An Introduction to PPC Advertising

Pay Per Click – often abbreviated to "PPC" – is an internet advertising model used to direct people to websites. Unlike traditional advertising, where you are charged simply to display your advert, pay per click only costs you anything when somebody actively clicks your ad and visits your website.

PPC advertising appears on a wide range of websites, social media and on search engines such as Google or Yahoo. In the UK the most widely used PPC platform is Adwords – Google’s advertising program.

PPC and search results

PPC is most powerful when combined with search results.

Targeting specific keywords or search phrases means that your adverts are only shown when people search for them. PPC adverts usually appear to the right or above standard search results under a heading such as “Ads” or “Sponsored Links”.

Choose the right terms and your ad is assured a niche, qualified audience speaking directly to people who have already expressed an interest in your product via a search. For example - if you sell tennis shoes and you target the phrase "buy tennis shoes" - it's highly likely that visitors will be interested in what you have to offer.

Why use PPC?

Implemented well PPC can result in a reliable, measurable stream of sales or qualified leads for your business.

PPC also has a number of other unique advantages:

Accountability – detailed statistics show exactly how your budget was spent, show what happens when people click through to your website and provide valuable insight into the demand for your product or services. This ongoing feedback can most importantly be used to optimise your campaigns – identifying what tactics work and what need to be refined.

Affordability – PPC offers incredible control over your advertising spend. You can set a daily budget, adjust your spend for different campaigns and change the parameters at any point. This means that even smaller businesses can set themselves up and effectively use Pay Per Click.

Flexibility – Advertising platforms such as Adwords offer incredible control over your advertising. Geo-targeting for example can enable you to target people in a specific city, within a 30 mile radius of a postcode or even an entire continent. Additional options include mobile ads, scheduling your advertising to be shown at specific times of the day or posting ads to other websites and social media platforms such as YouTube.

Results in the short term – Unlike search engine optimisation (“SEO”), PPC can deliver in the short term. It's important to properly plan and manage campaigns but it's comparatively quick to set up a PPC campaign and once configured it can start driving traffic to your site within a matter of minutes.

Display advertising

You can also place adverts onto other websites using the PPC model - for example via the Google Display advertising network. This model of advertising is better suited to brand building campaigns.

Get in touch

For further information please contact us at info@andersanalytics.com.