I've seen a few people suggest starting with adwords standard edition by creating a campaign called "bogus" or "test" which would be deleted later. The intent to at least get your adwords account started, and learn how it works hands-on. The "bogus" campaign would be deleted later when you've decided on the real campaign you're going to do. Can this also be done with YSM? (and if I use a $25 starter coupon, how long do I have before I have to really start putting some real campaigns out?)
Why do you want to start with test campaign? You can start with actual campaign then add one or two keywords and set very min bid and see if you ad is generating impressions or not. this is best way i can think of. if you want $100 FREE YSM coupon then check below thread.....use this coupon to test your campaign...good luck! http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=1007997
Why do you want to start with test campaign? You can start with actual campaign Thanks, but I don't have an actual campaign I'm new to all this affiliate adwords+landingpage stuff, and it seems like a chicken-and-egg thing. One half is looking through affiliates to see what product programs they have available, but the other half is to look through adwords/ysm to see if the best keywords available are reasonable. So I'd at least like to see the cost of keywords before I start an affiliate campaign. And again, can I start an account with that $100 coupon, but not put up any ads for at least a few days? (or how long can I go with an account but no campaign?)
OK, here's a different tactic - I have a WP blog that I barely keep updated with an occasional tech-related post. If I were to buy some keywords pointing to this blog at rock-bottom rates, would that satisfy any requiremenis of the coupon? Or does that set me up for a low-score (bad rates) later?