In yesterday’s blog, we discussed a number of tips provided by Derek Gehl, who is Entrepreneur.com’s “E-Business” columnist. He is also the CEO of the Internet Marketing Center which is an online firm that helps people begin their own internet businesses. Gehl offers up a wealth of information on utilizing the popular search engine, Google to help promote your business and get it to the top of the lists for online users researching your industry.
In today’s blog, we continue to offer a few more of Gehl’s helpful suggestions from his August 2005 article. Have you heard of AdSense? Gehl explains that this is one of two advertising avenues that are offered by Google. Essentially, these are third party ads that your website hosts allowing you to make money each and every time that someone clicks on the ad and moves off your site.
Now, of course, it is not necessarily a good idea to direct traffic away from your site. But ensuring that you are compensated each time that you do isn’t such a bad thing. Gehl informs readers about one of the smartest ways to utilize AdSense.
He writes: “Google matches the ads to your site by finding similarities in the keywords of each. The good news is, you can set a filter to prevent your competitors' ads from appearing on your website, and you can customize the appearance of the ads so their background color is the same as your site's, making them look more like informative content than sales pitches.”
The amount that your company can earn utilizing AdSense depends on how much the advertisers are paying Google for the keywords and how many visitors click on the ads on your site. The better you optimize this feature, the more lucrative it can be for you.
The second of the two advertising opportunities is AdWords. These are ads for your business that Google places on other sites for you. One of the greatest aspects of this feature is that you control how much the ads cost. Each time your ad is clicked, you pay that amount. This can range anywhere between five cents and one hundred dollars. You may also set a daily budget so that your cut-off amount is not exceeded.
As Gehl explains: “Google uses the keywords you chose to help them place your ads on sites that have content relevant to yours, so you can be assured the traffic you're paying for is highly targeted. AdWords reach 80 percent of internet users, and you can define their target region and language.”
These two advertising opportunities are both relatively inexpensive ways of ensuring a greater presence for your business on the internet. They help to provide a good gauge on what people think about your products and/or services. If you find that you are not generating enough traffic to your sites, it will indicate that you may need to readjust your marketing strategy and create new ads.
