PPC Bidding Software

March 18, 2005

Automated Pay Per Click Bidding Software should be evaluated carefully before buying. You are entrusting your funds to these programs. They are great timesavers, and can be made to work very effectively for you. Below are the ones we’ve tested, and recommend. However, you should still manually check your pay per click accounts on a regular basis to ensure not only the software is working properly for you, but that you are using the proper rules for bidding based off of your website goals and competition.

Web Based PPC Bidding Software

GoToast - PPC Tracking, Bidding & Analysis Software

GoToast is one of the most comprehensive pay per click management systems around. It has many options for creating bidding rules for a large list of pay per click search engines. They have an easy to implement java or pixel based conversion tracking system with provides web analytics to the keyword level based on overall effectiveness or by ppc engine. Their system can track your campaigns to the keyword level. They also offer tools for implementing non pay per click campaign tracking (i.e. if you had an internet yellow page ad). This is one of the most recommended systems around.

Software Based PPC Bidding

BidRank - Automated Pay Per Click Bidding

BidRank is a unique bidding solution as its software you purchase once, and then it sits on your computer. If your computer is on, you know BidRank is working for you. The pay per click bidding features are very good, and BidRank has been offering their product since the early days of pay per click advertising and has grown with the industry. The software includes a very useful keyword wizard. BidRank comes in several different packages, including a stand along for just Overture, or manage many different pay per click search engines with their more robust products.

BidRank automated PPC bid management

Written by Brad Geddes aka eWhisper · Filed Under PPC Info | Comments Off

Google Local - Create Your Own Listings

March 14, 2005

Google Local has added a new feature for small businesses. You have the option of adding your own business listing and updating your own business information.

Google is using a mailing system to verify addresses. Once you create your listings, a mailer will be sent with a specific pin number on it. This is the verification code used to make sure you really have a business address.

The local listings allow you to add a link to your site. As Google Local expands (it’s user base is still quite small), this can be an effective way of driving local traffic to your site.

Additional Information:
Google Local Small Business Login
Google Local Help Files

Written by Brad Geddes aka eWhisper · Filed Under Blog, Local Advertising News | Leave a Comment

Kanoodle Ads Local Target

March 11, 2005

Kanoodle claims to have a variety of behavioral targeting techniques. In reality, most of these are channel based techniques and not demographic information.

The difference between those two is very key to understanding targeting.

The use of demographic data (usually received through logins (aka Yahoo) and subscriptions (such as AOL) where an engine knows the user provided data and can use that information in targeting to a user.

Channel based targeting is where it is assumed because you’re on a truck website that your male. Then, depending on the exact product, additional assumptions into age and income may be made.

Kanoodle’s targeting works like the channel example above. In the new case of local, Kanoodle has struck deals with many local TV sites to provide local advertising data. In these cases, the channel based method should be pretty accurate. Why would I goto a Chicago TV website if I live in Los Angeles? Of course, there are some reasons, but overall, this channel based local method should provide somewhat effective.

Kanoodle doesn’t have enough advertisers to break these local channels into geo vertical channels yet. For example, if you’re a car dealer in Los Angeles, you must advertise on the entire LA website, you can’t just target the Auto section of a website. As the advertiser base grows, Kanoodle has informed me that they will grow this targeting capability.

Business to Business Marketing

March 9, 2005

When people think of sales, they often think of small retail operations, or sales from a business to a person, but much of what makes the economy run in the United States and abroad is business-to-business marketing and sales. These people would be surprised to learn the extent of real sales and transactions that go on between various businesses, but it should not be so surprising.

Every business must purchase things no matter what field they are in. Accountants must buy pencils or printer ink, McDonald’s needs to buy grain to make buns. All businesses are also consumers, so expanding your sales to encompass not just people, but also businesses should come as a no-brainer.

In today’s growing information economy, e-commerce is becoming an increasingly prevalent business-to-business application. But for many small businesses, it is difficult to plan a successful business-to-business marketing strategy. Cold calling a business is not a good way to get results, and many of the standard marketing techniques that you can use to attract clients on a one to one basis will not work when attempting to approach a business.

One of the best ways to increase the percentage of your sales that go to another business is to let them come to you. But the eternal question of business-to-business marketing is how to get those other businesses to even know you exist, let alone want to contact you.

Online, search-based advertising represents one of the best ways to turn other businesses heads. Letting them know exactly who you are and what you are offering is now possible with the use of the Internet’s most powerful tool, the online search.

Over 100 million Americans turn to the Internet each day for solutions to problems and to handle everyday tasks. Some of those 100 million are people who work for businesses that are looking to buy your product. Placing your advertisement exactly where those businesspeople can see it is one of the major keys in business-to-business marketing.

In fact, with so many people online, a search-based advertising campaign can directly target the audience that you are looking to attract, namely another business. Putting off marketing will not help you stay competitive, and marketing your business to another business represents a lucrative way to expand.

Setting up an online advertising campaign is the simplest and quickest way to get your business on the map in terms of business-to-business sales.

Written by Brad Geddes aka eWhisper · Filed Under Vertical Marketing | Comments Off