Getting an ROI through your PPC campaigns

No, since the software I've seen has been PC only. You can pry my PowerBook from my cold, dead hands.  (Time to upgrade!  I, Brandon, went from a PowerBook G4 to a MacBook Pro and love it!)

I've worked in web and mobile marketing for five years. A friend introduced me to Adwords in early 2005 and I was blown away - it seemed like turning traffic on with a tap. Within weeks I was staying up until 2am every night to learn the system inside out.

What PPC networks do you use?

Adwords has made up 99% of my spend to date. I've always found Yahoo Search Marketing agonizing to use, so I await YSM's Panama with interest. Microsoft adCenter UK has just launched and - despite being buggy and slow - I'm getting some very promising results, albeit with around 15% of the traffic of an equivalent AdWords campaign.

I spoke to a Miva rep at SES London in June. Their contextual ads for email product is on my rainy day 'to do' list.

What is the max you have spent on a keyword?  Do you mind disclosing that keyword?

Around $10 is the most I've paid for a high value niche keyword. I'd rather spend my time on keyword research than chasing the same high CPC keywords as everyone else. If you're paying $10 per click, you're likely bidding far higher in any competitive market. I've lost hundreds of dollars in an hour before with far lower bids when a merchant's site went down, so bids that high raise the stakes a little much for my liking.

What is your monthly PPC budget?  How much of the budget do you spend on average?

I don't work to a fixed budget. If traffic is converting, I keep spending until my credit cards squeal. I usually set my daily budgets several times over what I want to spend to ensure ads run 24/7. Unsurprisingly, I've had my fingers burnt once or twice, but the benefits outweigh the risks for most of my campaigns.

What ROI do you have for PPC?

My ROI varies wildly between merchants. My star performer PPC campaign ran at close to 1000% ROI for nearly nine months. Most are lower.

How many affiliates do you promote at any given time?

As many as I can find that are making money. At the moment, I'm working with just under 20 merchants; my largest campaign has around 8,000 keywords.

Which is your favorite PPC network?

Adwords still beats the competition hands down.

Do you have a favorite affilate company? e.g. CJ.com AzoogleAds, ClickBank, etc.

My business, Quality Nonsense, is based in London, so I work with a mix of UK and US affiliate programmes. Some UK affiliate networks beat the big US networks hands down in certain respects.

Unlike Commission Junction, Affiliate Window guarantees commission even if a merchant refuses to pay out. The interface is top notch and they pay affiliates every other week. I've recently joined WebGains, who offer 24/7 support, AdWords integration and weekly commission payouts - perfect for insomniac pay per click affiliates like myself.

Commission Junction are struck off my Christmas card list for the painful interface, poor tracking and slow payments.

What types of products or services do you like to promote?

Any company based in the US, so I can drop hints that they ought to fly me out for PubCon/SES. Alas, it's yet to pay off yet...

Like many affiliates, I found a niche early on that still pays the rent each month, so you'll have to forgive me if I keep that between me and my accountant.  (It's ok, if it was a good tip, I might have kept it all for myself!)

Affiliate marketing is worse than pro poker for sob stories, and every PPC affiliate has their own bad beat tales. Like any business, you diversify. I promote a mix of high volume/low margin and low volume/high margin products in different markets, each with different decline rates, return rates, seasonal variations, sale seasons and so on.

I'd always assumed that the ringtones and mobile markets were saturated, but I now make a little money from both. Shoemoney is the man who can with ringtones.

Have you ever promoted eBooks?  Was that venture profitable?

It's no secret that most eBooks are low-rent cut and paste jobs. Newbies, take note - steer clear of any PDF pairing the word 'AdWords' with 'instant wealth', 'make millions' or 'work from home'. Would you buy an eBook called Make Millions with a Career in Management Accountancy? The cold hard truth is that learning how to make a living from PPC is as much hard work as any other profession. Like figure skating, it simply looks easy if you're doing it right. The key difference is that barriers to entry in PPC are low - you just need a computer and a credit card.

In answer to the question are eBook's profitable, I reveal the secrets they don't want you to know in my 13 page unspellchecked PDF, How to Make Millions from eBooks. Joking aside, I've just signed up as an affiliate for Aaron Wall's excellent SEOBook.

That's it from Richard.  If you have any questions you'd like to ask Richard, post them in the comments below and I'll make sure he stops by and reads them!

Thanks again Richard!