If you haven't been to the PPC's lately, you might want to know that many are partnering up with other major search engines to show the top listings along with the results of that certain search engine search. The top three listings under a keyword at Overture will show up in the Yahoo search for that keyword. Check out the benefits of being listed with the various search engines. You might get more than you think you are paying for. If you have the funds, bid higher amounts on those words that can get your site listed on a major search engine – as long as your site can convert lookers into buyers (if not, then you are wasting your money).

Never bid on a keyword if your site isn't related to that keyword, or if your site doesn't generate interest to get people to buy from your site. You will only lose money in the clicks. Watch out for PPC's that automatically pull in your keywords off your site. Go back and look for the keywords and delete any that are no good – like "the" or "an" which were part of a phrase. Why pay for clicks from people NOT looking for your site? That includes the use of the dump accounts – some PPC's give you the option of bidding on placement for searches which produce no results. I don't recommend this – people might click on your site, but it wasn't what they were looking for, so chances are you won't make a sale – only pay for the click.

Check the PPC to be sure it monitors for bogus clicking. Some competitors are known to go in and click on your bid over and over to eat up your funds. Make sure the PPC you use looks for such activity and discounts it.

Be careful when using a main category for listing your site in – if it's too general, you might get clicked on a lot, but the clickers aren't finding what they are looking for in your site. Don't get listed in "business" category unless your site will appeal to most anyone looking for "business" – if it's an affiliate site for a beauty product, most people will escape your site the moment they click to it, and you will have lost the click money.

If the PPC is new, it might be wise to get listed early for a penny a click – because until there are higher bids, your position as the first penny bid will keep you in the first position until someone bids 2 cents or more. In any case, your penny bid will stay on top of the other penny bids. If the PPC is new (or for that matter, any PPC you are using), promote it! People need to know it's there and you want them to go there since you're listed in it. Don't invest lots of money in a new PPC until you know it will succeed – if no one visits it, it does no good to be listed there.

A good PPC will have steady daily and monthly flow of traffic to its site (and NOT from pay-to-click programs which pay clickers to run searches (which they do not care about except for collecting their pennies for actively clicking the searches). If you are able to, get into their bid search tool (many have them, some don't) and check both the bid keywords appearing in a search, and also check the popularity of the search term (how many times was it searched for in the last month). If you see no relevant searches done on a supposedly popular keyword, check out keywords such as "health" or "free" or "business" - if those searches are low or non-existent, then this PPC is probably not a good one to be listed in (unless it's brand new and then you can allow some slack - but keep monitoring it). Correlate this information to the bids

showing up on the keywords - are there any that are paying even 1 cent? Are there one or two paying $2.08 and $1.35 per click, but then no other bids? This tells you that the PPC is not being used or monitored by searchers or bidders. Stay away from those.

On another note - Overture search tools do not seem to be accurate - one of my sites is on the #1 spot with no other site for that keyword. The tool says there are about 600 plus visitors to that keyword - and the description completely tells people this is a site which has what they are looking for. There are not even close to 600 visitors to that site, unique or otherwise. There is some inaccurate data in the search tools, but use them the best way you can.

Be careful of automatic bidding in which it automatically ups your bid to number one position - if the #2 person did this - you two would be driving bids up and leaving the rest behind at the low prices.

Be careful about "catch-all" or whatever term is used - in which your site shows up in any keyword search done for keywords in which there are no matches. You might get clicks but they won't be for terms people are looking for - so it's untargeted traffic. If you have a site that is good in a catch-all area in which untargeted traffic works well, then go ahead and try it. Don't put a specialized site in these types of searches.

Be careful of keywords being automatically pulled from your site and being included in your bids. You might be paying 1 cent for traffic that ends up in keyword "the" - or one word of any keyword phrase - which may have no relevance to your site. It could cost you.

Some PPC's show no monitoring of relevant sites to any keyword category - beware. Targeted traffic is what you are looking for. If a PPC does not offer this, what good is it?

If the PPC places you in a category keyword - be careful. Your account may be eaten up very quickly if you are listed in a category of "business" - your site may be a business opportunity, but not in a "business" type of search someone is looking for. Try to get into a very specific type of listing and not into a major category listing (unless you can cater to all visitors' needs to that category).

There are a couple PPC's in which the sites with bids on them have not even been listed. This tells you the PPC is inactive - don't waste time on it.

If you get to try out a PPC for free, when the owner awards you perhaps $10 in credit to try out his PPC - take advantage and see if it works in bringing you traffic - some have gone belly up already. I have tried several with this type of promotion - some work a little, some not at all, and others are already gone. At least you are not out any money in this case.

PPC's are very good tools to use if the PPC is sound and solid. If people actually search there, you can benefit. If no one searches, you'll get no traffic from those.

Another point about PPC's - if you get traffic, your site needs to be good, and offer the solution people are looking for. If your site is a mess - no matter what traffic comes to it - you will make no sales at all. If you pay for traffic - make sure your site you send them to supports the needs they are looking for.

PPC's can be powerful tools in bringing a good amount of targeted traffic to your site. You need to choose the PPC's carefully.

To be very effective in the PPC arena - monitor your own bids, and keep them as low as needed for good effect. Don't get into "upping" wars if the #3 spot is available for 2 cents. You also need a very good, compelling and descriptive site title to make people want to click to your site over the #3 spot. Get people's attention with your site title. Using these tactics, you can make the PPC's work better for you.

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