If you really want to waste your advertising dollars, write enticing Pay-Per-Click ad copy that incites your viewer's curiosity and compels them to click through, whether they want to buy your product or not.
In most forms of advertising, the highly successful ads first grab the viewer's or reader's attention, however they can. Consider the old auto parts ads with the pin-up models. They worked. The advertising funnel begins with general readership, is selected by gaining the attention of some, and then further refined to those interested in the product being offered. This strategy also works on the internet, but only so long as the advertising is paid for on a CPM - cost-per-thousand-impressions - basis. If you pay for impressions, you want to grab attention first, and then sell your product.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) is a game-changer. If you use the old strategy of attracting attention first, and then selling your product, you end up paying for the clicks of the voyeurs, those viewers who are curious about your ad, but either don't understand your product yet, or perhaps already know that they don't want to buy it.
In the PPC world, you want to qualify your viewers as having a very high probability of being buyers BEFORE they click through - before you pay for their click. If you run an ad campaign that results in a low Click-Through-Rate (CTR), you have lost nothing. You got no results, but you paid nothing either. However, if you run a campaign with a high CTR but few conversions, you just incurred a big bill from your vendor such as Google AdWords, but achieved no sales.
When you are paying for your advertising on a PPC basis, provide as much detail about your product and your offer in your ad as you possibly can. If you can't fully describe your product and your offer in 95 characters, consider running an image ad, but one that is rich in text. Another game-changing aspect of PPC advertising is that you don't pay much more for big ads than for tiny ones. An ad as large as 336x280 pixels costs somewhere between the same and three times as much as a 95 character text ad on a PPC basis. If you need more space to describe your product in enough detail to avoid curiosity click-throughs, go for an image ad.
If someone isn't going to buy your product, you want to discourage them from clicking. Don't worry that having a low CTR will hugely inflate the price you are charged for your ads. Within limits, this is a vastly overhyped fear. With PPC, low-key highly descriptive ads are the real winners.
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Making Money With Adwords - Why Conversions are Much More Important Than Click-Through Rate and a 10-step Program to Maximize Adwords Conversions
Read almost any article on Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and you will be told about click through rate (CTR). Click-throughs are what you pay for. Click-throughs are great for the search engine provider, but for you, the business owner trying to make a buck, click-throughs are only a source of expense, not revenue.
Conversions, are where you make your money. Suppose your click-throughs cost you 20 cents. If only one in a hundred of the visitors driven to your site buys something or signs up for your mailing list, that sale or sign-up costs you twenty bucks. Unless that sale was a car or a boat, you can't afford that. Now suppose one in two site visitors buys or signs-up. Your cost, 40 cents to get each customer - huge difference.
Now that you believe in the power of conversions, here are 10 steps to really drive conversions:
1. Start by making a list of all the words that might describe your product or service.
2. Enter that list into the Adwords keyword tool. The tool will tell you keyword rankings and suggest additional keywords and phrases.
3. Remove all generalized words from your list. They are usually the words with the very highest keyword ranking, but they won't get you conversions. Let's say you sell car stereos. The keyword "stereos" will get you a lot of clicks, but you don't want to pay for the privilege of having people who are looking for home stereos visit your site.
4. Create a negative keyword list. This is a list of words and phrases to exclude from your search. The car stereo store would want to add words like "home" and "theater" to the negative keyword list. Negative keywords hold great power. The most effective Adwords campaigns have usually specified hundreds of negative keywords.
5. Look carefully at your landing page. Make sure your landing page delivers what your keywords promise.
6. Install Google Analytics, and learn to use it. Otherwise, you are flying blind.
7. Go for a test drive. Invest a few bucks and start running your ads, but keep your cost low, as you won't be getting a great conversion rate yet.
8. Use Analytics to study your results. Remove those keywords that have great click-through rate but few conversions. Also remove keywords with few click-throughs.
9. Experiment with alternative ads and landing pages. Track the analytical results of your experiments.
10. Keep adding to your list of negative keywords. You are likely to be surprised at the phrases that trigger click-throughs to your site. Tune your negative keywords to exclude those you don't want.
Optimizing your conversion rate requires some effort, but the payback can be amazing.
Conversions, are where you make your money. Suppose your click-throughs cost you 20 cents. If only one in a hundred of the visitors driven to your site buys something or signs up for your mailing list, that sale or sign-up costs you twenty bucks. Unless that sale was a car or a boat, you can't afford that. Now suppose one in two site visitors buys or signs-up. Your cost, 40 cents to get each customer - huge difference.
Now that you believe in the power of conversions, here are 10 steps to really drive conversions:
1. Start by making a list of all the words that might describe your product or service.
2. Enter that list into the Adwords keyword tool. The tool will tell you keyword rankings and suggest additional keywords and phrases.
3. Remove all generalized words from your list. They are usually the words with the very highest keyword ranking, but they won't get you conversions. Let's say you sell car stereos. The keyword "stereos" will get you a lot of clicks, but you don't want to pay for the privilege of having people who are looking for home stereos visit your site.
4. Create a negative keyword list. This is a list of words and phrases to exclude from your search. The car stereo store would want to add words like "home" and "theater" to the negative keyword list. Negative keywords hold great power. The most effective Adwords campaigns have usually specified hundreds of negative keywords.
5. Look carefully at your landing page. Make sure your landing page delivers what your keywords promise.
6. Install Google Analytics, and learn to use it. Otherwise, you are flying blind.
7. Go for a test drive. Invest a few bucks and start running your ads, but keep your cost low, as you won't be getting a great conversion rate yet.
8. Use Analytics to study your results. Remove those keywords that have great click-through rate but few conversions. Also remove keywords with few click-throughs.
9. Experiment with alternative ads and landing pages. Track the analytical results of your experiments.
10. Keep adding to your list of negative keywords. You are likely to be surprised at the phrases that trigger click-throughs to your site. Tune your negative keywords to exclude those you don't want.
Optimizing your conversion rate requires some effort, but the payback can be amazing.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Amazon Associates vs. Google AdSense for Your Blog
You want to make a few dollars from your blog, now what? Most bloggers think first of Google's AdSense program, but that is not the only alternative. One interesting possibility is Amazon's Associates program. Which to choose, and why?
AdSense and Associates are both very easy to begin. Signing-up for either just requires filling out a simple form. The only other step to get started is copying a small chunk of HTML into a widget to display in your blog's sidebar. For Blogger, click Add a Gadget under the Layout tab, and select the HTML gadget.
If your only objective is maximizing current revenue, you could try to estimate whether AdSense or Associates will provide more income, but that is basically just guessing. Instead, put one of each on your side bar for a couple of weeks to compare results. Then choose.
A much more important consideration than current revenue, however, is the long term future for your blog. This is where the choice between AdSense and Associates becomes really important. Although you can specify a list of products, services, and brands that you don't want AdSense to advertise on your blog, the best you can do is minimize the harm that the ads cause to your blog's integrity and reputation. Maybe the revenue is worth the impact on your blog's character, maybe it isn't.
In contrast, Amazon's Associates program can actually enhance your blog. If you want, you can specify exactly which products will be advertised. For example, I write a book review and place an Amazon ad for that book next to the review. Or I talk about my favorite camera and place an Amazon ad for that camera on my blog.
If you do have Amazon choose the ads for your blog, their algorithm for selecting products makes amazingly perceptive selections - in my experience. I have found their choice of books to be a great complement to the content of my blog - adding interest rather than being just another commercial.
AdSense and Associates are both very easy to begin. Signing-up for either just requires filling out a simple form. The only other step to get started is copying a small chunk of HTML into a widget to display in your blog's sidebar. For Blogger, click Add a Gadget under the Layout tab, and select the HTML gadget.
If your only objective is maximizing current revenue, you could try to estimate whether AdSense or Associates will provide more income, but that is basically just guessing. Instead, put one of each on your side bar for a couple of weeks to compare results. Then choose.
A much more important consideration than current revenue, however, is the long term future for your blog. This is where the choice between AdSense and Associates becomes really important. Although you can specify a list of products, services, and brands that you don't want AdSense to advertise on your blog, the best you can do is minimize the harm that the ads cause to your blog's integrity and reputation. Maybe the revenue is worth the impact on your blog's character, maybe it isn't.
In contrast, Amazon's Associates program can actually enhance your blog. If you want, you can specify exactly which products will be advertised. For example, I write a book review and place an Amazon ad for that book next to the review. Or I talk about my favorite camera and place an Amazon ad for that camera on my blog.
If you do have Amazon choose the ads for your blog, their algorithm for selecting products makes amazingly perceptive selections - in my experience. I have found their choice of books to be a great complement to the content of my blog - adding interest rather than being just another commercial.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Apple Continues to go the Wrong Way with Glossy Screens and Mini Displayport
I love my last generation Macbook Pro and my last generation 23-inch Apple Cinema Display - both with matte (antiglare) screens. Mostly, I think Apple does a great job with product innovations, but last Fall they made what I consider to be HUGE mistakes, and they have still barely begun to dig themselves out.
The new 15-inch Macbook Pro is still only available with a glossy screen - worse yet, the screen has an extra sheet of glass in front of it, so you don't just get reflections, you get double reflections. At long last, the 17-inch Macbook Pro has a matte (antiglare) screen option - but at extra cost on top of a $2800 base - that's a crazy price and it's not so portable.
Last fall Apple discontinued their matte screen 23-inch Apple Cinema Display with DVI connector, and introduced the glossy screen 24-inch LED Cinema Display with Mini Displayport. That broke just about everything. Previous Mac owners now have NO option for an Apple display in that size range - even if they would settle for a glossy screen, as Apple still doesn't offer a DVI to Mini Displayport converter. For buyers of new generation Mac's with Mini Displayport, the choices are limited to buying a glossy external monitor or ponying up extra for a Mini Displayport to DVI converter to allow them to connect to a non-Apple monitor. It's all ugly, and no word of help from Apple.
What's so important about an antiglare matte screen? While game players, movie watchers, and many casual users prefer glossy screens, surveys show that 2 out of 3 serious graphics, document, and business users - the typical user base for Macbook Pro's - prefer antiglare matte screens. Many, like myself, refuse to use a glossy screen at all - it's just too fatiguing.
The new 15-inch Macbook Pro is still only available with a glossy screen - worse yet, the screen has an extra sheet of glass in front of it, so you don't just get reflections, you get double reflections. At long last, the 17-inch Macbook Pro has a matte (antiglare) screen option - but at extra cost on top of a $2800 base - that's a crazy price and it's not so portable.
Last fall Apple discontinued their matte screen 23-inch Apple Cinema Display with DVI connector, and introduced the glossy screen 24-inch LED Cinema Display with Mini Displayport. That broke just about everything. Previous Mac owners now have NO option for an Apple display in that size range - even if they would settle for a glossy screen, as Apple still doesn't offer a DVI to Mini Displayport converter. For buyers of new generation Mac's with Mini Displayport, the choices are limited to buying a glossy external monitor or ponying up extra for a Mini Displayport to DVI converter to allow them to connect to a non-Apple monitor. It's all ugly, and no word of help from Apple.
What's so important about an antiglare matte screen? While game players, movie watchers, and many casual users prefer glossy screens, surveys show that 2 out of 3 serious graphics, document, and business users - the typical user base for Macbook Pro's - prefer antiglare matte screens. Many, like myself, refuse to use a glossy screen at all - it's just too fatiguing.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Exercises to Keep Your Mouse From Biting You
If you use your computer a lot and you are of that certain age, you recognize when your mouse is beginning to bite you. It may be your mouse hand cramping, your lower or upper arm muscles, your shoulder, or perhaps the opposite shoulder knotting in sympathy. Don't wait until you are suffering, try these hints to avoid "mouse shoulder" and its cousins.1. Take a break every hour, if only for a minute. Many short breaks are more effective than a single longer one.
2. Stretch your arm tendons. Extend your arms straight out to your sides, forming a cross with your body and arms. Start with your palms facing the floor. Pull your hands up and back, tightening your arm tendons. Repeat 10 times slowly. Now, pull your hands up and back, and twist your arms clockwise and counter clockwise - remain in the cross position while twisting your arms like wringing out a wet towel. Do NOT do anything that hurts - even a little.
3. Perform the same towel-wringing motion with your arms extended overhead, then in front, finally extended straight down.
4. Take a short walk. Exaggerate swinging your arms as you walk.
5. Get two light weights - perhaps five pounds each. Raise the weights with your arms extended to your sides, then with your arms extended to the front. Raise the weights over your head. Finally, lower the weights behind your shoulders and raise them back to overhead.
Even if you only take a minute's break, and even if you only do the first of these exercises, do it every hour.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Blogging With Your iPhone Camera
Keep your personal blog up to the second with your activities by taking photos on your iPhone and emailing them directly to your blog.Enable your Blogger.com blog to accept posts via email by clicking Customize, clicking on the Settings tab, clicking Email, choosing an Email Posting Address, and choosing "Publish emails immediately."
Take a photo with your iPhone, view it, click on the curved arrow icon in the bottom left, and choose Email Photo. You have a place to type a subject before you send the email to your blog's Email Posting Address. In a few seconds, your photo and one-liner are visible on your blog.
Go crazy with your new toy. Post pictures of everyone you meet, post photos of what you eat for lunch.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
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I'm not sure about compatibility, but a site like the Gutenberg Project (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page) gives you access to a dizzying array of content for free.
Jim, thanks for the link. That's a ton of free stuff just waiting to be read on a PC or Mac. Most of it is in PDF format.
Kindle won't accept PDF directly. Here's another blogger's take on the trials and tribulations of converting a PDF for Kindle use.