You know the Top Ranked Competitors that can some how afford .70 a click with a product that is probably making $25 profit? What am I missing, is it the fact that there PPC is so good, they are actually getting .20 cents a click? Is it that they are getting 100% of the profit, because it's there company and they can afford a small profit margin because of the branding? Or is it that there landing page is so good at converting, I've probably already bought their product TWICE without even knowing it. PPCB
With Google AdWords, I heard that the longer you are an advertiser, the lower the bids become and the better your rankings become as well... So longer you stay with them the less you have to pay to dominate certain keywords..
There are many factors involved. They must be getting high conversions They might be bidding lesser. They might be playing on Bulk Sales
How do you know that they are bidding $0.70? Just because that's what it would cost you to appear top, it doesn't mean that it cost them the same. They may simply have a better Ranking Quality Score: http://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=10215 To break even, they need a 2.8% conversion rate, which isn't unreasonable in many cases...
Yep, I was being nice with .70, I know some keywords like webhosting/medicine can get ridiculous. LifeTimeValue of a customer also seems to make sense, but isn't the case for all these cases. PPCB
yes it could be many things quality score landing page conversion much better back end sales you dont even see etc. .... take a stab at yahoo or MSN, might be cheaper for you over there
The only time looking at LTV doesn't make sense is if you never have repeat business...which is common in PPC if you're just pushing affiliate products. If you have your own product/service and the potential exists for repeat business you're limiting your growth opportunities by not looking at LTV.
I've found that MSN is a viable alternative to Adwords...costs about the same, and some of my ads get placed directly under the search box, which equals better click through ratio.
Are you 100% positive the profit per sale is only $25? The top placements usually have a couple things going for them 1. they own the product so therefor they are making the highest margins. This is usually why the affiliates cannot remain in top positions only real businesses can. 2. They have good QS which keeps CPC down 3. They have high converting landing pages 4. They have been advertising for several years. 5. They have money to dump into google Usually top placements have all or most of those qualities, but don't let position fool you. Just because you are not position 1 does not mean you are making less money or that you are getting an unfair share. Many times position 8 is best for ROI. Focus and worry less about position and just make sure ROI is in line with your marketing goals. If its position 1 or position 8 if your making money then you are doing great. When you are in search of volume, this is where things can get tricky and lots of testing is needed to capture more market share. When you have nowhere else to turn for more income and volume you need to step up your game and campaign management skills...