Pay Per Click Sydney Advertising Agency

Today I saw a new icon in Google and it seemed like I have not seen it before. In September Google had rolled out Google Instant and this was immediately viewable in Australia at least with the correct url or by using Google.com instead of Google.com.au.

I had heard reports earlier in October that searchers in the USA had been seeing something similar to Google Instant in that it could change the way that people interact with search engines taking them away from the standard “List of 10 blue links” into something more interactive and hopefully helpful.

Our research has shown fairly little change in traffic numbers on larger sites for either Google SEO or Adwords metrics with the rollout of Google Instant. It appears people do not for the most part change when using Google Instant or they haven’t at least yet.

This new thing is called “Google Preview” and it can show you a preview of the actual website before you go there and render the entire page normally.

Google is reading, then caching an image of websites pages it seems.

Here is a screen shot of a Google.com.au search for “Website Hosting” done today:

Do you see anything out of the ordinary? I was not sure at first when I saw it if it was something I had seen before but never used.

It is the little blue magnifying glass immediately after the Title tag:

When clicked on any of the 10 sites shown in the results on Google it does a parsing of the page and displays that image to the side. Strangely it is covering the paid Google Adwords ads. I had gotten used to the idea that Google never messed with their money or decreased the chance for ads to be clicked. This might actually affect Adwords Click Through Rates on terms you are running paid ads for but don’t have a strong SEO presence.

Once the first Magnifying Glass is clicked on it changes the search page to a mode where any result hovered over will create a preview pane for that page.

Here I have clicked on the first results glass and am now seeing a preview pane:

Wow that is one of the most interesting Search Results I have seen in a while.

Moving the mouse down the page to over the second result shows that pages preview. You don’t have to click to get more previews.

On this listing there is also a yellow insert pane with an orange border with the text that seems to be read from the site and the most relevant keywords to the search performed are highlighted.

The words in the pane are highlighted in bold and then the passage from the site is highlighted in orange on the preview pane.

Here is another screen shot from this search on “Website Hosting”. This is when I hovered down to the third result:

This 4th example shows the highlighted text again like the second and then highlights where it is from on the page:

What do you think of this feature?

Is this something that you think the average web surfer would do?

What affect do you think this will have on paid and unpaid traffic?

Are you seeing this on searches on Google.com.au or Google.com now where you are located?

Google has just released an addition to the way Broad Match can be implemented on Google Adwords campaigns. At least it is live in the UK and Canada.

I imagine people like us in Australia, New Zealand, and the United States will see it soon enough if the results are favourable.

It looks like they are waiting a bit before messing with the huge market of the United States.  Cant blame them, but really we would like to see it there as soon as possible. We do have clients there, as well as in Oceania.

What it does is this:

It allows you to use broad match but you can tell it which words you dont want to deviate from what has been typed.

There is a good writeup on the Rimm Kaufman Blog.

The example on the Google Adwords blog is shoes.

The new Broad Match Modifer at Work

If you really dont want the keywords where your ads are shown to get into sideline words like wingtips, footwear, or boots you could put a plus sign before the word shoes.

This is quite useful especially for merchants that have part of a product line but not all the possible variations.

I have seen this and before what would be required is a phrase match or even an exact match campaign to be constructed.

This is quite interesting and should help Internet Marketing Consultants and possibly business owners construct better campaigns with less need for negative keywords.

This month we did not have locally hosted episode of ClickCast the Pay Per Click Podcast. We joined fellow Internet Marketer, Justin Kunst on his site and talked about 5 of the most common mistakes we see when optimizing clients Google Adwords Accounts.

It turned into a pretty good rundown on why many companies get off on the wrong start with Adwords and their account and campaigns will continue to suffer and it will seem difficult if not impossible to outrank competitors that are not making the same mistakes.

The top 5 mistakes with Google Adwords as we see them are:

1. Too Broad of Keywords – Don’t use vague words like “real estate” or “house” and expect great results.

2. Geotargetting has not been properly setup on the campaign. On Google you can show your ads only to people that are located in areas likely to want your product or service. This can be done by country, state, city, or even by a distance from a point on the map.

3. Turn off the Content Network – Google Adwords is not just searchers at google.com, it is also sites that want to show Google advertisements to raise income. By default this is turned on and confuses most advertisers as to where the traffic is coming from. Michael Smith suggests turning off the content network until the campaign is fully understood.

4. Negative Keywords – You can add special words to campaigns that make it so the advertisers ads don’t show. For example if someone types “cheap (keyword)” and the advertiser does not want to pay for this traffic they could add the word “cheap” as a negative keyword.

5. Turning the keyword targeting from Broad Match to a more particular matching type. By default Google sets keywords to “Broad Match” which will show the ad the often, and to the most diverse type of searches. Being more focused will get the advertiser better web visitors.

So if you would like to hear more about these and my take on them listen to the podcast below:

Top 5 Google Adwords Mistakes Podcast

Out with 2009 Online Advertising - In with 2010

It is now the New Year and we are like most of you starting to plan for the next year. Many people reevaluate their marketing decisins in January and we think this like most years will be the year online advertising becomes more important.

And the trends from 2009 are just coming in and show this as well.

All other Advertising Mediums declined in 2009 from 5 to 25%

• Cable TV – Down 5.0%
• Direct Mail – Down 10.0%
• Yellow Pages – Down 13%
• Outdoor – Down 14%
• Radio – Down 15.1%
• Broadcast TV – Down 19.0%
• Magazines – Down 20.0%
• Newspapers – Down 25.0%

The ONLY Major Advertising sector to increase was Internet Marketing.

Search Marketing increased 2% even in a year with an economic slump in most countries.

So let’s all start thinking ahead to 2010 and how we can make our businesses more successful than ever.

We knew Web 2.0 was the wave of the future, the savoir of the internet and IPO money everywhere but resisted joining Twitter until March of 2009.

Since then we have really started to enjoying its minimal design, easy to get involved idea (What are you doing), and the better integration with corporate accounts than Facebook.

Along the way we found oursevles reading diverse posts and interacting with a lot of people on our main twitter.com/ppcsydney account but always thought it was too easy for people to setup fake accounts and start sending messages to you, me, and everyone with an account. If you did not turn off your updates you might be getting emails all day long from people telling you of the latest tooth whitener or Twitter follower trick.

Definitely this is such a severe problem with Twitter that it might bring the whole thing down if people have the perception as a haven for spam. I mean who wants to hang out someplace and get spammed all day?

Twitter is starting to take Twitter spam more seriously and making the process of reporting a spammer more direct with a button on each account that allows you to vent on these people (or robots).

I recomend reading about todays Twitter blog post and looking for patterns that are a spammer like the following 8 accounts, After each one I give you some hints of why they are probably spammers.

Twitter Spammer 1aSoftware2009

17,000 Tweets and only 326 people follow this self proclaimed Internetgeek? Does this make sense at all? Talk about screaming with no one listening. But his last name is Rose and he is smelling a rose in his picture. It must be a real account, Right? Latest news is that this account was suspended

Twitter Spammer blabla7

7,000 Tweets and only following 20 people? Why don’t we think a lot of ourselves don’t we? And everything on this screenshot was posted 18 hours ago. Is that when the bot ran its program? A Girl who is scantily clad is another Spam Alert.

Twitter Spammer bluehawai

9,000 Tweets and only following 3 people? Wow this must be a record. Everything happened 2 hours ago as well. Mispelling Hawaii twice and having your location in lowercase is a another spam clue. Most people can spell their home state / city.

Twitter Spammer cashmachinenow

645 Tweets and only following 1 person? Umm ya I tweet like that as well. But the account is called “cash machine now”. Maybe he is too busy spending money to interact on Twitter.

Twitter Spammer Tech_fan

489 Tweets and following no one? Not one person? Not Obama, Ashton or Oprah or anyone? And who the hell are these 40 people following this bot?

Twitter Spammer 6,000 Tweets of Spam

5,902 Tweets and only following 2 people? And everything happened 9 hours ago… This is Twitter Skynet err Spamnet.

Twitter Spammer following No One

3,000 Tweets and following No One? This picture is popular I see it a lot on Twitter. She wouldnt spam you would she?

Twitter Spammer Zero Follows, 2 Followers

500 Tweets, Following No One and only 2 people following this bot? Come on Twitter can’t you filter this better?

Ok I feel better. Please comment if you have any news on these people or other spammers. How do you reduce spam on your Twitter account?

But learn to spot the patterns of spammers, report them with the new interface, and Block them so you do not see their broadcasts.

ClickCast Pay Per Click Episode 2

ClickCast PPC Podcast Episode 2 Website Statistics

Here is another episode of our Pay Per Click Podcast. In this Episode we talk about 2 Free ways to Implement Website Statistics on your website.

And we also talk about which one works best with PPC traffic and why.

Be sure to check back monthly for the latest Podcast every month.

Note: Slight problem with the audio on some words the volume is a little low. We will try to fix that by the next podcast. If you have any ideas of what is causing that please let us know. The rest of the audio sounds good.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

ClickCast – PPC (Pay Per Click) Podcast – Episode 1

This was Episode 1 of our PPC podcast and we hope to do this every month. We might do some video screen captures as well if we get the chance.

For this episode I did not write out the main part in a script. I just made a script for the beginning and ending and an outline for all the main parts and talked about it. If you are interested in this topic you really should listen to the podcast. Most of it is improvisational and there is much more content than the rough outline.

If you have an idea for a show or a guest please let me know.

The following is a rough outline of what I talked about:

Hello everyone this is Mike Smith and you are listening to ClickCast – the podcast about Pay Per Click and Online Advertising. It is Monday June 8th 2009 and this is show #1. Enjoy!

<<<<<<<< Music >>>>>>>>>>>>

Hello, how are you. Mike Smith here Thank you for stopping by.
Today we are going to talk about PPC which stands for Pay Per Click. It is how you place ads on search engines and websites. It is one of the three main ways of getting traffic to a website. One of the main reasons companies find Pay Per click so appealing is because it can be started very quickly, is very trackable, and can be tailored to the goals of the business. In this episode we will talk more about those three things that make PPC so powerful. But first a word from our sponsor

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Advertisement >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Tonight’s show is brought to you by PPC Sydney, the online advertising agency serving Sydney, Australia and the rest of the world. I am Mike Smith, the Sales Director for PPC Sydney and we consult with companies looking to start, finetune, or take their online advertising to the next level. We specialize in writing and placing ads on Google, MSN, Yahoo and other web portals. This allows you to focus on turning the leads generated into customers, and then keeping them happy.  We work hard to get you the most relevant website visitors, at the best price, with the best tracking in the industry. PPC Sydney – the other half of the click.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< END Advertisement >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Hello everyone, again I am Mike Smith, and today is the first episode of ClickCast. Today we are going to talk a little bit about PPC which stands for Pay Per Click. It is one of the three main ways of getting traffic to a website. Now to review those 3 ways of getting traffic to a website are:

Seo or search engine optimization

• It’s popular
• It is quite targeted
• Basically Free – Don’t pay per visitor
• Cons:

Viral or direct traffic

• Type in traffic like radio, magazine, or tv ads

• Hear about it from friends

• Past website visitors

PPC or Pay per click

• It is paid advertising. Usually Per Click.but can be per 1000 impressions
• It is the traffic on the right side of Google search results.
• It started in the first dot com boom with Goto.com, Sprinks and a few others
• Was perfected by Google and others a few years later.
• Now is the main way Google makes money.
• The cost per click is determined by an auction type model.
• It is fair but can be difficult as an auction.
• Bad ads, keyword choice or bad implementation can make it difficult to impossible.
• One of the main reasons companies find Pay Per click so appealing is because it can be started very quickly
• is very trackable. It can be measured in cost and
• and can be tailored for the goals of the business. (Start whenever, stop whenever, pause it, start seasonal campaigns and then pause.)
• Can be changed quickly for new products and company goals.

Ok so that is a quick run down on the 3 ways to get traffic to your website. They were SEO or Search engine optimization, social or viral methods, and then finally PPC or Pay Per Click

On this podcast, clickcast, we are going to focus each week on PPC advertising and how to do it most effectively. If you are also interested in SEO, Viral and other methods of advertising you will probably want to listen to more podcasts. And you should, we do here.

We would like to bring guests and topics in the PPC arena that you would like to discuss. So if you have a question or comment feel free to drop us a line or comment on our blog.
For shownotes, links to all the stories, and more join us at our blog at ppcsydney.com. We will be back 2 weeks from now with another podcast, and in the meantime feel free to catch up with us on ppcsydney.com.au, on twitter at twitter.com/ppcsydney, or on our blog at ppcsydney.com. Thanks and we hope you enjoyed the podcast.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

7 Ways to Flush Cash on PPC Campaigns

Dennis Yu of Blitz Local was a speaker at SMX Sydney 2009 and gave a great animated speech on PPC, how to implement it, and warning on 7 of the ways people new to PPC are likely to “Flush Money” on their PPC Campaign. Here is the powerpoint of the presentation: PPC Dennis Yu Presentation

But here is a summary with some added comments from me:

Indiscriminate Brand Branding – Bidding on the business’s name or products tradenames. He stated that many companies are spending a large percentage of their ad spend on getting people to click on a PPC showing when their business name or trademarks are shown. And these people would have found the right site anyways, because almost everyone ranks for their business name. He suggests putting these trademarks in a group and pausing it and carefully tracking the difference between less PPC clicks and more SEO clicks.

Start off with a zillion keywords – There is no need to have a lot of keywords as most of a huge list will generate no or little traffic. And they will just dilute the account as a whole having a lot of keywords that don’t generate clicks, or ultimately conversions. Not totally sure if I completely agree with this. And now Google will not let you add keywords that have very low traffic.

Choose the most expensive software – He warns against picking an expensive PPC bid management based solely on price alone. He even suggested a piece of software by name that happened to have an exhibition at SMX Sydney… umm about 50 meters away.

No Conversion Tracking – He warned of having accounts without keyword level conversion tracking. This is definitely true as without that people are just driving blind and trying to get as much traffic as possible and hopefully sales or conversions on the other end. But in the middle of that is a process that is not very much understood.

Using default campaign settings – I have said this for a long time. Don’t leave the standard campaign settings to the settings Google has set. Many of the settings are not in your best interest and are there to get you showing ads in the most places for the most expensive keywords, and for more expensive keywords than you have suggested. Content network is probably not for a new campaign or for newbies. Why this is on for a default setting is slightly questionable.

Staying with keyword targeting – Most people think of advertising on the internet as Google Adwords and buying contextual ads. There are reasons for that and many of them are a credit to the successes of Google. Their interface is the easiest to use, shows the best ads typically, and also has the most traffic. In the Australian market the keynote of SMX Sydney discussed the 90% market share Google has. It is without a doubt the highest traffic place to advertise. But there are other ways to advertise on Google. You could do content network (but shouldn’t from the beginning), Map advertising, image ads, and mobile ads. You could also pick other places to advertise such as Stumbleupon, Facebook, Youtube, and AdMob. These places show typically broad market ads at a good rate. If your business has a universally accepted product or service these other locations may be a good place to advertise and should be tested with good conversion tracking (as per tip before).

Rely completely on the Agency – Even though Dennis Yu who works at Blitz Local a successful Online Advertising Agency, he states that customers of them, should not rely on the Ad Agency completely. This could come from a variety of means from having access to the Google account, checking stats themselves in reports, and working towards KPIs that they help define. The standard reporting of the Ad Agency may be in a report that is not clear or directly outlining the success of the overall campaign. If an ad agency shows you a report showing growing traffic over the life of the campaign is that universally good? What if the CPC is going down? Should that be enough to make your firm happy with the results of your PPC agency? It shouldn’t. You need metrics closer tied to the success of your business like Conversion Rate or Cost per Acquisition.

Google Adwords Asia Head Talks PPC

I just read an interesting article in “The Digital Media” which has some interesting quote from Daniel Alegre who is the Google Asia Pacific VP of Sales & Operations. He has some interesting things to say about Sydney, Australia and for the entire Asian internet market.

“We have around 300 employees in Sydney and we’re moving to a new headquarters here soon.  Search is going to continue to grow here in Australia and New Zealand.  Query volume is up  -retail searches on Google were over 30% higher in December 2008 than December 2007.  As Nielsen Online figures show, more Australians are spending more time online than ever before. It’s Australia’s largest medium.”

Wow that’s an amazing increase in searches for this region. And I swear it isn’t all me.

In case anyone is not clear on the whole concept people search for words on Google and there are then results which are from the content of the website html primarily. And there are advertising options on the right side that say “Sponsored Links”. These are where your can advertise and pay for visitors in a Pay Per Click or PPC model. That is the name of this blog. PPC Sydney where we talk about internet advertising in the Biggest City in Australia.

PPC Ads on bottom of Google Maps

It now appears that Google is showing Pay Per Click Advertising on Google Maps. The above pic show a London Hotel ad on a map of London.

Pretty good matching and contextual advertising is my opinion.

A quick check of my friendly Google Maps is also showing ads.

Sydney Map showing ads as well.

In this case the ad is not for a hotel but a site called Sydney Guide.