Part one of this guide helped you understand the basics of pay per click (PPC) marketing through search engines and set up a PPC account. This second part will look in more detail at researching your keywords and setting your budget.
What are keywords?
Keywords are the terms people have typed in to a search engine to look for some information. For example, if you are looking for a birthday card you may type in ‘birthday cards’. When the search engine brings back the results, it also displays adverts related to that subject.
Advertisers have told the search engine that they want their advert to be shown whenever their chosen keywords are searched for. Depending on what you want to advertise, your list of keywords may be anything from a dozen up to literally thousands (as is the case with the major retailers).
Keyword research
There are numerous keyword research tools to help you decide which terms to bid on. Some of these are free and others ask for payment. Google provides a free keyword estimator tool as part of its AdWords account, which will show predicted spend and traffic for a keyword. However, it will not create a list of keywords for you.
One of the most popular tools is Yahoo’s free keyword selector tool. This will tell you how many times a certain term has been searched for in the past month, along with associated searches using that term.
In order to build a keyword list, start by using these tools; type in the keywords you think people will use when searching for your product or service. The keyword tools will then show you know all the combinations of alternative keywords that people use to look for your product or service.
Choose the keywords that you think are most relevant to you. The more keywords you choose, the greater the potential traffic and sales that your PPC campaign will generate.
Generally, common keywords are popular amongst many advertisers, so the cost per click you’ll pay for them is likely to be higher than longer, less frequently used keywords. It’s a good idea to include as many as possible within your account.
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