Pay-Per-Click Advertising Providers
Choose The Right Service For Your Business
For online businesses operating in the UK marketplace, there are three major search advertising providers that reach the majority of search engine traffic: Google AdWords, Yahoo! Search Marketing, and Microsoft AdCentre.
These providers offer similar forms of pay-per-click advertising, with the bid amount determining an advertisement’s placement and the frequency with which it is served for a particular keyword. The advertiser is charged a fee either when an advertisement is clicked through or when it receives a certain number of impressions. There are, however, major differences between the coverage, charges and levels of sophistication of the three main pay-per-click programmes, the key features of which are outlined below:
Google AdWords
Adwords is the pay-per-click advertising programme operated by Google. Google has used its dominant position in search engine technology to develop the most wide reaching and configurable of the various pay-per-click programmes. For the experienced pay-per-click campaign manager, AdWords combines the advantages of sophisticated targeting and matching options with higher penetration and lower costs. It offers the following services:
- Displays advertisements on Google search engine results pages (SERPS) and on other search sites in the Google network, including Ask Jeeves.
- Displays advertisements on the Google Display network, which incorporates any site running Google’s AdSense program. This includes YouTube along with several other major partners.
- Location targeting for advertisements, allowing you to limit coverage to single countries or even specific post codes.
- A language selection tool, meaning that you can target ads at different language groups across and within countries.
- Options as to how closely the trigger key phrase and the search term must match before an advertisement is displayed.
- A site exclusion feature to prevent your ad from appearing on chosen websites.
- Low minimum bid prices with no monthly minimum campaign spend.
- A bid discount system providing protection against over-bidding for individual keywords. This means that you would only pay enough to beat your competitors, despite putting in a much higher maximum bid.
Because of its comprehensive and highly customisable service, Optillion has identified Google AdWords as the most effective system for Search Engine Marketing campaigns. The options available mean that your ads can be highly targeted, meaning you reach customers who will provide the best return-on-investment (ROI). The Google AdWords system also offers reporting and monitoring services that allow effective optimisation of your campaign’s performance.
Google attracts over 85% of search engine traffic. Its ownership of major sites such as YouTube means that it offers the most complete coverage for advertisers. Optillion recommends AdWords as the best system for search engine advertising and has used it to achieve success for many clients.
Yahoo! Search Marketing, MS AdCentre and the Y!/MS Search Alliance
Yahoo! and Microsoft offer comparable search advertising services through Yahoo! Search Marketing and Microsoft AdCentre. Yahoo!’s service provides coverage across its search network and its other products, while Microsoft’s displays adverts on the SERPs for its Bing search engine. Between them, these two services account for almost 10% of search engine traffic. While this is significantly less traffic than Google attracts, it still represents a substantial number of search engine users and should not be overlooked.
These two providers have made great efforts to emulate many of the best features of the Google AdWords system and can offer similar targeting options to advertisers. They also deliver the same cost-effective bid mechanisms and performance reports, helping advertisers to optimise campaign ROI.
A recent major development that could serve to differentiate the two services from their main rival is the establishment of the Yahoo/Microsoft Search Alliance. This new partnership facilitates the merger of the two search advertising platforms, with pay-per-click advertising across both networks being run through the Microsoft AdCentre service.
The partnership will allow advertisers to reach a larger audience through a single service. It will combine the two companies’ search engine technologies and merge their existing ad inventories. Microsoft’s AdCentre service will be used to manage the transactions of smaller businesses, while Yahoo! will take responsibility for high volume advertisers and Search Engine Marketing agencies.
Optillion can advise on the transition to this new service and manage campaigns that effectively work within the procedures of the new system. For more information on pay-per-click providers and how you can work with them to achieve great results for your business, contact Optillion today on .
