Creating a Pay Per Click campaign is easy to do and the best part is, you can do it for free. Large Search Engines such as Google and Bing constantly offer potential clients the chance to try out their Pay Per Click platform by giving the user free credit. If you are trying to generate a list of keywords for your website this is a great place to start.
Quick Tip:
Google and Bing give a potential customer the option to let them manage your Pay Per Click campaign on your behalf. The benefit to this is it will save you time however employees of such organizations are notorious for setting up badly optimised campaigns and using “Broad Match keywords” which will increase your visitors in order to make you spend more. Setting up a campaign is easy, anyone can do it!
Did You Know:
In 2010 the Pay Per Click market was valued at $10 Billion.
Lets begin…
In order to offer the best guide we will be using Google Adwords in this tutorial. To begin, you will need to have a list of some keywords which you believe is suitable to your business, for some help on generating a basic keyword list visit our tutorial on how to generate a keyword list with Google Adwords Keyword Tool. This method of generating keywords works best when you have a good idea of keywords you want to rank for as this will verify your research and provide you with free traffic.
Setting up your Adwords Account
To set up your Google Adwords account you first need a Google account which you can create here, on completion of your signup please then visit the Adwords homepage. If you look at the Adwords homepage there is a feature on there which says “Request a call back” if you enter your details one of the Adwords team will call you and upon your request will give you a voucher from £25-£75. They will normally input this voucher for you once you have completed your account signup. An Adwords team member will also talk you through how to create your account in terms of adding keywords and adverts. It is also highly recommended to have Google Analytics installed onto your website, to install Google Adwords click here. If you have installed Google Analytics please read our guide on pairing your Adwords account to Analytics.
Please note: In order to set up a Google Adwords account you will need to add a payment method. You will not be charged as long as you remember to check your account regularly and don’t exceed the trial credit. You can then close your account.
Once your account is live
Once your account is live let it run for a few days to a week to generate some data but be careful not to overrun your free credit or you will be charged. If you have kept your account open long enough to generate data you will be able to see what keywords are generating you traffic. You will see the exact keywords and phrase match keywords on your campaign along with the impressions which may or may not verify your findings with Adwords. If you campaign was set up from a member of the Adwords team the chances are you will have some broad match keywords. If you would like to see what keywords has brought you traffic you can do two things;
First option: Google Analytics
Google Analytics will show you visitor metrics which will include their entry keyword, if you have paired up your Adwords account and Analytics account you can see this by going to:
Traffic Sources > Sources > Search > Paid
If you have not paired the accounts your keywords will appear to be organic, you can access them by visiting;
Traffic Sources > Sources > Search > Organic
You can also view metrics such as time on website, bounce rate and much more. Google Analytics is an invaluable tool to have on your website to really get into the minds of your visitors and seeing exactly how they are reacting to your website.
Second Option: Google Adwords
Google Adwords gives you the options to see what keywords were used in order to reach your website. You can do this by following this path:
Choose your campaign > Keywords > Select the keyword you want to see search terms for / Or leave for all > See Search terms > All or Selected
If there has been enough data generated it will tell you the searched keywords used to trigger your advert and provide a click through to your website.
Please Note: It is highly recommended to verify findings with both Google Adwords and Analytics.
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