Google Adwords and my blood pressure.....

Yes - have to agree with you there.

Too complicated to use unless you have deep pockets.

I just lower my budget, i dont let G dictate how much i "need" to spend. AW needs a lot of knowledge and research, keywords, ad-wording, long tail keywords, content, placement, search, CTR rate, split testing...etc..

The "problem" is that a noob can very well start out quickly...but the money can be spent as quickly too.

I also try to get most of the traffic from "natural" sources like blogs, squidoo etc. and i just dont rely on G that much. $50/day is actually a pretty big budget...i wonder what your max CPC was, your ad wording, how your landing page looks and why it didnt convert?

I assume that people DID click..the just didnt buy. KEY is to research WHY.

Another key is to monitor your campaigns...i mean on an 3 hourly base or so...and if you see 1000s of impressions and no clicks....or you see 200 clicks but no one buys...ACT. First thing pause the campaign and check where and what to tweak.

I am also mad right now since i am experimenting with the content network right now, i have VERY low CPC....but thousands of impressions and HARDLY any clicks.

Target, target and target more...start with more specific keywords, research what long tail keywords you can use.....maybe even add price in the ad....geo-target in adwords, do NOT use the whole world but use only USA, UK, NZ, AUS for better conversion rates..and such things.

Dont use "broad" matching, use exact and phrase matching, use negative keywords like
-free
-scam
-gratis
-torrent
-rapidshare
-crack
etc...etc..

Start with FEW ads first and dont load 1000s in your AW account for a start.

You may also find it better to look for leads instead of straight sales. Don't forget that people are looking for information when searching.

Try CPA offers or building your mailing list.

Use free methods to build your list, see how much money you make, then define how much a subscriber is worth to you over 6 months or 12 months, then you can define how much you can spend to get a lead on Adwords or other sources.

Fabian

I gave up using it a long time ago for much the same reason. Too expensive and few results. It also allows your opposition to waste your money by having umteen dozens of people click your ads.

there are many free resources out there and one of the best for me has been Adland Pro who give free ads for web sites.

You can also paste their ads to your site and get paid, similar to adsense,

I just posted about this on another thread. Go look at what I said. I think you will find some real help.

http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...tml#post225229

Don't waste your money on adwords. But if you do, make sure you do what this program tell you to do, first.

This will definately help.

Adam

I gave up on PPC almost two years ago and it was probably the best thing I've done. It taught me how to optimize my site for natural searches and I've never had to pay for traffic again.

Some of the experts (the ones selling courses) make it sound like a no-brainer. Well, I'll tell you... the truth is it's a constant battle with both your competitors and Google. And if you don't have sufficient conversion you're just not going to be profitable no matter how many courses you do.

Learn how to attract traffic the natural way... free! You'll find that conversion also improves through natural search. People clicking on Adwords tend to be very skeptical and I got real tired of paying for people to spend 2 seconds on my site!

Like anything you do, you need to learn more to make it work. If you give up it will never work, but you shouldn't spend big to learn.

You did right by taking a class. You should also start by turning the adwords faucet on to just a trickle. I know someone that turned it on to just $5 a day.

Research is also a good way to see if the keywords have even a chance to work. You have to check out competition, intent and finally, you need to test conversion on your sites. If you aren't tracking you visits, you should be.

In some niches it can be easy like falling off a log. In others, you can really blow a wad with no return.

Check out the intent on MSN at:
Detecting Online Commercial Intention: Audience Intelligence: adCenter Labs

Sometimes it won't work because you think it wont work. If you continually worry that you won't make money, you probably won't. I have made great head way in my business this year just by changing my thoughts.

Answer to your question:

Very easy. For every $10 I put in, I can normally expect to get
$17 back (on average). $1000 will bring in $1700. Care to vomit
on that?

$100 Adspend is really not much. You should put aside at least $500 to test a new campaign. That is bare minimum for me to find all the converting keywords. At this stage, your campaign would usually be in the red, but after you discovered the converting keywords and altered your campaing, you will start to turn a profit.

What course did you buy. It is obviously not very good if it tought you that you can put up a campaing, spend $100 and expect to start making money. There is a big learning curve involved.

There are a lot of variables involved before a campaing can become succesfull:

Domain name
Landing page
Keywords
Merchant page
Offer
Etc

All have to work in harmony.

If spending $100 to grow your business makes you want to vomit, then yes, mabey PPC is not for you. But if you are willing to learn and adjust your campaigns, then PPC will put you on the fast track.

If you want, PM your landing page URL, and the keywords you are bidding on. I might be able to help.

Regards,

AffiliatePPC