, so it’s good to go with a quality service. It can be hard to migrate lists at a later date.

[tags]UltraSwaps, aweber, autoresponder, internet marketing, adswaps, business online,auto respond email, autoresponder emails, autoresponder services[/tags]

QR Codes – They’re Everywhere

You’ve seen them, maybe not even knowing what they are or how they work. Well the good news is that I have found a short, if older, video that will help you out a lot if you are new to QR codes.

QR Codes Everywhere

QR Code, you say? See QR Codes in action, learn how they work, and get a quick explanation of their history with Dan S. Robbins of Creative Search Media.

[tags]QR Codes, how to make a QR Code, How to read a QR Code[/tags]

Easy PLR – Private Label Rights Article Packs – A Review

Product: Easy PLR

Where You Can Buy It: Easy PLR

Product Description: Private Label Rights Article Packs

This site offers private label rights articles which are sold in packs to web publishers looking for top quality content for their websites or blogs. This site also sells content to offline publishers like local parenting magazines and coffee table book publishers.

Who This Product is Intended For: The customers at EasyPLR are website or blog owners who are interested in adding quality content to their website or blog to give added value for their readers. These people are usually in the market for unique, quality content, but cannot afford to pay ghostwriters higher prices. Their solution is to purchase quality PLR and edit it to become unique and their own.

Uses: Use the PLR articles from EasyPLR for blog posts, articles in your newsletter, or to create e-courses for your auto-responder. Pull the articles together in a document, add graphics, and turn it into a pdf. Then, offer that pdf as a freebie to your list. Create an information product, put your name on it and sell it. The uses are only limited by your imagination.

Pros: EasyPLR offers affordable articles. They always have many different topics to choose from. The articles are top quality, written by a paid writer, and then also edited by a second writer.

The articles can be personalized to better fit your site and you can claim them as your own. The people at EasyPLR only sell a limited amount of articles in each topic so you aren’t regurgitating the same stuff everyone else is. The other benefit of choosing Easy PLR is that there is no membership required. You can shop just for what you need – and get what you need without loading up on miscellaneous content.

The folks at EasyPLR also include suggested affiliate programs to monetize the PLR that you purchase.

Cons: The content will not be original to you. However, unlike most PLR sites, the packs are sold in very limited quantities.

The only other negative for this site is that I can’t always find content on the topic that I’m looking for. However, the quality more than makes up for that when I can find the topic I’m looking for. One way to get around this, although you will have to wait a bit longer, is to send an email and request a certain topic. Usually, they will have an article pack written up at customer requests.

Personal Opinion: EasyPLR.com allows me to provide my readers with quality information while saving me time (it’s available when I need it) and money (no ghostwriters or PLR memberships)

[tags]niche marketing,Easy PLR,PLR, Private Label rights, affiliate marketing,[/tags]

First Link Priority – Are You Shooting Yourself In the Foot?

Here is an SEO tip I picked up from my Market Samurai friends. It concerns something called the First Link Priority, which can hurt your ranking chances without your being fully aware of it.

They suggest some options in the video. Perhaps the simplest is to not link your images on some pages. But there are other approaches as discussed.

[tags]first link priority, seo, anchor text, image links, [/tags]

How To Decide Which Clickbank Product to Promote.

As affiliate marketers we often rely on Clickbank for inventory to sell. It offers products to sell in a lot of different niches. Quite a few in many of the more lucrative fields. Some pay to promote, others may not perform.

Deciding is a complex mix of knowing your competition, the quality of the site, its products, gravity, and trend lines, etc. Some pay more, some have residuals. We can analyze all the above or rely on pure guess work.

Now in the past, I looked and ultimately kind of grabbed a product and ran with it, if only to get the experience.

But as you get more systematic and start following a plan of consistent action for massive results, you want to focus on the best products, which when coupled with your best efforts yields maximum profit.

But you can’t be wasting your time researching the sales page of junky Clickbank products that won’t sell. Your time is too valuable. Instead spend your time focused on the best options and use the ones that best fit your particular niche and approach. Your results will be better, for the same amount of effort.

There is an easy way to discover the best performers.

Brad Callen introduced a free plug in for Firefox, that highlights the best performers from among all the products listed on Clickbank.

It’s easy to install. I have, and it works great.

The plug in color codes each product offering on Clickbank, and reports critical information on its marketability. Those colored green, met a set of standards for marketability that is proprietary to the product. The red ones didn’t and are to be avoided.

You will succeed faster by focusing on those products with stronger prospects.

The one rub is that it’s kind of a black box. We don’t really know the full contents of the equation they use to decide who gets green and red and why. But we can get a pretty good idea by listening to their introductory video. Enough to make a decision on.

http://askearlabout.com/CBSurge.php

Do you think it makes sense to try it for a while? Would it help you find better products to promote?

The basic version is free so you can test drive it for years if you want.

Once it’s working for you, upgrade to the paid version, but no need to do that now. Unless you want to.., of course.

Whether you are working facebook, twitter, blogs, email marketing, moble or more, Clickbank is a huge resource – no matter what your niches.

Your objective is to promote the cream of the crop, not the poor performers.

This free tool will eliminate 80% of the clutter, so you can focus on the 20% of solid offers that will pay you for your efforts.

http://askearlabout.com/CBSurge.php

[tags]clickbank, CBSurge, firefox, plugins, firefox plugins, affiliate marketing, niche marketing, twitter, blogs, email marketing, [/tags]

Free Gift for Clickbank Users

If you are doing affiliate marketing and use clickbank as one of your primary resources for product to sell, you will want to grab this free plug in created by Brad Callen for Firefox users.

http://askearlabout.com/CBSurge.php

One of the most important steps in promoting an affiliate product is in picking just which products you want to promote. This new FREE tool will let you see a lot more information than you can get from Clickbank itself.

Most people I know, rely on gravity scores to make their decisions. While gravity is a useful aid, it can be very misleading, and most importantly, its an incomplete means of judging.

If you are going to the trouble of setting up a full fledged marketing campaign you want to start off with a quality product with some upside. This new firefox plugin will help you do that.

[tags]clickbank, CBSurge, firefox, plugins, firefox plugins, [/tags]

SENuke – A Big Boy Tool – Big Girls too!

One of the challenges for new people to internet marketing is the need to not only know what to do, but to do it on a massive scale. The beauty is that you can, IF you have the correct tools.

You can try to get by with free tools and hand me down tools to learn the ropes, and most people probably should do it that way. But once you understand the role that building backlinks represents to your websites or those of your clients, you must investigate systems you can employ to make it an easier, and more powerful part of your operations.

The massive action available to you from powerful tools makes it possible for you to develop much more effective sites with much less time and effort. The downside is that you need to pay for advanced tools to do this. Sorry, the professional tools don’t get given away like the starter tools and ebooks you may be used to.

The good news is that you can often get a free trial, to help you see if the tools is right for you. Why wouldn’t it be? Well, maybe you are not ready for the power of some of them. Or perhaps you don’t understand how to take advantage of them yet. It make little sense to buy a professional tool like SENuke unless you are ready to put it to work for you.

There is just one exception to that, and that is when you know you are committed to learning what you need to know and can get a great deal by acting quickly. That may be the case here, and during the launch of the powerfully enhanced SENUKE they are offering a one time lifetime access that is a dead simple decision for long time user like me. I will let them explain the special for you inside.

Now if your not a big kid yet on the internet marketing circuit, you probably shouldn’t be buying this today. But you owe it to yourself to take a serious look at its capabilities if only to know what is possible. It might also show you a bit about why your occasional article to the article directories is not flooding your account with new sales.

Success takes massive action as I said above, take some time to check out the spanking new version of SENUKE and if you are a big girl or big boy online, take the plunge.

Once you do, you will be able to blow away your competition in thousands of different niches and actually start making some real money online.

[tags]SE nuke, SENUKE, search engine optimization, Building backlinks, Internet marketing Tools,[/tags]

My Secret to Getting Citations for Google Places Pages

In the following video, you will see one of my secrets revealed, and learn a bit about citations and the eventually important dynamic role reviews will play in your businesses future.

I use the resource mentioned to jump start my clients citations, but going beyond that takes more personalized attention over time.

While some of my competitors will hide the resources they use, I am willing to share them with you. If you have the time and know how, you can do this all yourself. If you prefer to let an expert take this function off your hands, I can get it done for you inexpensively.

Google Places SEO & Marketing

Do you have a small business and want your Google Places listing to rank well in the Google Maps 7-Pack?

PS: UBL has raised their prices since this video was first released.

There are other services such as Merchant Circle that do a partial job, but still a good start. Here are some of the places citations go:

These are national citations and while you may wonder why you want to show up on someones in-car navigation, you presence there is a definate plus in the Google Places Ranking game.

What’s missing in these solutions are the local listings from within your community. For now you will be better of with these citations than with none. In the future, the prize will go to those who learn how to get in the local directories from within their communities. These will eventually make a big difference. The best time to prepare for this eventuality is now. Early adapters with effective programs will gain an insurmountable advantage that will pay off for them for years to come.

I can help your business win the Google Places game now and in the long run. Contact me at enetwal@gmail.com to set up a free initial consultation.

[tags]UBL, universal business lists,google places pages,citations, getting citations, google places reviews, Importance of reviews, [/tags]

We’re Winning Recognition!

I was just informed by Thumbtack.com that my Minneapolis Internet marketing services have been ranked in the top three of such services in Minneapolis by them. All such recognition is welcome.

Internet Marketing Consultants, Minneapolis

My efforts in Minneapolis are focused on helping local businesses attract new customers by being more findable online. Pretty much the same as here. I do tend to focus more there on non internet marketing businesses, and have been pushing as hard as I can for businesses to take advantage of the new Google Places pages opportunity.

Internet Marketing Consultants – Minneapolis

[tags]thumbtack, Minneapolis internet marketing consultant, awards, Local Business, [/tags]

Google Places Searches Will Change the Playing Field for Local Businesses

Local businesses have just had a huge new factor applied to their marketing needs with the advent of Google Places Pages and the Google Map. Those who are quick to act and internet savvy have been handed a huge advantage.

This time around, the techniphobes will suffer. Those who do not take action will loose future customers without knowing what hit them.

Many small businesses with web sites saw little benefit till now. About half of all small businesses have web sites, which implies the other half does not. The reason for that? Those who had web sites were seldom seen unless someone already knew to search for them specifically.

Those who waited to get web sites may have the last laugh. With Google Places Pages, they may never need to get additional web sites of their own.

Now they will still want to get found when someone is searching for them. Web sites will still play a huge positive role to those who know how to use them. Google Places pages is a turning point in online marketing. Those who act now and act effectively will benefit by getting a larger share of the “new” customers in any market.

New customers are the lifeblood of any business.

A good web site can tell many stories to those who read it. The primary purpose of a web site though for most business was to get seen by new custoemrs. From now on, in most cases that function will be dominated by Google Places Page search results.

The places page service will (and to large degree already has) replace the traditional role played by the Yellow Pages in the last century.

When people have a need for goods or services that they do not have an already established supplier for, they go the easiest reference source they have to find possible solutions. In the old days that meant turning to the Yellow pages to find a dentist or auto repair shop if one didn’t already have a regular supplier.

Today, the majority of people do that search online and of those who do most rely on Google. This is true of all age groups, but is even more predominant in the younger generations where the Yellow Pages are seldom used at all.

This online search traffic is valuable. And this is why Google has focused on it, and redesigned their entire search process to meet the needs of this population of searchers.

Google wants to replace the Yellow Pages recognizing that businesses are willing to pay high advertising fees to get active prospects. People who are searching for a supplier are doing it because they have a need and thus they are much easier to convert into customers and cash. Same is true with the online version today.

But now, despite the volume of buyers who are finding suppliers online Google is offering in essence a free ad to any business who takes the time to effectively complete their listing. It might not always be free? It’s such a huge value today, its amazing so few people have woken up to its value today. Afterall, it’s free.

Now Google is selling little tags for $25 a month that provide additional visibility, and will eventually make revenues from that means. Their initial goal is to get their online directory as complete as possible.

To get businesses to fill out their listings as fully as possible, Google rewards those who do by giving them a higher ranking on the Google Map than those who only to a partial job or fail to do it at al.

We know from past studies of organic search results, that ranking matters. The higher your business ranks, the more calls you will get compared to the others in almost all cases. As a general rule you will get more business by being higher ranked, and a quantum more calls than if you are on the second page of results.

Today, for many businesses in many communities across the world the word is just beginning to get out. In many niche, in many cities it is still incredibly easy to get a top listing on the Google Places search results.

It’s so easy, that many businesses are making a mistake and not taking the time to learn what is needed to ultimately prevail when the word gets out more fully in the marketplace. And it will. They need to understand that they need to not only completely fill in their listing, but also show up on Googles competitors. Within months for some and perhaps years for others, what will matter even more is the accumulation of positive reviews from satisfied customers.

The technology consumers use has changed and will continue to do so. The reality is that it’s not changed at all from the merchants perspective. A local business need to be where the customers are, or where the customers are looking. And that means a business must be visible when their prospective customers to a Google Places search.

The development of Google Places pages as a major force in local marketing has lead to the development of a new blog of mine which will focus on Google Places Search

[tags]Google places pages, Google places search, Google map[/tags]

Google Kills A Aardvark & ABC’s

Wanted: Google Places Page Visibility

Calling all cars, calling all cars. Be on the lookout for a massive search engine that has killed dozens of small business marketing gambits and mortally wounded the titan of marketing.

Among the dead are A-Aardvark, ABC whatever, A-ABC whatever and similar efforts to be on the top of any category in the Yellow Pages. The Yellow Pages themselves are in intensive care, and not expected to survive.

If you were to look in any yellow pages directory in any city in America, you could find an ABC named company in a dozen or more categories. Why, because it paid to be in the top listing in the yellow pages.

The beauty of the yellow pages was the fact that the people who used it, were in a buying mood. They had a need to find the right person for a specific purpose. Most businesses would welcome an actively interested prospect over three casual browsers any day.

That was the magic of the Yellow Pages and why they were able to charge such huge sums to advertise. Outrageous sums. But it worked.

You had three options.

Go with your free listing and not expect to get a lot of calls.

Buy visibility from a bolded text, to being listed in multiple categories, or to really be seen, to invest in display advertising. If you went for display advertising, the cost quickly hit the stratosphere. But as expensive as it was, it obviously worked, or people would have stopped using it.

The third option was to game the system, by naming your company something like A-aardvark commercial cleaning, or plumbing, or dry cleaning etc to get the top listing in your particular category.

The yellow pages franchise was a huge money maker for many decades. But today it is all but dead. And despite their efforts to reinvent themselves as an internet directory they are having the life crushed out of them by the ten-thousand pound gorilla, Google.

And recently Google has initiated is coup de grace.

For years now, Search Engine Optimization specialists and knowledgeable marketing consultants have been encouraging businesses to set up their web sites to show up when people searched online for “Accountant” and then your home town. This tactic and related tactics gave their clients the visibility display ads and the A-aardvark strategy offered yellow pages advertisers. Visibility at the top of the category.

At one time, it was only young people who were computer savvy. Today virtually every age group is equally and nearly totally computer oriented when it comes to searching for information. Yellow pages use has shrunk and most people find information that they used to get there online. Google has virtually 80% of that traffic. But this is old news. It’s been that way for almost a decade now. But there is new news.

For the last several years Google has been experimenting with its Google Map. It has evolved over time and may continue to do so, but in its current status it shows up to seven businesses in virtually every category the Yellow Pages ever dreamed of. And since it knows where a person is searching from, it can serve up those businesses that serve that market area.

The new game in town is to find a way to be the A-aardvark on the Google Places Page which is what they are now calling the Google Map feature.

Currently, you can often get there just by claiming the page Google may have already set up for your business and filling in the information they ask. As time goes on, the savvy business will seek advice from experts in the field. Such experts are popping up like dandelions after the first warm spring rain.

There are some tricks to the trade, but the actual work is not rocket science nor particularly difficult. But you want to find such a person and get yourself a fist mover advantage. It will take a year or two before all your competitors catch on to the new changes. In the meanwhile, if you move quick, you can capture more than your share of the new customers in your market.

[You have Permission to reprint and republish the above as long as you include the following resource box with it with live links]

The author Earl Netwal calls himself the Micro Business Specialist. He is a Minneapolis Internet Marketing Consultant. He provides support to businesses who are interested in becoming more visible online using Google Places and other techniques. He offers an inexpensive ebook which provides useful advice in filling out a Google Places Listing at Google Places Map.

[tags]Yellow pages, Google, Google Places, Google Places Page, Google Places Page Rank, Google Places Page Ranking[/tags]

How To Keep Google Adwords Costs In Check

You can get significant marketing results with Google Adwords but unless you are careful and manage your results well, it can become quite expensive. That said, it can be a powerful and quick way to drive traffic to your web site. Ideally, you want ads with high click through rates, lower costs, and better response overall. We will discuss several of the best ways to take charge of your pay per click expenditures in the paragraphs that follow.

Experiment with cost per click AND cost per thousand impressions.

Some websites (and yours may be one) have highly targeted traffic to a particular offer. If that’s you, you can buy in volume on a cost per thousand (CPM) instead of cost per click basis. Do use “CPC”; (cost per click) in addition as well, but try CPM as well, to lower overall costs.

Keywords Matter
In almost any competitive niche, you will dicsover that the most obvious keywords tend to be very expensive. Be careful, because you don’t want to bid on the keywords that are really expensive – you could go broke pretty quickly. It is often better to search out less expensive keywords, and to organize them into effective ad groups wtih matching ad copy. You want to get the highest possible position at the lowest possible cost per click.

Adwords in not a set and forget game. You must constanly monitor your results and treat it from the beggining as an ongoing experiment. Start with a good keyword tool to identify a wide range of possible keywords. The free Google Keywords tool is one of the best out there, but you can find others that may add additional insights.

Long Tails Can Bring Good Results

There is ofter less competition and thus less cost for phrases of two or more words. Longer phrases also tend to be more narrowly targeted to your niche do whiel fewer people will search for them, those that do are more likely to be interested in your offer. The real payoff is that they are usually much cheaper clicks. I like to focus my capaigns as much as possible on three word keywords, and you should be sure to add a goodly number to your campaigns. Then watch and see not only which get clicks, but which convert into sales.

Now It’s Time To Start Selling

The ad your searchers see need to grab their attention and get them to click. If it doesn’t work well enough, Google will start charging you more when it does.

Your ads should:

• Uses your keyword phrase as often as possible, especially in the title
• Offer a benefit in the first line (not a feature)

• A call to action is good if you can fit it in

• Remove Objections with a Promise

• Use the keyword in the URL

The better written your ad the more clicks you will get. This in turn imporves your quality score and Google rewards you with lower costs per click.

Writing good ads in such a limited amount of space is a challenging art form, but the importance of well written ads requires on on going effort to constantly improve the ads you use.

Start with long tail keywords. Focus on well ritten ads and constantly try to improve them. The net result will be more traffic at lower cost per click.

[tags]Adwords, Google Adwords, Pay per click, PPC, Lower cost per click costs, Online advertising, PPC Ads[/tags]