Can PPC Work For A Small Business?

Writing by Pay Per Click Journal on Tuesday, January 8, 2008 Comments (2)

In a section of a blog post about BusinessWeek columnist Gene Marks’ absurd assertions that small businesses don’t need Internet marketing, Caroline Melberg had this to say:

I’m not an expert on AdWords, but I do know people who have used Google AdWords and other pay per click models to turn a profit. You don’t need thousands of dollars. You can make money on a $200 per month budget. Many have. You just have to learn how it’s done. You didn’t know how to run a business either until you tried. Right, Gene?

She’s right. Gene Marks is wrong:

John’s a pretty smart guy. He runs a company that sells specialty pet foods. He manages his own investments. He keeps an eye on his taxes. But I’ve found a way to turn John into a blithering idiot. I’ve asked him to figure out how to use Google’s (GOOG) AdSense profitably.

It’s really not hard. You don’t have to be a genius to figure out any of the pay per click models successfully. And, Gene, it’s Google AdWords, not AdSense. AdWords is the pay per click advertising vehicle for businesses who want to advertise and bid on clicks per keyword. AdSense is for publishers who want to place ads on their website. Two different things.

That aside, just because you don’t understand it doesn’t make you an idiot. Like anything else, you have to take the time to learn it. If you can’t, or don’t want to, there are people who will manage your pay per click campaigns for a modest fee. Believe me, it’s worth it. Thousands of small business owners have managed it successfully.

The key is in ROI. You don’t need a big budget to run a pay per click campaign. You just need to do your research – your keyword research, and don’t bid yourself above your means to pay. You can control your budget. AdWords, and their competition, makes that easy.

Is pay per click advertising for everyone? No. But you don’t have to be intimidated by it if you run a small business. There are ways to make it work for you.

Comments (2) Category: PPC Keyword Research

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2 Comments

Made Tuesday, 8 of January , 2008 at 10:38 pm

Hey Nick, great post. To your point, PPC does work well for small business owners who take the time to learn how to implement it for their business (or who are smart enough to hire someone who knows how to do it for them). My passion is helping small business owners succeed, so it drives my crazy when guys like Gene Marks start spouting off about stuff that they obviously know little about, leading entrepreneurs to assume that Internet Marketing is either to complicated for them to understand, or simply doesn’t work. Nothing could be further from the truth, as you’ve pointed out so well in this post!
Caroline

Comment by Brick Marketing

Made Wednesday, 9 of January , 2008 at 3:09 pm

Thanks Caroline! Guys like Gene Marks would rather you go out of business so their big business friends can rake in all the money. That’s why they give such bad advice. Thanks for reading.