Adword Advisor launches, specializing in 2nd and 3rd tier engines-portals
Adword Advisor Launches
Don’t Put Your All Your Advertising Eggs In One Basket
If you have spent any time promoting a Website online, you have no doubt encountered Google Adwords, Yahoo (formerly Overture) Search Marketing and MSN Ad center. I have been advertising products and services using their networks successfully, for many years.
If familiar with these pay per click advertising networks, you are probably thinking to yourself there is no reason to advertise on second-tier networks, you get all the traffic you need from the top tier.
There is nothing that a smaller PPC ad network can offer me that the services I currently use cannot. However, why be satisfied with 80 percent of the market, second and third tier ad networks and portals such as Miva, ABC Search and 7Search provide a vast array of opportunities for your advertisements.
Most small and medium sized business (SMB) advertisers often do not realize these networks exist and provide a comparable if not better return on investment (ROI) than either Yahoo! or Google Adwords. I am currently testing AdKnowledge and am pleased to report we are having positive ROI results. Up until two weeks ago I was not even familiar with them.
It’s All About the ROI
Essentially, more traffic in no way correlates to a better return on investment (ROI). I have had several firms look into our current setup wondering why traffic is down by 50% from a year ago.
I explain that traffic does not equate to ROI and then they get it. These are professional search firms looking to get our business and no one ever asks about ROI. If smaller pay per click advertising networks provide an equal return on investment (and in some business verticals they do) these companies can not only survive but thrive in the competitive online advertising landscape.
I personally do not like RON or run of network. This approach may work for some people but I prefer a self serve network where I can fine tune either GEO targeting or partners-websites my ads will show up on. By tracking the referrers I am able to acurately trace the click through (we use fired pixel tracking).
It is important to note that popular keywords performed very poorly for some second tier networks. A popular keyword is one that is searched for very frequently by consumers and, hence, sought after by advertisers. Google Adwords, Yahoo! Search Marketing, 7Search, and MIVA have excellent ROI for even the most competitive keywords.
While the benefits provided by both Google Adwords and Yahoo Search Marketing are large, it is important for pay per click advertisers to utilize second tier networks to supplement traffic generated from the larger networks, as long as those second and third tier networks can provide a positive ROI.
