What Do Pay Per Clicks Have to Do With Paper Clips?

by Ritchie Hale

If you are new to online marketing you are probably in a state of bewilderment with some of the lingo. When you venture into new circles it is natural to experience moments of confusion. Dont let this intimidate you.

When I was first looking into ways of driving traffic to my website someone recommended paper clips. I sat there wondering what in the world paper clips had to do with online advertising. It seemed rather bizarre but I was assured they gave you the ability to drive high quality traffic to your website.

Not wanting to appear uninformed, I kept nodding my head through the whole discussion on paper clip advertising. Well... the light bulb went on when I realised they were referring to a technique called 'Pay Per Click'. So I have decided to explain what I have learned in nice, simple language.

Pay per Click (PPC) is an advertising technique used on the web. The ability to drive high quality traffic to your site is fundamental to the successful outcome that you are seeking with your online business. In other words, you need the right people to visit your website, so you can sell your products.

In search engines, Pay per Click advertisements are usually text ads which appear near the search results. There are two primary Pay per Click search engines that cover about 90% of the World Wide Web. They are Google AdWords and Yahoo Search Marketing (formerly Overture).

These two systems offer basically the same capability although their techniques differ from one another in various ways. In addition to these basic engines, each of these results are syndicated to a large number of other search engines. Appearing in the top three or four positions will allow your search ad to be syndicated to nearly all search engines on the web in one form or another.

Now how do they get there? Advertisers bid on words or phrases, which are referred to as 'keywords'. When a user searches for a particular word or phrase in the search engine, the list of advertiser links appears in order of bidding. Google provide their paid inclusions (Sponsored Links) down the right hand side of the page. In Yahoo, the advertisers links (Sponsor Results) are shown at the top of the page above the regular search results.

The more you bid on the keyword, the further up this list of links your ad will appear. When and only when the user clicks on your link do you pay the agreed amount for each click. This user is then directed to the destination of your choice.

So basically..... the Pay Per Click technique allows you to bid on search words, when the user clicks on the advertisement, then you pay. Thus you have Pay Per Click.

Some key aspects to bear in mind:

* You select the keywords you want your link to appear on.

* The link itself is like a small ad, with a title and text.

* This link can go to any specific page of your website that you choose.

* You only pay when somebody clicks on the link.

* The higher up the paid subscriber list you appear, for the most part, the more you pay per click.

* Depending on the search engine, minimum prices per click start at $0.01 but very popular search terms can cost much more.

Ritchie Hale is founder and owner of ELAH Group Pty Ltd. Consultant to large, global corporations in the areas of Marketing and IT. Developed eClass programs geared to small businesses based on proven marketing techniques. Personal coach to small business owners and individuals. Visit http://www.elahgroup.com