I’ve been using Pay Per Click Search engines quite a bit lately. In the past I’ve tried to avoid them, opting instead to focus on organic SEO methods for my web traffic. However, I’ve been doing quite a few product reviews for ebooks and software that have been developed around the use of PPC, so I’ve had no choice but to play around with them.

In my testing, experimenting and otherwise floundering around I’ve had a few failures and seen some interesting successes. All things considered, I’ve managed to turn a nifty little profit. Here’s a few ideas that I’ve seen success with, use them in good health!

I’ve looked at several products that are promoting the use of the Amazon affiliate program. For me (and many other marketers), the downside to Amazon has always been the low commissions (my first Amazon sale was a plasma TV that sold for $1,700, I made a whopping $67 in commission on that one – I could have made that selling a single clickbank ebook). However, the fact that the entire world has heard of Amazon, outweighs the low commission by increasing the conversion rate. That $67 in Amazon commissions cost me less then $2 in Adwords clicks ;).

So how do you make money with Amazon.com?

1) Target specific products (names and model numbers). If someone searches Google for a “Panasonic xj224 HDTV” they’ve probably already done their research and are looking to buy.
2) Link directly to the product! Don’t make them search through the Amazon interface to find what they’re looking for – send them directly to the exact product page, of the product they want.
3) Pre-qualify your clicks by putting the product price in your ad. That’s right, you’re looking for buyers here and they expect to pay for a product. You’re paying per click here so let them know up front that this product is going to cost $X, if that’s too much they won’t click, saving you money.

Tools Used: Amazon Hunter, Dominating Amazon (Great value only $7)

Moving past Amazon…

I’ve also tried direct linking to several other affiliate programs, including some Clickbank products and a few Azoogle Pay per lead offers. With the Azoogle offers, I didn’t have much success – I think because my keyphrases were to general. One offer I tried was for a weight loss website, it was one of those as seen on Oprah things. At first I was making money by targeting the product name but soon after the merchant stopped allowing their trademarked phrases to be used at the PPC’s, once I stopped using those terms, my sales stopped… immediately.

I’ve fared much better with Clickbank products. Once again, I’m targeting the exact name of the products and I’m direct linking to the product page. My conversions here are good, but no where as good as with the Amazon products. It costs me much more in clicks to make a single sale, but the higher commission rate more or less balances it out.

Tools used: Beating Adwords -this guide is indispensable if you plan on getting serious with Adwords.

Well those are a few war stories from the PPC front. I do recommend the three products that I listed in this post, as they have helped me to avoid a lot of costly errors and brought me to profitability without a lot of trial and error.

Let me know how you make out…

Posted by David Olsen - Owner/Editor

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