I was using Adwords in the UK & found it extremely expensive. I'm now in Aus & I find it much more affordable. Not sure whether that's to do with the exchange rate or the general CPC is lower here If you're in the UK I rate MSN Adcenter, converts like crazy
I like the CPM but your ad never shows up on the sites that matter unless you set your CPM fairly high. $.25 to $1.00 doesn't cut it. That feature seems to have been designed for companies with very large budgets. Bottom line: the little guy is screwed. WHy bother with $.25 clicks and $5 daily budgets when they can make millions and millions out of $1000 daily budgets and $2 clicks?
Seems the underlying message here is to learn AdWords better before you use it and understand the process, potentials and pitfalls before you spend money .... lack of preparation and knowledge on your part does not constitute a ripoff on Google's part ....
The only way adwords is a rip off is if you do not know what you are doing. Alot of us do very well there!
I agree that one should really figure out what they are doing when it comes to adwords. I am no expert but I am finally getting it. I started a campaign on Monday this week and not once have any of my keywords been paused or inactive due to having the bid to low. One thing I have did as well is group relevant keywords and phrases together. That is working now I have to work on writing better ads. Suggestion on that would be appreciated. thank you Michelle
Remember to adjust your bids for content and search. Content bids should usually be around 1/5 of your search bid becase the traffic is less targetted, and the conversion rate is much lower .
Adwords is just like anything else, you have to do a little trial and error to see what works. Make sure you are tracking which clicks are actually beneficial so you know what type of conversion you are getting from the traffic.
I use the 3 of them AdWords, AdCenter and YSM. The proportion of use is about 40% AdWords 35% AdCenter and the rest 25% on YSM. For sure I spend about 10-30% more per keyword on AdWords that what I do on YSM and AdCenter but my conversion rate for the leads generated are a lot higher too. My conversion rate for AdCenter is around 0.7% for YSM 0.4% and on AdWords is 2.1% I think the extra cost is worth it.
AdWords has fantastic potential to reward savvy advertisers. I hate bidding a rigid amount for my MSN and Overture accounts, when I know I can buy the same keywords on Google and steadily work the cost down by manipulating quality score. Unfortunately, I think this fact comes full circle, and can be somewhat detrimental. I think a lot of advertisers who know that Google rewards the skillful use AdWords because of this fact, so you wind up with a really competitive environment. jmo