1: How did you get started with Search Engine Marketing and Adwords?
I worked for a small software company as a Webmaster and worked in the marketing department. It seems I have always managed to be a technical professional yet work side-by-side with marketing. I was already knee deep in SEO and showing what search engine visibility could do for sales so when paid listings became available the “search engine guy” was put in charge of figuring out how best to leverage them.
2: Can you give us a brief definition of Adwords for our visitors?
Adwords is a Google owned online advertising service that allows you to place text ads on:
• Relevant search result pages for Google, AOL, Ask Jeeves and other search engines
• Relevant content partner sites such as About.com, Business. COM, and The New York Times site.
• Relevant independent web site owners and blogs.
The power in an advertising network like Adwords is that you can engage web users when they are actively looking for your products and services and you only pay when your ads are clicked on and a visitor reaches your site.
3: What is the best way to supplement you organic search traffic using Adwords?
You should run ads in conjunction with keywords you are already ranking well on. There has been a significant amount of study that shows that when you have an organic ranking and a paid listing on the same search results page that conversions can more than double.
In addition, running ads for keywords you are unsure of optimizing for in your SEO program is a good way to determine that amount of traffic you might be able to expect and what kind of conversions you can expect for a given keyword.
4: Can Adwords ads truly be relevant for natural information searches as well as product hunters?
Absolutely. E-commerce sites aren’t the only ones running ads. I have consulted with politicians, health organizations, charities, special interest groups and religious organizations who in addition to a monetary goal for a successful visit may also have an educational or awareness goal.
5: What do you feel Google can do to make their Adwords program more relevant and effective?
Google could provide all information rather than it’s filtered view of activity of an advertisers ad campaign and create an API (application programming interface) that ties into Adwords to allow 3rd party tools to be developed to cater to advertisers informational needs.
6: Do you feel Google will try to lessen the search power of organic search results by finding a way to make their Adwords results more prominent on the SERP pages?
It would probably go against their ideal of not allowing money to influence rankings if they were to try to “push” paid listings and let natural listings take a back seat. However, Google has been seen testing three top-paid listing instead of the usual maximum of two. Another top paid listing would push yet another natural ranking below the fold, which would further narrow the natural rankings “sweet spot”.
7: Can click fraud truly be managed and what do you feel the best way to handle it might be?
Yes, click fraud can be managed, however this management cannot be left up to Google alone. The most qualified person to spot unnatural activity in Adwords is the person who manages the advertising on a daily basis. They are much more capable of determining awkward patterns than an automated algorithm or a Google employee who is not familiar with their advertising activity much less the their industry.
Even with an experienced person on staff there is usually just too much information to comb through to be able to effectively monitor for click fraud. This is where a click fraud service such as VeriClix or Click Fraud Detective comes in. These services run in real time and not only keep up-to-the-second auditing records for each visitor who clicks an ad but allow the advertiser to set thresholds, that when exceeded, alerts them in real-time of suspicious activity. These tools along with the advertisers familiarity with their paid advertising, allow click fraud to measured and dealt with.
8: Besides your own site what are a couple sites you love visiting?
It doesn't’t have to be SEO/SEM related at all.
As I am a moderator in the Search Engine Watch Forums I spend a good deal of time there. I also read RSS feeds from Matt Cutts’ blog, Google’s Blog, the Yahoo! Search Blog, the MSN Search Blog and Google Blogscoped. In addition I visit Webmaster World, The Register and Slashdot (like any good geek).
Jeff has over five years experience in natural search engine optimization and SEM project management with clients such as: American Airlines, the Colombian Coffee Federation, the National Institute for Alcohol Abuse and Awareness, ‘all’ laundry detergent, Spirituality.com and Zales. Jeff is the founder of VeriClix, the web’s only free click fraud service and has been a featured expert in publications such as Forbes and Revenue Magazine and is a moderator in Danny Sullivan’s Search Engine Watch Forums.
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