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Affiliate marketers often hear of how much money a competitor is making from PPC.

However, done the wrong way, PPC can chew up all your available budget in a day. Done right, you really can profit, and profit big over the long haul, from PPC advertising.

PPC (Pay Per Click) is familiar to everyone now. It’s nothing more than those small text ads on the right that you see on Google or Yahoo when you search for something online.

The hope (validated every day) is that someone will click on an ad rather than, or along with, one of the organic results.

The sad fact is, though, that unlike a newspaper, you can pay, but you are not guaranteed placement. Ads can slip off to a later page or off the search site entirely.

Paradoxically, some marketers find that one the best ways to maximize their PCC dollars is not to aim at a sale at all. Instead, they aim at generating a relationship.

Here are four ways you can encourage your visitors to come back to your site:

#1 – Aim at Creating Relationships, Not One-Time Buyers

A person who clicks on your ad is, almost by definition, a good prospect. They are looking for something they think you are selling, as evidenced by your ad.

Suppose they do click and you hit them right away with sales copy and a picture of the item with its price prominently displayed. Great! You have made the product they seek easy to buy and they can make an immediate buying decision.

Now, what happens if you don’t have exactly what they are looking for at the price you’re offering? They will probably look elsewhere. You have just blown your one chance to make that sale. The money you paid to place that ad is wasted.

Yet by including an opt-in box on your site, you might very well capture that visitor’s name and email.  You can then build a relationship through follow up offers.

#2 – Product Reviews

When you shop for an HDTV, you want to know all about the product, not just its price next to a photo. You want to know the screen size, the resolution, and much more that will help you decide if that price is too much or just right. And you probably want a comparison between that product and those of its competitors.

Well-written product reviews provide visitors with that crucial information. The same ideas apply no matter what product is for sale.

Instead of making a sales pitch right away, think about providing more valuable information. People will be more likely to return to your site for that product and others in the same category.

#3 – Testimonials

Believable testimonials offer another way to provide great content for visitors who arrive from a PPC ad click. They’re expecting to be hit with a blatant sales pitch and instead you lay it in more subtly. Offer them trustworthy opinions on the product or service.

If you are selling an ebook, for example, both these methods work well. Unless you are a recognized author with a track record, you need others to brag about the benefits of your book. When lots of ordinary people say they bought it and are happy they did, you are one leg up on the competition. If a “big name” does so, you’re two steps ahead.

#4 – Get Opt-In Subscribers

Opt-in is a stellar way to profit from the majority of PPC ad clicks. Many people who click a PPC ad are just like you. They are not buying, per se; they are shopping.

The more regular subscribers you have, the more chances you have to put your pitch in front of them. A PPC ad click represents one chance to make a sale.

The way many affiliate marketers use it, a PPC ad provides a searcher with a way to purchase one product.

But by establishing an ongoing relationship, complete with integrating some of the above tips, you have many more opportunities to sell not just one product or service, but many: a subset of all searchers — those who are interested in what you offer. They are predisposed to buy your product.

By offering them information and establishing a long-term relationship, you turn a possible one-time buyer into a probable ongoing customer.

Following these ideas will result in more sales over the long run, and not very long at that. At the same time, you will stretch and multiply your PPC budget dollars. That’s something we could all be happy about.

NOTE: For more information on mastering the power of PPC and maximizing your ROI, visit ppcclassroom.com!

PPC Classroom will re-launch tomorrow, February 24, 2009 at 12:00 pm noon EST!

A lot can be said about the power of PPC Classroom, but the most impressive is that our students have earned more than $4.2 million since its initial launch in October 2008.

And they did that in spite of a bad economy!

PPC Classroom 2.0 launched in October 2008 as an online course and community, supplemented by training webinars and teleseminars. Since then, thousands of marketers have learned how to use PPC (pay per click) search marketing to earn affiliate commissions, with amazing results.

Take a look at this  webinar with the founders of PPC Classroom, Amit Mehta and Anik Singal; also listen to Amit explain his entire business strategy.

And there’s a surprise waiting for everyone when PPC Classroom relaunches tomorrow!

Take a look at what some of our students have to say about the impact PPC Classroom has had on their lives!

NOTE: Space is at a premium, but you can still get on the waiting list at PPCClassroom.com.

NOTE: PPC Classroom will be re-opening February 24! Get on the waiting list at PPCClassroom.com.

Around 1995, business on the Internet became a hope and interest for many. That was just 14 short years ago, and today, Internet businesses are booming.

The concept behind pay-per-click marketing is pretty straightforward. You select keywords, write your ad, bid on the keywords, and pay for the number of clicks that you receive, with the amount owed based on what you bid and the number of clicks that were received.

The more you bid, the higher your ad is placed on the web page. There are many ways you can use PPC to your advantage.

Here is a look at the top five:

#1 – Using PPC for Direct Sales of Products
Selling a product with PPC is really quite easy. As always, the first objective is to ensure that you bid enough on your selected keywords to ensure that your ad is placed high enough to be seen – preferably on the first page of the search results for your keywords. You select keywords directly related to how people search for your product.

#2 – Using PPC to Build an Opt-In List
Since you will be paying for the clicks, you definitely want to build an opt-in list, regardless of what the bigger purpose of running the ad is. Otherwise you will be wasting a great deal money paying for one-time traffic.

If you can persuade a certain portion of that traffic to give you their email address, in effect you get more mileage for your PPC dollar. In fact, some people run PPC ad campaigns for the sole purpose of building an opt-in list.

#3 – Using PPC as a Lead Generator
Many people confuse lead generation with building an opt-in list. They are not quite the same thing, although they are similar. When you collect opt-ins, it’s inevitable that you will end up with some freebie seekers on your list — and these are not necessarily leads.

To generate true leads, you will need to select different variations of your keywords and write your ad in a way that pre-qualifies searchers as true leads. You aren’t just looking for people who are interested. You are looking for people who fall somewhere between “interested” and “ready to buy.”

#4 – Using PPC as a Viral Generator
Viral marketing is a big deal on the Internet. What you must remember is that the Internet has no borders – no limits. It reaches far and wide, and it is impossible to reach your entire market all by yourself. You need help, and this is where viral marketing comes in.

PPC ads can send searchers to your branded viral marketing collateral, which can take many forms.  The simplest viral tool can be a free PDF report that includes affiliate links or links to your money site.  But you can also give searchers access to an online report populated with affiliate links, a free branded software download, or even a quiz or poll that inculdes a “tell-a-friend” script.
#5 – Using PPC with Landing Pages
Landing pages are great for really targeting your audience. You can have various landing pages for different products, but with the use of PPC, you can also create dynamic landing pages, with different sales copy, based on the ad that was clicked on.

The above are just five ways marketers can harness the power of PPC. PPC continues to grow and so do the possibilities for PPC and affiliate marketers.

If you understand the PPC concepts that level the playing field, even the “little guy” can compete with big corporations who have the deep pockets to pay for placement on the most trafficked keywords.

You just need to be sure that you have a firm grasp on what the purpose of your PPC campaign is.  That allows you to write effective ads that target the people who will bring in the revenue, as well as determine a workable budget.

Most failure with PPC does not come from not choosing the right keywords. The fastest way to fail with PPC is to not know and convey your purpose in the ad, regardless of whether or not you are in the top position on the page. It’s not just in what you say and where you say it – it’s in how you say it and in how it is understood that counts.

NOTE: PPC Classroom will be re-opening soon! Get on the waiting list at PPCClassroom.com.

After you’ve spent the time developing your PPC campaign and set your bids, the next thing to do is to sit back and see what happens. Just don’t get too comfortable, or you might lose a lot of money. Here are some PPC testing tips that you can try:

1. Watch your budget. The first stages of a new campaign can be intensive. Expect to watch your campaigns carefully during the first two-three weeks. And be sure you set your daily budget to a level you can afford.

2. Build a complete site with keyword specific pages.  If you’refairly certian the niche is a winner, create a 20-30 page site with content, plus specific landing pages that revolve around your most important, high traffic keywords.

3. Split test landing pages.  By split testing two landing pages, you can make huge increases in your conversions and thus in your income. Be sure to split test just one thing on the page at a time, and make sure your results are statistically valid. (You can use http://splittester.com, a great free tool.)

4. Experiment with a page that work in organic search.  If you already have a page, such as an opt-in page, that converts well with organic search, try this experiment, Test how well your opt-in page works for paid traffic versus organic traffic.  Do this by creating a duplicate landing page that is exactly like the one that gets organic traffic.  Drive a little pay-per-click traffic to it, and see what happens.

Theoretically the SEO page should not convert as well with paid traffic, but you never know.  Of course if it doesn’t, you’ve now got the ad and campaign all set up, and just need to tweak the landing page accordingly.

5. Optimize! After you give you campaign a little time to produce data, be sure to kill the keywords are that aren’t converting and put your money into the keywords that are. This is called optimization, and it’s extremely important.

Keeping your bid price high enough so your ads appear in the “sweet spot” for rankings is essential. In fact, avoiding the first position is actually a good idea. Some advertisers have found that the first position generates a lot of interest clicks that don’t result in good conversion ratios.

Pay-per-click is a terrific way to great targeted, affordable traffic, though it does take a watchful eye to get it right. But if you don’t overspend and keep a steady eye on what creates sales and what doesn’t, you will have found an excellent way to grow your business without being at the mercy of the search engine algorithms.

PPC Classroom will be reopening soon. You can get updates at PPCClassroom.com.