Is Your Business Built on Pay Per Click PPC Quicksand?
Guest Post by Winton Churchill
Your success with pay-per-click may be setting you up for a revenue shortfall.
This is one of the challenges I see impacting those with a complex sales cycle.
Recently a client came to me who had been very successful in just this type of situation. They had uncovered some great keywords and had very skillfully exploited them in the PPC environment for over a year. Then one of their competitors discovered the keywords as well and a bidding war ensued.
Soon several other competitors joined the party. Within 3 months the cost of PPC had risen out of reach for this client and a foundational pillar of their revenue stream was gone…wiped out completely!
Just because a company finds a “good” set of keywords, it doesn’t mean they can drop their guard on their other strategies.
This is one of the reasons I insist on a good email marketing program for my clients.
With email you can target your best prospects very precisely using reports, white papers, audio and video. These tools help you build your own list of interested parties.
If you build that list using PPC you can touch them free of charge in the future if PPC gets too pricey.
The other advantage is that you can use permission-based 3rd party lists from publications very tightly targeted to industry, job function, company size and a host of other variables. The downsides to these lists are that they are expensive and generally not as responsive as a list you build yourself.
The best time to build your email list is when your PPC is working because you will do it at a lower cost.
Don’t be caught asleep at the Pay-per-Click switch.
Email Marketing & Complex Sales Cycles by Winton Churchill
This book contains information which is beneficial to the following people and businesses: small business owners, professional consultants, marketing executives, sales executives and people in technology companies. Most have complex sales cycles which simply means, they form a relationship with their prospects before the prospects make a purchase.
These topics and themes are in your book.
• Building rapport with prospects
• Presenting information in a way that they don’t drown
• Reducing tedious and demeaning sales tactics
• Closing more sales
• Shortening sales cycle
• Reducing stress in sales organization
• Reducing uncertainty about meeting forecasts
The content is easy to understand and it is packed with great information for any business that wants to use email to reach prospective clients. When done right, email is a very powerful marketing medium - Winton Churchill knows how to do it right.
Please, read on for more details.
About Email Marketing for Complex Sales Cycles
The principles in this book have helped thousands of business people and entrepreneurs increase sales and reduce stress and aggravation…Will you be the next one to benefit?
Why not generate more sales, more quickly?
Are you burnt out on sales and marketing activities because they are so labor intesive and unproductive?
All the glib conversation and backslapping in the world won’t close the deal until your prospect feels, “You’re the one that can help me the best!”
It’s hard to convince prospects, but easier than you think to help them select you.
This book gives you proven methods to help you slash the time and effort required to turn your prospects into clients.
It’s hard to convince prospects, but easier than you think to help them select you.
This book gives you proven methods to help you slash the time and effort required to turn your prospects into clients.
You Will Discover:
– 3 keys to improving the quality of your leads
– 5 techniques to increase the number of leads you get
– 3 little-known conversion tactics that turn leads into revenue
– 1 mistake that dooms most lead generation to anemic results
– 2 unconventional ways to shorten your sales cycle
– 3 ways you’ve been brainwashed when it comes to email
– 6 special needs shared by all complex sales cycles
– 3 critical stages of success (and what to do at each one)
– 18 essential components you need to get going
– 8 indispensable “fast track” strategies to get you on the road to success
Level the playing field!…Compete with your strengths.
Sales Lead Generation Expert Winton Churchill improves the efficiency and effectiveness of sales and marketing efforts for thousands of businesses. If your company experiences complex sales cycles and if you want to increase sales with more effective lead generation programs then GET YOUR FREE SNEAK PREVIEW of his new book: “Email Marketing for Complex Sales Cycles.” Get it now at: http://www.churchillmethod.com/chapter.
For more information, visit www.churchillmethod.com. Visit www.virtualblogtour.blogspot.com for the most up to date information. His full tour schedule is posted at here. Winton Churchill is offering a wealth of free gifts for every person that purchases his book Email Marketing. Visit www.churchillmethod.com/bookbonus for full details about how to download all of these free gifts.
About Winton Churchill
Winton Churchill is Founder and CEO of Churchill Method, Inc. , an international sales and marketing consulting firm that helps clients improve their sales and marketing processes. He is the author of “Email Marketing for Complex Sales Cycles.” He has held senior positions in both F500 technology firms including Apple, Oracle, Spinnaker and Sun. He headed sales & marketing as VP at Contact Software, the developers of ACT!. He is Past President of the South Bay Association of Chambers of Commerce. The SBACC serves 18 Chambers and more than 53,000 businesses in coastal Southern California.
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Sep 17th 2008
There is so much more to lead generation than relying solely on a PPC campaign. As Winton mentions you could easily find yourself outbid by competitors in your field, when they catch on to the methods being employed. Far better to develop strategies and goals for long-term lead generation results. I’ll be checking out this book for clues on gaining an edge in my industry.
Sep 17th 2008
I have also worked a bit with Google Adwords but havn’t achieved the level of success that usually people talk about. Perhaps I am not that good in setting a good campaign, as my ads never appear on front pages for the search term that I choose.
I think I better read more learn more or completly let go for using PPC, or by reading this got another option in my mind. Why not hire an expert to do it for me.
Thanks for usefull info on the subject
Joe
Sep 18th 2008
This is an issue that I actually discussed today. Not so much with the email marketing, but with how PPC should be used as a supplement to SEO and other forms of marketing instead of the only way.
My analogy was that many forms of marketing including SEO was like buying a house, investing into equity that can be cashed in later, while PPC was like renting a house. Once you stop making payments, you get nothing back.
Sep 18th 2008
Tip of the hat to Bill and his loyal fans! Yesterday after this was posted my book made it onto the Amazon best seller list for the first time…Thanks Bill
Sep 23rd 2008
Personally, I have found the Quality Score side of PPC the most arbitrary and frustrating aspect of it. I have pages that have an OK or Great QS that are NOT for the dominant keyword phrase across the page bot Poor for the obvious best phrase. Sigh.
Sep 24th 2008
Diversity is important to any business model. Whether it’s PPC, SEO, or email marketing. A multi pronged approach is one I follow in my own business. If one channel is particularly, I like to use it to bolster the others.
Sep 24th 2008
I agree, purchasing targetted email lists can be very expensive and not too responsive. Building your own list however is a slow process and can even take years to get the responses needed. PPC on the other hand, provided it’s managed properly can bring instant results. It’s just a case of keeping one step ahead of the opposition.
Oct 2nd 2008
Agreed that building a portfolio is the right approach…sadly most businesses only have 1 or 2 effective marketing processes and this makes them vulnerable to the winds of change. The good news is that once you’ve built the list, by whatever method, you owne it and have that direct part to your prospects.
Oct 5th 2008
While I agree that you certainly wouldn’t want to build your entire or even a large portion of your marketing efforts on PPC for the reasons that were mentioned above, I also think PPC offers different possiblities depending on the business model and/or products.
For example, if my business sold a consumable item or item that had to be frequently replenished, then I would be willing to “lose” some money on PPC for lead generation and customer acquisition . If my web site converts well, and I had some idea of the lifetime value of a customer to my particular business; then I would be far more willing to take a loss on my PPC costs knowing that I can potentially make the difference up with repeat business from customers acquired through that PPC campaign. While some would view that philosophy as risky, it’s worked well for some various businesses that I either owned or worked for. The trick is having the necessary data to estimate the long term value of a customer.
Oct 5th 2008
Be honest with you I stall away from PPC all together, I love organic traffic. It’s not to say this isn’t a great way of getting traffic to your site, I just like staying on the safe side of things.
Oct 8th 2008
I agree that you certainly wouldn’t want to build your entire or even a large portion of your marketing efforts on PPC for the reasons that were mentioned above, I also think PPC offers different possiblities depending on the business model and/or products.
Oct 13th 2008
I agree, I try to avoid PPC advertising, I just focus on SEO and getting free organic traffic.
I learned SEO from Brad Callen and found him very helpful.
Oct 15th 2008
Personally i find PPC not worth the risk. Alot of it hinges upon the circumstance where competitors don’t find the keyword and push prices through the roof.
Oct 17th 2008
I used to do quite well on PPC marketing, then I had to start being really really targeted with my ads to stay in the game. Now with every joe selling the same products I am finding it diffcult to make it pay, as some of the joe’s have deep pockets.
I think you are right that e-mail marketing and SEO are the best tools.
Oct 19th 2008
Using PPC to market a business is risky as mentioned above, if one was so inclined you would need to make sure you offer a product with some sort of continuity to make it worth while. Recurring payments should allow you to make the most of it.
Having a means of capturing paid traffic is a must, if you don’t you are wasting your money.
Oct 22nd 2008
It’s true… to only use PPC as a lead generator for your website is short sighted and frought with problems. While it is possibly the most quantifiable of the online marketing efforts available, it can also drain your money with little return if managed badly.