Learning from the King of AdWords
January 2, 2009 by Efficient Entrepreneur
Filed under E-Commerce, Programs
You’re not the only one hurting in the bad economy…Google is too!
In response to lowering advertising budgets and less money being invested in Google AdWords advertising, Google did something pretty sneaky. Advertising with Google AdWords means that you pay every time someone clicks on your ad. For the most part, the more you’re willing to pay for an ad or the more your ad gets clicked on, the more often and the closer to the top of the page your ad will show up on a Google search. Obviously if your ad is more popular or Google gets paid more per click, it’s in their best interest to have it show up more. When setting up your Google ad you can choose which search terms your ad will show up for. You could also choose whether or not your ad would show up only for the specific search terms you specified or for a broader range of search terms similar to your chosen focus. For example, if “diapers” was my specific keyword my ad would only show up when someone typed in “diapers”. If “diapers” was my broad keyword my ad would likely show up if someone searched for anything from “toilet training” to “baby butt rash”. This would be beneficial because most likely someone looking up these terms could use diapers too. But recently Google has decided to broaden the term “broad” and now when I typed “diapers” into Google at least one ad was for Custom Cake Creations. This is a sneaky little difference that could drain your Google AdWords budget in days by attracting people that aren’t really interested in buying what you have to sell.
Do you want to know where I learned this valuable information? From Perry Marshall, the man many consider to be the King of AdWords.
Perry Marshall offers quite a few educational resources and even one-on-one consultations that are full of information. But this article is just focusing on the Google AdWords-focused offerings, including a free newsletter packed with valuable info.
Perry Marshall Adwords Fluff 5%, Meat 70%, Gold 25%
Meat and Potatoes: 70%
Every product you receive from Perry Marshall, even the free ones give lots of straight-forward, usable, relevant information. He starts you off with AdWords and how to make it work for you, but then continues to teach you about changes you can make to your site and other marketing channels you are using in order to attract more customers, increase the number of visitors that become customers and how to build strong relationships with your customers. He’s been around a pretty long time, (check out his bio) meaning he can offer some good packages of information. He has experience making the web work for huge corporations and mom-and-pop solopreneur’s running affiliate or e-commerce sites.
Gold: 25%
Perry Marshall offers incredibly focused and valuable information that he tests out on a regular basis. He is only one of the very few internet gurus that offers levels of membership to cater to everyone’s learning budget. You can start with the Free 5-day Google Adwords Course if you just want to get comfortable with what Google AdWords is and how to use it to get your website noticed. Once you’re ready to bump up your online paid advertising, you can join the AdWords Mastermind Course(runs about $99) to help you turn more of your paid clicks into paying customers. And if you’re looking to get the most intensive and personalized course available on the web (to my knowledge), you can apply to be a part of Perry’s Bobsled 12-week intensive (runs about $3000). That’s right. He doesn’t want to waste anyone’s time, including his own, so he only takes people with a solid business plan and a commitment to follow through and do all the homework. Still feeling like you want some more one-on-one attention, how about four-on-one attention?! Perry has assembled a team of 3 other web business experts to give you all their attention for one year. You attend various 2-day intensives focused on you and your business and in various amazing locations around the world. This is another program you have to apply for, but Perry Marshall’s Roundtable Club(~$1500 per month) is like having your own presidential cabinet of experts all working to get your business to succeed.
Fluff: 5%
This man spends his time keeping track of what’s going on with Google AdWords and just gives you the information you need. Unlike the newsletters you get from quite a few of the other experts who are windbags and fill their emails with tales of trips to the grocery store and updates on their 6 year old’s ballet concert, Perry Marshall’s emails are mostly straight-forward and full of info. All his Google AdWords products are focused and virtually fluff-free. Occasionally you will get an email that seems more directed at reminding you about Google AdWords rather than to give you any news. Which may be fluff, but it isn’t necessarily a bad thing to be reminded occasionally to check on your AdWords strategy, budget and conversion rate.
AdWords can be an amazing tool, but it can also be a great way to drain your budget quickly. Get the most bang for your buck by avoiding general phrases and by only advertising for search terms that real customers that are ready to purchase are using to find you. And check out what experts like Perry Marshall have to say!
Here’s the lot of Perry Marshall’s Google AdWords-focused offerings:
Free 5-Day Google Adwords Course
Google AdWords Mastermind Course
