PPC Marketers Take Note: China-based Domain Phishing for Google Adwords Accounts March 24, 2008
Posted by Andrew Wee in : PayPerClick - PPC , 2 commentsI got this email over the weekend which looks like a genuine email from the Google Adwords team, mentioning that you need to authenticate your account because it’s been disabled/suspended.
Just about any PPC marketer will be concerned if they get an email like this because AdWords downtime could translate into a significant of profits.
Before you jump to the page and entering your account information, I checked that the HTML email was going to a *.cn (China-based) domain, so it would be pretty unwise to enter your username or your password.
Mozilla Firefox had earlier been patched with a “phishing site” notification, similarly Internet Explorer showed a similar warning when I tried to access the site.
Just take note of the destination URLs in your emails before clicking on them, also if needed view the message headers and you can usually spot their point of origination (unlikely that the Adwords team would be sending notification emails out of Africa or Russia).
There was also a port about this at KezNews.
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Leaving Las Vegas…And PPC Classroom Live! December 12, 2007
Posted by Andrew Wee in : PayPerClick - PPC , 3 commentsIt’s been more than a week since I left Las Vegas after attending Anik Singal and Jeremy Palmer’s PPC Classroom Live.
So the question is “Was it worth a 20+ hour plane ride each way?”
Certainly a resounding YES!
I got to meet a bunch of great people and the stellar cast of speakers presented great content. Now it’s a matter of hunkering down and putting some of those ideas into practise.
The turnout was very respectable with the room filled to the gills…
It was great to hear how Anik took one of his info product sites, added CPA offers to it and have it generated $42,000+ to date this year.
Andrew Wee and Anik Singal
Just as you’re seeing a convergence of search marketing and PPC marketing, I believe the worlds of info marketing and lead generation/affiliate marketing are going to draw closer in the coming year.
Andrew Wee, Kirt Christensen, Greg Cesar
I look to Kirt Christensen as one of the pioneers in Internet Marketing, together with his partner, Terry Dean.
It was certainly illuminating to hear about his strategies for positioning yourself as a PPC management agency and it was pretty impressive hearing about some of the biggest Internet marketers he manages PPC campaigns for.
Greg Cesar is someone who’s in my mastermind and this was (more…)
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Google Adwords Holiday Profit Tips November 22, 2007
Posted by Andrew Wee in : PayPerClick - PPC , add a commentThe Google Adwords team has published a number of tips for optimizing your campaigns across 3 verticals: retail, entertainment and automotive.
Here’s a couple of techniques to bump your CTR (clickthrough rate) and conversions:
- Behavioral-based bid management
Research shows that consumers are surfing shopping sites and doing price comparisons during work hours. Bump your ad positions during office hours to get better ad positioning (and consequently, higher conversions).
- Match your consumers stage in the buying cycle
Your keywords determine your websites’ visitor profile. For buyers early in the buying cycle, they’d be looking for information, product reviews, so create an appropriate content site.
Buyers in the later stage, primed to buy, will be looking for coupon codes, bonuses, and other goodies, so a coupon site or inventive site will convert better for that demographic.
- Highly targeted landing pages
Spend more time focusing on targeted and highly relevant keywords. Instead of “holiday events”, shoot for (more…)
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Monday Question: Dispelling the PPC FUD November 19, 2007
Posted by Andrew Wee in : PayPerClick - PPC , 5 commentsHere’s a straightforward Monday Question:
“Now that you’re starting to do more PPC (pay per click) traffic. How has it been? Isn’t it a waste of money to pay for traffic, and it doesn’t generate much income, does it?”
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My Answer:
There’s a lot of FUD (Fear Uncertainty and Doubt) being spread, especially by marketers who aren’t using paid traffic, typically certain members of the Web 2.0 fraternity.
Yes, you can lose lots of money, and not generate a single sale, but only if you don’t have a plan in mind. I was in that category before, bidding on low competition keywords, having subscribed to the “long tail keyword” strategy.
The fact is that with quality score playing a dominant role in Google AdWords, you will need to bid reasonable prices to get the conversions.
I have a stock portfolio which generates 10-20% on an annualized basis. If you’ve refined your PPC campaigns and are able to generate at least 50% on a monthly basis, you’ve outperformed most of the mutual funds and equity funds in the market.
So let’s look at some PPC newbie pitfalls:
- Not enough keywords in your adwords campaign
If you’ve only 20-200 keyphrases in your campaign, it might only generate a handful of clickthroughs and even fewer sales per day.
Reasonably you should have at least (more…)
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New PPC Marketers Must Overcome These Challenges… October 21, 2007
Posted by Andrew Wee in : PayPerClick - PPC , 7 commentsAs I’m working with PPC Super Affiliate Amit Mehta on our Super Affiliate Accelerator project, I’ve stumbled on a number of challenges that new PPC marketers are going to face, and have developed some workarounds for them. Plus new PPC marketers can get free AdWords traffic too.
Which PPC Ebook Should I Buy?
The first challenge, PPC marketers will face is the plethora of PPC ebooks (primarily focused on AdWords) out there. There’s a large number of PPC-focused forums and affiliate marketing forums with large PPC sub-sections.
So which do you choose?
Before buying anything, I’d suggest time checking out the AdWords Help Center and reading the Inside AdWords blog. (They’re both FREE).
As you know, I buy just about every Internet marketing product out there and a number of AdWords “Insider” ebooks merely rehash the content contained with the Help Center.
So save your $47 (use it for your PPC costs instead) and check out the resources, the Google AdWords team has provided for free…
Can I Test Google AdWords For Free?
If you’re new to using paid traffic, you might have a slight phobia as I did (as I’ve been using free social traffic generation methods to bring traffic to my sites). But here’s a way to get free adwords traffic.
There’s a number of free AdWords coupons out there (so you can have a free PPC trial if you choose to).
You can google for (more…)
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Will Google AdWords Quality Score Guidelines Set Trash Affiliate Earnings? September 20, 2007
Posted by Andrew Wee in : PayPerClick - PPC , 4 commentsThere’s been quite a bit of debate about how pay-per-click market leader Google AdWords’ Landing Page and Site Quality Guidelines is going to hit PPC affiliates.
Here’re some of the more hotly debated items from the the AdWords blog post “Websites that may merit low landing page quality score“:
 Types of websites that will be penalized with low landing page quality scores:
- Data collection sites that offer free gifts, subscription services etc., in order to collect private information
- Arbitrage sites that are designed for the sole purpose of showing ads
- Malware sites that knowingly or unknowingly install software on a visitor’s computer
If we receive user complaints about ads for the types of websites listed above, the advertisers of those websites may not be allowed to continue running AdWords ads for those websites.
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“Data collection sites” will hit affiliates who use PPC to drive traffic to zip/email submit type offers or to an opt-in page for a free report.
And who’s going to file a “user complaint”? The visitor? Unlikely. More likely, (more…)
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