I'm confused about PPC?

[eLectrix]

Heya,

I'm extremely new to this and in reading everything am a bit confused about PPC. If I register with a company and set up a max bid, what do I get?

Does this help the listing in the main section of the search engine, or does it simply put me in the sponsored link section tiered appropriate to my bid?

If the next lowest bid is $0.20 cheaper should I drop my bid to $0.01 more than that bid?

It seems that google (who I don't pay) lists me quite high, but I get somewhat of an abbreviated listing.

On Yahoo I get a sponsored link and my description is completely custom

MSN uses the site description and I get a sponsored link, however the site description and page title are not abbreviated as much as google.

On checking another site of mine for which I pay nothing for advertising I see the only real difference is the sponsored links which is why I am confused.

Thanks,

-e

[Lori99]

Paying for your clicks and your sponsored ads does not assist with your rankings throughout the search engines.

With Overture you have the option to set your bids at a set price (manual) or they will adjust your bid (automatic) to be $0.01 more than the next highest bid but never go over your suggested click price per keyword.

Its great that you have high listings in Google. Using their GoogleAdwords program will allow you to chose the verbage for your ads.

I hope this helps answer some of your questions

[jbgilbert]

electrix,

Make sure you understand which PPC engine is delivering the ads to what search engine. That will help you understand.

To keep is overly simple:

Overture PPC is delivered to Yahoo and MSN.

Google Adwords is delivered to Google and AOL.


Each PPC engine has different rules for the length of ad titles and descriptions, and their distribution partners can also alter the ad appearance (like MSN does ot Overture ads).

[eLectrix]

Thx,

I understand who gives me what (sort of). What I'm really missing here is fundamental. What does PPC get me? Does it get me a sponsored link? Or is it something else I just can't see? Or, is the sponsored link a separate thing altogether?

Thanks much,

-e

[skyrocket]

You get an AdWord advert which appears on the right hand side of the page of the Google page results. For example go to Google and type peanut butter and you should see a sponsored link over on the right for "Peanut Power Butter - Peanut Butter Fortified with Flax Seed Oil and Other Proteins" yum (?)... :?

More info maybe read this: https://adwords.google.com/select/?hl=en_US