"Our global search network includes Froogle, Google Groups, and search sites such as AOL and Ask.com..." Do I want the search network option, or is it just a foolish money-waster like the Content Network?
Depends on what you're advertising, I guess. For me, it works quite well (unlike the content network). But one caveat: the list of sites on the search network is quite large and includes lots of low quality sites such as parked domains with no content and just ads. So you need to keep an eye on it and see that it's not bringing you garbage traffic.
I found content network worked sometimes but then they reviewed my account and really screwed it up so its a bit of a suck it and see job in my opinion. Check your click through ratio if it makes you more than it costs you are alright but don't just leave it running. Add new campaigns as they take a while to get approved and you need to vary to get continuous benefits as one goes down make sure you have anew one ready to run. Try pausing as well and then reactiviting. I got 300,000 impressions on a paused ad and got my money back on the clicks as well cos it was supposed to be off line. Try the different options they have available and always make sure you monitor your analytics as they will tell you whether you are getting more through organic or paid clicks. When it goes organic drop the payments and work on SEO or your next project. Finally I shoudl say I agree with ghoti partially, the content network is sometimes goods sometimes bad its disabled by default, try it you can get 1p clicks from it, if they work its worth having I've boosted my traffic significantly over the last moth with it on http://gimesumsex.com, but it didn't work for http://gimesumlove.com I haven't discovered why yet but I'm working on it. The admin team at Adwords are inconsistent for example one guy accepted fcuk while another said it was againts their allowed terms. Suck it and see and you should get results if it doesn't work try it similar but different
I believe even the content network works pretty well, all you need to do is get the right message to your audience and get your ad to show at the right places.
It's all about treating the content network as a different entity from the search engine marketing. You can read more about this in my post: http://ohad-news.blogspot.com/2007/03/using-content-network.html
exactly its a different beast with its own foibles I did get 107,000 impressions form them while my add was on pause though and they gave me the fees back so its worth trying changing setting regularly sometimes it does you a favour when it goes wrong even in your favour they still refund