How to make money with Google AdWords ?
If you already know Google AdWords, you probably asked yourself "How could I make money with a service for which I always pay ?". In fact, you're right asking yourself this because you cannot directly make with Google AdWords, you pay to display ads. On the other hand, With Google AdSense you can make a lot of money.
So how can I make money with the Google AdWords program ?
You will make money if you refer other people to Google AdWords and they open an account and start advertising. So you will use the Google Referral program (included in the AdWords account) to set up your referrals to the AdWords program. Referral can look like this :
When people clicks on banners like this and opens an account, the referrer gets some money. This can be very lucrative, but since the referral program is not as money maker than the AdSense program, you have to put those banners where people will see them, that is, before you site content and your AdSense banners. If you want to use AdWords referral, be aware of that because it doesn't work well on all site. On the other hand, Google AdSense performs well on any website, and very well on a lot of websites.
Money you get when referring new advertisers
When an advertiser spend at least 5$ in the first 90 days (excluding the 5$ registration fee),
you get 5$.
When this same advertiser spend 100$ in the first 90 days,
you get 40$.
If you refer 20 advertiers who all spend at least 100$ in 180 days,
you get 600$.
All this seems very tempting but in fact, rare are the ones who get that 600$ bonus.
What is Google AdWords ?
Google AdWords is one of the best advertising system on the web right now. It consists of contextual ads (text, image, video) displayed everywhere on the web. Anyone who wants to advertise something can set up an account and start advertise the way he wants ! Ads can be displayed on the search network as well as any website using
Google AdSense. You can chose to pay for each click on your ads, or pay for a number of impressions of you ads.
Let's start with a little bit of story...
AdWords has been created in 2000 with some limited features. Advertisers wasn't able to create their campaings like they want, they had to pay Google a monthly fee and let them set up their campaign. Google then launched to possibility to create our own campaigns. In 2005 google introduced the Jumpstart service to help advertisers setting up their campaigns. Everything was not as easy as it can be today, so Google had to change their advertising solution to keep advertisers advertising. Now, in 2008, you can set up your own campaign in clicks, and it works very well !
First, AdWords for the Google search network
If you want your ads to be displayed in the right part of the Google search result page, you have to decide which keywords will make them appear. When someone searches for one of the words defined in your campaign, your ad appears on the right side of the result page... in fact, there's some other things to know, like the keyword's auction. In the example on your right I searched for "AdWords" on Google, and a lot of ads appeared. There is 2 places for ads on the Google search result page; top and right. In the example, there is ads in the 2 spots.
Not only your ads will be shown on Google but they will also be displayed on sites where there's the Google search box like this one :
 Enter your search terms Submit search form |
Secondly, AdWords for the content network
Ads can be displayed on a lot (I mean, a lot) of websites on the net. Every website using the Google AdSense program allows you to advertise on them automatically. You have 2 choices to decide how you want your ads to be displayed on other websites. You can chose websites, or chose keywords. If you chose websites, your ads will be shown on the websites you decided. On the other side, if you chose keywords, your ads will be displayed on any website containing your keywords.
Keyword's auction (CPC or Cost per click)
Because of the great popularity of the AdWords program, Google had to create the keyword auction. This "auction" is used to help advertisers to display ads in the top results if they are ready to pay more than other advertisers. For each keyword there's an auction. The prices changes every day. Price per click for a keyword can be in cents as well as dollars. If you have the keyword "Dating", you will have to pay more than 1$ to appear because there's a lot of advertisers who wants to advertise they dating site. On the other hand, is you advertise for "Kozlowski-Krajewska syndrome" (this is a rare disease), you will be able to pay 2-3 cents per click because no one advertise for this.
How I started my own dating site
How I started this site :
http://www.iseduction.net
I was wondering what I could do to generate more money than just my salary. I was thinking and thinking every day and every night 'till the day I decided to create a dating site. It was not my first website. I already did some for companies and for games, like
http://www.aidemyst.info/ (Myst & Riven help site).
(2006-05) Because I wanted to do it all by myself I started to put my ideas on a sheet of paper, putting more and more every day. I knew I was going to use the .Net framework 2.0 and SQL Server 2000, so I read a lot on the net to search for optimization techniques and things to care before publishing the website on the web. I then started to design my database, putting tables, stored procedures and so on. I then took Photoshop to design my web pages. I also purchased some icons and pictures on sites like
istockphoto to fasten to design process, and because I'm not the best web designer, normaly I design entreprise applications (my day work).
(2006-07) I started to add some asp.net code behing all that. It took me about 8 months to get something to work great. It took me a lot of time to make PayPal payments works.
(2007-07-07) I'm not someone who is very superstitious but because my site was ready for publishing in July 2007, I waited for the 2007-07-07 to arrive so I can put my site on the net at this time. For more sevens, I waited for the clock to show 07:07:07am :-). Everything whent great, I started to display my AdWords ads and traffic started to come in. My first strategy was to expose my website worldwide to see where people would came from the most. It appears to me that Africa gaves me A LOT more members than America of Europe so I decided to advertise only in Africa : first mistake ! In africa I can get clicks for 2 cents (that is absolutely perfect for someone who don't want to invest a lot in this). To be able to send message in the site, (int the first version) the user must pay. In africa they barely get 1000$ per year, so charging 20$ a month is a lot too much for them.
(2007-08) I then decided to advertise in America (USA and Canada) but It was about 20-50 cents a clikc !! That was killing my daily budget, so I was thinking what to do : turn into a free dating site ? invest more ? try to advertise on different network (other than Google) ? It's difficult to choose ! I was jungling with ideas, but for the moment, I returned to africa because I wanted to get some traffic, even if they don't pay, I wanted traffic because this is the heart of any working web site : traffic.
(2007-11) In my search of the perfect campain, I opened a Microsoft AdCenter account : second mistake. I lost my 5$ charged to open the account and never got a ad impression on the network... don't even think about a click ! So I closed it. I then decided to stay in Africa and turn into a 100% free to use web site : first good idea.
(2007-12) In the process of becoming free, I also decided to switch from SQL Server to MySQL : another very good idea. For personnal websites, I suggest you use MySQL because it is free and easy to use and performs very well. I also changed to design of the website. Everything has been changed. Everything ! I put some AdSense ads everywhere on the pages. I removed the paypal payment form, I removed some unnecessary functionnalities like changing the visual theme of the site. I remembered something one of my teachers told me : (KISS) Keep It Simple and Stupid. I helped a lot, because with less unused functionnalities, it is simplier to maintain the source code.
(2008-01) I uploaded the new version of the site. I started to see a real difference. I started to get revenues from the ads. I also put some affiliate network ads. It works great too. The only problem was that every clicks I got what giving me cents (1-5)... This is not like this I was going to be rich ! So I canged my advertisement strategy to Canada. I started to advertise in Quebec (where I live), paying about 8-10 cents per click. The revenues I got started to grow. Because competition is better in Canada than Africa, every click was giving me 10-90 cents : a lot better ! Don't pay less to get less, pay more to get more !
(2008-03) Now I get approximately the same amount of money I invest every day. The main source of revenue is AdSense but affiliate marketing pays a lot too.
http://www.iseduction.net