An Overview of our Pay Per Click Management Process

Quick 5-Step Guide

• Discuss your goals and objectives with us
• We research potential search terms and analyse the most suitable search engines
• You provide us with feedback on the suitability of these search terms
• We create the campaigns and produce the ad copy
• Constant monitoring, adjustments and reporting

Preparation

Initial Meeting: We will arrange a meeting with you to discuss your goals and objectives. We will also discuss the target search terms that you would like to appear for.

Keyword Research: LandingNet will do extensive research into the search terms discussed in the initial meeting, then expand them using bespoke in-house technology, and send this list to you for approval.

Opening and Linking Accounts

All New Accounts: We can assist you, or open accounts on your behalf with the major search engine platforms, Google, Yahoo and MSN. We may need some details from you to do this, which can be discussed at any point.

Existing AdWords Account: If you have an existing Google AdWords account we can link your account to our Client Centre. We will ask you to provide us with your customer ID, which is located in the top right corner of the page once you have logged in. We will then send you a request through the AdWords system so the next time you log in it will ask you if you would like LandingNet Ltd to manage your accounts. At this point you select “Yes” and we have access to your account and can continue with our progress.

Existing MSN and Yahoo Accounts: These search platforms do not support agency management at present, so if you already have a campaign with either of these, you will need to provide us with your existing login details.

Implementation

Create Campaigns: We split the search terms into related ad groups so we can write the ad copy specifically for these terms. Once these have been set up we set the bids for each term accordingly.

Monitor and Adjust: We continually monitor and make adjustments to your campaign to maximise the return on investment. This includes re-writing ad copy, adjusting bids; day parting, geo-targeting and making suggested landing page changes.

Reports

Reporting: Every month we will send you a detailed report on how well your campaigns are performing, how we plan to improve it and make other suggestions based on your campaign history.

If You Already Have An Existing AdWords Account

Once we swap over to the LandingNet campaign you may see some changes with your traffic and enquiries. Initially Google will see our campaign as a new campaign and it takes a few days to build up some historical data with them. We may see ads showing periodically, in slightly lower positions for a short period of time, but this will change once the data has been built up over a few days.

Jargon Buster

Targeted Search Terms – These are the words people type into the search engine to try and find what they are looking for.

Impressions – Each impression represents a single showing of one of your ads.

Day-Parting – This is when we are able to select certain times of the day to display your ads. If you only want them displayed 9am-5pm, no problem, just let us know.

Geo-Targeting – We are able to target specific countries and make sure your ad is not displayed in the wrong country for your service.

Landing Page – This is the page where we send the visitor after they click on your ad.

Not likely – or at least not yet anyway!

Today Microsoft and Yahoo! announced that they have (finally) completed a 10-year search deal which will help them be more competitive against the giant that is Google. However, they haven’t combined their advertising businesses.

Yahoo! currently has about 20 percent of the global search market, with Microsoft hanging behind with just under 10 percent which leaves Google with the lion’s share of the remaining 70 percent. Many have estimated that Google will begin to lose market share to Microsoft’s Bing as it gains popularity through its visual superiority over Google, however other have argued that if this becomes the case then Google will just match Bing’s template ideas. They have still yet to prove if they do what they do better than Google, all they have shown us so far is that they do it prettier.

The question that now needs answering is what will happen to the search as a result of this partnership? Well, according to Reuters, under the deal announced on Wednesday, Microsoft’s Bing search engine will be the exclusive algorithmic search and paid search technology for Yahoo’s sites, while Yahoo will be responsible for selling premium search ads for both companies.”

So how long has this engagement taken to come to its happy ending?

• 01/02/2008 – Microsoft makes an offer out of the blue to buy Yahoo for $44.6 billion or $31 a share, after two years of rumours of a merger
• 03/02/2008 – Google lawyers announce the buyout will hurt Web innovation
• 04/02/2008 – Yahoo’s Jerry Yang lets the employees know that selling to Microsoft is a possibility
• 11/02/2008 – Yahoo! tells Microsoft ‘where to go’ saying their offer “substantially undervalues” Yahoo!
• 19/02/2008 – Bill Gates announces that they’re not interested in raising the offer for the buyout. Yahoo! releases severance plan details that would take effect after the deal and make it more expensive for Microsoft
• 05/03/2008 – Yahoo! announce and extend deadline for nominating candidates to its board, effectively buying time to come up with an alternative proposal. Rumours emerge that Yahoo are in talks with Google, MySpace and AOL
• 18/03/2008 – Yahoo! release a very healthy revenue forecast for the following two years – basically telling Microsoft “you see, that’s why you’ve undervalued us!”
• 05/04/2008 – Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer gets aggressive and gives Yahoo! a deadline of three weeks to accept the deal on the table or expect Microsoft to start hostile tactics and lower the offer price
• 09/04/2008 – Yahoo! announces it’ll have a trial run of using Google’s ad platform in place of its own for a bit – Microsoft raise antitrust concerns
• 26/04/2008 – Microsoft’s three week deadline expires
• 01/05/2008 – Ballmer announces to its employees that he “won’t go a dime above” what he thinks Yahoo! is worth and is willing to walk away from the deal
• 03/05/2008 – Microsoft increases its offer to $33 a share, Yang retorts by saying they want $37, Microsoft walks away
• 15/05/2008 – Billionaire investor Carl Icahn says he’ll try to oust Yahoo’s board at its annual shareholder meeting if it doesn’t reopen talks with Microsoft and ditch plans to team up with Google.
• 18/05/2008 – The pair get together to have a chat about a more limited deal, however after a month Yahoo announce the talks have stopped
• 12/06/2008 – Google and Yahoo! officially announce a deal to run Google’s ads alongside Yahoo’s search results and some of its partner sites
• 21/07/2008 – Icahn takes back his threat in exchange for three seats on Yahoo! board
• 09/09/2009 – The U.S. Justice Department hires an antitrust litigator to review the pending Yahoo-Google search-advertising partnership.
• 05/11/2008 – Google gets worried and cancels the partnership to avoid a Justice Department lawsuit. Yang can still see a Microsoft acquisition in the future
• 17/11/2008 – Yang steps down as CEO for Yahoo!
• 19/11/2008 – Ballmer washes his hands of the talks and says Microsoft is “done with all acquisition discussions with Yahoo!”
• 05/12/2008 – Microsoft hires ex Yahoo! search executive Qi Li to lead its own online division
• 13/01/2009 – Yahoo! hires Carol Bartz to replace Yang
• 10/04/2009 – New reports emerge that Bartz and Ballmer have met about possible deals, including one in which Microsoft would sell advertising on Yahoo’s search pages and Yahoo would manage Microsoft’s display ads.
• 03/06/2009 – Microsoft dumps Live Search and replaces it with Bing
• 29/07/2009 – Microsoft, Yahoo! partnership announced

Now we wonder, is this going to be a marriage made in heaven – or can we expect to see the divorce papers come through shortly?

Adding to the increasing complexity of the AdWords “Quality Score” algorithm, Google has announced that page loading times will soon become a key factor.

The intention is that sites runing advert-heavy pages will be penalised in an effort to improve the “user experience”. Google claims conversion rates are lower when page loading times are poor, as users abandon the site, a claim supported by many frustrated browsers.

Losers

Flash Sites and Image-Heavy Websites – as Flash sites tend to require more image requests from the server than a typical html site, they may be penalised under the new calculations.

Poorly Hosted Websites – the jury is still out on whether cheaper hosting packages result in slower server responses, but inferior hardware undoubtedly takes its toll.

Winners

Text-Only Sites – we might see retailers using incredibly simple text-only landing pages (or maybe defaulting to the low-graphics accessibility pages?).

Google have not (and will not) release details of how much effect loading times will have on the quality score, for all we know it could be minimal, but Google are generally very commited to providing the best search results for their users. There are several conspiracy theories and there is no doubt that any changes will benefit Google’s profit margins but ultimately those who abide by the rules will be rewarded.