I'm going to give you some information you can use to decide if you want to hire someone to manage your pay-per-click campaigns in Adwords, Yahoo! Search Marketing and Microsoft AdCenter, or if you want to do it yourself.
Bottom line is that the biggest factor is you and what your skills and talents are - I am just going to tell you what to be aware of in PPC managment. In the process, hopefully I can save you some money and money too!
If you're considering managing your own PPC campaigns, here are a several things you should to take into consideration:
Time --> Do you have enough free time in your business schedule? Managing a PPC campaign can be very time-consuming, depending upon your industry.
Experience --> Do you already know a lot about PPC marketing? Most of the bigger companies have someone with at least 4 years of PPC experience, if not more!
One way is to spend time reading the marketing and PPC forums (this way is free). Secondly, just go ahead and open your own PPC accounts and dive in head first (this is what I did, and it was VERY expensive). Nevertheless, both are good ways to gain experience and skills, and both can put you on track to masterying PPC marketing.
Competitiveness --> How many other advertisers are there? How much are the bids going for in the top 3 to 8 positions of the ads shown on the first page of results for a specific keyword?
Keywords --> How many keywords will you be bidding on? Do you know how to find all the targeted keywords for your business? Keep in mind that if you are in a competitive industry, you will probably be going up against other advertisers who are using expensive bid-management software.
Ad Copy --> Do you know if you can write good PPC descriptions? I'm not talking about normal ad descriptions, but relevant PPC descriptions. The difference can be the deciding factor between your site making a profit or a loss - a lesson I learned first-hand.
Budget --> How much do you have to spend? If you are new to PPC and plan on spending more then $500 per month, I recommend you start off hiring someone to manage your PPC ads or to act as a consultant. It will be well worth the money if you shop around for the right person or company to help.
Learning new techniques and strategies - The PPC market is constantly changing and evolving. You have to stay up-to-date with everything, because you can be certain your competition is. Staying up-to-date involves reading newsletters and forums regularly, consistently, and carefully.
If you decide to hire someone to manage your PPC campaign, here are a few things you should take into consideration:
1) Knowledge & Experience:
How long have they been in the PPC management business? Do their current clients recommend them unconditionally?
2) Cost:
Shop around - you can always find a good deal on the internet. Just watch out for the ones that are TOO good. Remember the saying that if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Talk to at least three different companies and compare them carefully before making your choice.
3) Bid monitoring and ROI:
How many times per day/week/month do they check your keyword bids?
4) Service:
You are going to be communicating (via email or phone) a lot with the person running your PPC ads. You should like talking with them and find them easy to talk to.
5) Response time:
How quickly will your calls or emails be returned?
6) Support:
Do they offer phone support or just email support?
7) ROI tracking:
Is it offered? It is not necessary to have ROI tracking, but in today's market, it drastically increases your chances of having a profitable PPC ad.
All in all, for most people, hiring a professional and knowledgeable person to manage your ppc accounts is the way to go! Unless you have the time, patience and money to burn on getting past the learning curve can be pretty painful. Hire someone to help you get going today, and you won't ever regret it!
Bottom line is that the biggest factor is you and what your skills and talents are - I am just going to tell you what to be aware of in PPC managment. In the process, hopefully I can save you some money and money too!
If you're considering managing your own PPC campaigns, here are a several things you should to take into consideration:
Time --> Do you have enough free time in your business schedule? Managing a PPC campaign can be very time-consuming, depending upon your industry.
Experience --> Do you already know a lot about PPC marketing? Most of the bigger companies have someone with at least 4 years of PPC experience, if not more!
One way is to spend time reading the marketing and PPC forums (this way is free). Secondly, just go ahead and open your own PPC accounts and dive in head first (this is what I did, and it was VERY expensive). Nevertheless, both are good ways to gain experience and skills, and both can put you on track to masterying PPC marketing.
Competitiveness --> How many other advertisers are there? How much are the bids going for in the top 3 to 8 positions of the ads shown on the first page of results for a specific keyword?
Keywords --> How many keywords will you be bidding on? Do you know how to find all the targeted keywords for your business? Keep in mind that if you are in a competitive industry, you will probably be going up against other advertisers who are using expensive bid-management software.
Ad Copy --> Do you know if you can write good PPC descriptions? I'm not talking about normal ad descriptions, but relevant PPC descriptions. The difference can be the deciding factor between your site making a profit or a loss - a lesson I learned first-hand.
Budget --> How much do you have to spend? If you are new to PPC and plan on spending more then $500 per month, I recommend you start off hiring someone to manage your PPC ads or to act as a consultant. It will be well worth the money if you shop around for the right person or company to help.
Learning new techniques and strategies - The PPC market is constantly changing and evolving. You have to stay up-to-date with everything, because you can be certain your competition is. Staying up-to-date involves reading newsletters and forums regularly, consistently, and carefully.
If you decide to hire someone to manage your PPC campaign, here are a few things you should take into consideration:
1) Knowledge & Experience:
How long have they been in the PPC management business? Do their current clients recommend them unconditionally?
2) Cost:
Shop around - you can always find a good deal on the internet. Just watch out for the ones that are TOO good. Remember the saying that if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Talk to at least three different companies and compare them carefully before making your choice.
3) Bid monitoring and ROI:
How many times per day/week/month do they check your keyword bids?
4) Service:
You are going to be communicating (via email or phone) a lot with the person running your PPC ads. You should like talking with them and find them easy to talk to.
5) Response time:
How quickly will your calls or emails be returned?
6) Support:
Do they offer phone support or just email support?
7) ROI tracking:
Is it offered? It is not necessary to have ROI tracking, but in today's market, it drastically increases your chances of having a profitable PPC ad.
All in all, for most people, hiring a professional and knowledgeable person to manage your ppc accounts is the way to go! Unless you have the time, patience and money to burn on getting past the learning curve can be pretty painful. Hire someone to help you get going today, and you won't ever regret it!
About the Author:
Need to optimize or "fix" your Adwords & PPC campaigns? Kirt Christensen manages over $600k in PPC spending & knows what it takes to make your account hum! When it comes to pay per click management/a>, he's the man!
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