by Doreen Martel

Created on: April 04, 2009   Last Updated: April 05, 2009

Google AdWords make it possible for you to target your prospects. More importantly, effective use of AdWords means you target your prospect when they are looking for your product or service.

Explaining Google AdWords

Let us for a moment assume you are looking for a car. You open your favorite browser and in your Google search field you type car'. You will now have thousands of lines showing up on your browser window. The first thing you see are sponsored ads. These "sponsored ads" are the ones that are paid for. They are quickly identifiable because they say "sponsored" in the heading.

However, below that you are going to see what is called an "organic" result. These are the links that are unsponsored i.e. someone just happened to have the right terms in their marketing materials to get Google to notice them!

Google has basically set up an auction. Sponsors (the advertisers) are bidding on the word "car"! They pay for that if you click on the advertisement! If you do not click on it, they do not pay for it. The higher the bid, the higher the visibility. Most advertisers are interested in getting top quality clicks at the lowest possible cost. Clicks lead to new business leads, new leads lead to new sales.

Make Google AdWords work for you

We all understand that competition is fierce! The key to making Google AdWords work for you is to test your niche keywords and determine what happens. You have the benefit of putting your keyword to work for you, watching it and if it does not work, replace it! Your AdWords need to generate not just leads but sales to be effective.

Using AdWords

Set your goals early! This is the best way to get direct sales. If your goal is to create 20 new sales leads a day, then that should be the consideration in placing your AdWords. Turning those leads into sales should also be a consideration (and another goal).

Set your website up to be well organized, informative, and focused. Make sure that it clearly explains your product or service. Find out what your competition is doing! If you are offering product make sure you have a good e-commerce system. Security is always a concern so take special care to ensure you have the best security available.

Test, Test, Test! Make sure that your website works exactly as it should! Contact friends, family and co-workers to run through your website page by page and test every single form and feature (make sure to not violate Google TOS by clicking on ads!).

Budgeting/Targeting/Ad Groups

Ad Groups are where keywords are entered. Ad groups contain more than one ad. You want to make sure that you are writing a minimum of two ads for each ad group and that they are different. Creating multiple ad campaigns allows you to test to see which ones are most effective.

Target your marketing any way you choose. This is done by deciding where you want your ads to be seen. For instance, if you are in California and you want to target only California that is how your AdWords campaign should be set up.

Summary

Google AdWords are a very effective way to target the audience you want. Make sure that you have your plans laid out very clearly before you get started. Do not place AdWords and leave them! Find out what works and keep them and more importantly find out what isn't working and replace them!

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