If you think that the statistics regarding your affiliate marketing PPC advertisements are just a bunch of meaningless numbers, you need to think again!

Those statistics can tell you everything that you need to know about what is working and what is not working. They can tell you where your program needs to be tweaked, where you are pretty much getting it right….and so much more.

Sometimes new affiliate marketers just jump into PPC advertising blind. Without doing any research or any planning, they just choose to use all of the keywords recommended by the search engines, set no limits, and run their advertisements 24/7. That is a recipe for financial disaster. You can run up an advertising bill of thousands and thousands of dollars in a very short time and not sell a single product.

Learning to read and understand your PPC statistics is vital!

First, you need to do your homework:

1. Use the keyword tools provided by the search engines or a tool like WordTracker to choose the most effective keywords and phrases;
2. Determine the best keyword and phrases and place your (well-written) advertisements;
3. Then, and most importantly, learn to read and understand the statistics that are provided about each one of your advertisements.

One number does not tell the tale.

High numbers….low numbers….all kinds of numbers are just that….numbers…. and getting a thousand clicks isn’t a good thing or a bad thing.

A statistic is just a number until you analyze it and compare it to other applicable statistics. If you get a thousand clicks and don’t sell anything, then that thousand clicks just cost you a ton of money.

On the other hand, if you get a thousand clicks and sell 500 units of product, I want your formula.

The point is that by really looking at and understanding the statistics provided, you can determine which advertisements are producing the best results; on what days of the week; and during which hours of those days.

Then, you can choose to have your advertisements appear only on the best days and during the best hours.

This is one of the best ways you can get more bang out of your advertising dollar.  So, learn to read and analyze the PPC statistics, and then do it on a daily basis.

The next time you check your Google AdWords account, look for the new Quality Score column (or an option to activate it). The new column was scheduled to appear next week, but it may be released earlier. Google has been letting people know this is coming, but the information they provide is still vague, in my opinion.

You may have received a letter from Google outlining the new quality score criteria. It explains that they are trying to improve the quality of ads served to users by making improvements to the way the Quality Score is evaluated. (The Quality Score is important because it is used to set the minimum bids for keywords.) This new system will apparently give the advertiser the benefit of the doubt when the AdWords system does not have enough data to set the minimum.

According to Google, this is a good thing for advertisers – well, for some advertisers. They are expecting complaints from advertisers that see an increase in their keyword bids (and it looks like a fairly large number of keywords will be affected). But, they state that some keyword minimums will actually decrease. (These would be the ones that are new in the system, and will most likely go up when more information is received about the performance of the keyword.)

Google’s advice to advertisers is “Please keep in mind that you should always bid the value of your keyword to you – if your keyword becomes inactive for search, consider optimizing or deleting that keyword before raising your bid”

How’s that for words of wisdom!

The good thing is that advertisers will now be able to see their Quality score, where it was invisible before.

ClickZ News talked to Nicholas Fox, senior business product manager for ad quality and here’s the explanation received:

This is a change to the algorithm itself, updating what we call ‘prediction confidence’ to improve the accuracy in determining quality score in cases where we have less data,” Fox said. In effect, Google is becoming more lenient with ads that it knows nothing about, but could become stricter with ads once it has gathered some data.”

They also stated that it was the advertisers who asked for more transparency. I don’t remember begging Google for more changes, but I guess I’ll wait and see what the numbers show. . .

As a writer for Affiliate Classroom, sometimes I get to do those dreaded “other duties as assigned” that you see at the end of most job descriptions. And, I wasn’t too thrilled when I was asked to test some new software.

But I decided to be a trooper and give it a try.

The software was developed by IntelliResponse and has the power to dynamically optimize the return you receive from your AdWords advertising. Hence the name “Dynamic ROI Optimizer.”

AdWords gurus will tell you that when you’re advertising in AdWords, you need to use hundreds of keywords in order to get any results. And, you need to sort all of these keywords into the proper “Campaigns,” and then separate all the keywords into various “Ad Groups.”

After that’s all done, you have a LOT of groups to track, and the keywords can go on for pages and pages. This becomes a problem because it takes a lot of time to click through those pages twice a day (or more), and see what keywords are performing, and whether you have been outbid since the last time you checked in.

Well, it’s not a problem anymore with the Dynamic ROI Optimizer.

This software makes managing even the largest Adwords account quite fun – in fact, you don’t have to manage it at all!

You just automatically import your keywords (no manual re-entry) and then tell the software how much you want to make. You can set it for Pofit Otimization, or to optimize CPA, Profit Margin, or ROI.

Then, the software AUTOMATICALLY raises or lowers your bids to make sure your goals are met.

You don’t have to constantly check in – though you will probably want to at first because it will teach you what you have been doing wrong, if you watch its actions.

Anyway, that’s only one thing the software can do. And, I know some people are paying accountants big money to do this management for them. But now they don’t have to, it can all be done with just a few clicks.

The software has another valuable feature. It will track visitors through your site so you can see EXACTLY – at what step of your process, your visitors either purchase from you, or go elsewhere.

In my test, I found out that a lot of people were signing up for my free newsletter, but very few of them were taking advantage of the ebook offer on the Thank You page (you DO have a offer on your Thank You page, don’t you?). So, I re-wrote this page to make sure people at least moved on to the sales letter for the book.

I could go on and on with my review, but I’ll stop by saying that I’ve never used a software product that was so easy to set up, and gave me such powerful information and profits. You can take a look at a report and screen shots here:

Check it out, and see what you think!