My Buy Essay

Posts Tagged ‘overture’

Many of us who build websites get in the habit of using the Overture “Keyword Suggestion Tool” to do keyword research. It’s convenient, and one of the few remaining such tools that is free. Be careful, though, because there are four problems you may run into with it.

1. Singular and plural forms are lumped together. I once optimized a site for “mountain hiking” based on the search traffic indicated by Overture. I later discovered that over half of that traffic was actually for “mountains hiking.” Unfortunately, the search engines don’t lump singulars and plurals, so those searchers didn’t find their way to my site.

2. Alphabetizing. I hesitate to mention this, because it only seems to happen occasionally, but that makes it worse. Sometimes Overture alphabetizes search phrases. If you see “bag lightweight sleeping,” you might guess that the searches are actually for “lightweight sleeping bag,” but what about “hiking mountains?” That could reasonably be searched for both ways. Look down the list to see if other phrases are obviously alphabetized.

3. Misspellings are not always seperated. I searched “perseverence,” on Overture’s research tool, an honest spelling error on my part, and saw good demand. I almost optimized a page for it before taking a second look and seeing that the results shown were for “perseverance.” You can be certain that searches are being done both ways, but how many each way?

4. Inflated figures. Overture often shows more monthly searches for a keyword than other research tools show for ALL search engines. Who is in error? Hard to say for sure, but given Overtures other imperfections…

Overture’s Keyword Suggestion Tool is a fast way to learn if there is some demand for a keyword, and it’s still free. For serious keyword research, though, it’s best to look to other tools.

I can’t stress strongly enough how important it is for an Internet Marketer to know what marketing keywords they should use for their products, and how much their competition is willing to pay for those same keywords. This may seem like a complicated process, but it really isn’t. In this article we’ll discuss three free websites that all internet Marketers can use to find this information.

Let’s first talk about keywords… When I say ‘keywords’, I’m referring to marketing keywords. These are the words that your potential customers would use to describe your product. These are the same words that somebody would type in an online search engine to find your products.

If you have a business website and you don’t know which marketing keywords your website is geared to, then you’re website is certainly at a huge disadvantage. Why? Because you will be losing business. And you can bet that your main competition WILL know their marketing keywords, and they WILL be strategically using these keywords in their website and advertisements.

You see, when search engine spiders crawl your website, they’re looking for text in your website that can be indexed and used to describe the content of your website. If your website doesn’t contain the proper keywords that people use to find your product, then your website will likely not show up in their searches. So your website really needs to be optimized with the relevant marketing keywords that the majority of people are using to search for your product.

Another example where it is vital to know your marketing keywords is when using Pay-Per Click (PPC) advertising. Pay-Per Click advertising is typically done through search engines where you pay each time someone clicks on your advertisement (link). Your advertisement will appear after a user goes to the search engine and runs a keyword search (which is just a regular search). The search engine looks at their submitted keyword(s) and then cross references those with the keywords associated with the PPC advertisements. If they match, the PPC ads are then returned with the users search results… Go ahead and go to Google and run a search. The ads you see on the right-hand side of the screen are the PPC ads.

(Note: The order in which the PPC ads are returned are dependant on a few factors: the price you’re willing to pay for each click, the search engine used, the ad Click-Through Rate (CTR), etc.)

Let’s now go through a quick and free process for finding good keywords for your website.

1) Go to the Google AdWords Keyword Tool (https:adwords.google.com/select/main?cmd=KeywordSandbox)

Enter some key words into the textbox that you think people would use to conduct a search for your product. When you’re done, click the submit button. You will then be shown specific and similar keywords. Write down the ones that you think would apply to your product.

2) Go to the Overture Keyword Selector Tool (inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/)

Enter each keyword that you have written down from step 1, then click the right-arrow button. This will allow you to see which keywords are the most popular in Overture. Note: the most popular keywords aren’t always the most appropriate. For example, if your website sells guides on how to rebuild a 57 Chevy, then you will probably want to specifically target ’57 Chevy’ keywords, instead of the less specific ‘Chevy’ keyword. Why? Because you want to get your ad/website in front of the people that are most likely to buy your product.

The above 2 websites should give you a great keyword list that you can now use to optimize your website. But if you want to advertise using PPC, you really need to know what your competition is paying for your keywords. This is an easy task as well.

3) Go to the Overture Bid Tool (uv.bidtool.overture.com/d/search/tools/bidtool/)

Enter your keywords into the textbox, and then click the search button. This will return the Overture bids for that keyword. The highest bids likely get the highest placements &ndash meaning the ads are closer to the top position on the first page of the user’s search results. The goal is to get as high as your budget will allow to the top position to ensure maximum exposure of your ad.

There you have it… three great websites that can help your Internet marketing campaigns &ndash and best of all, they are all free to use!

Sincerely,

Michael Ellis

The Pay for Performance or P4P was originally invented by Overture. Overture observed that the internet was growing into a unique kind of shopping mall, where people could shop conveniently and easily and that advertising was gaining grounds on the internet. But now, Overture has been taken over by Yahoo and hence popularly known as Yahoo.

A visible and popular website attracts more and more people. It provides ads in other sites that link to a particular site can direct potential consumers and customers to that site thus increasing traffic and sales in that website. Yahoo provides a service using which it is possible to show ads kept in their websites when people input certain keywords.

Using Yahoo services, any willing website can have their traffic increased by utilizing the same. When more and more people become aware of your site, the traffic to your website would automatically increase. This in turn would increase the chance of people viewing your pages and products. Even if a small fraction of those people actually buy your products; that would still mean a substantial figure for you and your company.

It is the goal of every internet based company to get a high volume of potential consumers to their website. To accomplish this, the companies try a handful of methods to make their website more and more popular and make the people all over know about the existence of their services.

Yahoo/Overture is very similar to Google’s Adwords. Both of them use the same principle in showing ads according to keyword or keyword phrase searches. Whenever someone types in a phrase or a keyword in their search engine, the result page shows the usual results and along with it, shows the ads matching the search criteria on the right side of the same page. These ads in turn link to the websites of the respective companies.

As an example, let us consider that you run a car parts retail/wholesale site and you have chosen for Yahoo/Overture services, choosing some keywords that can trigger your ad to be displayed. Then, if somebody searches for Honda Accord, your ad might show up if you have designated that as one of your keywords. Using this system, you don’t even need to optimize your website with Search Engine Optimization methods and techniques.

With some labor and work, you can make your site one of the high ranking sites per keyword search and you would have the chance of your site being displayed on the top of the list or at least, on the first page of a search result, thus increasing your chance of people clicking on your links. This is a fast way to have traffic and visitors to your website.

However, remember that this service is not free. There are different ways in which Yahoo/Overture might charge you. They could charge in the number of keywords or keyword phrases your as uses or in the number of times your ad gets clicked on. Similar services might offer other features like having your ad show up on some third party sites, besides showing it on the search result page. You should look out for those.

Some third party supports placing ads that have similar content to that of the site. The more sites your ads are shown, the more is the chance of getting visitors to your site, especially, if the site where your ad is shown is a popular website.

With the internet being the largest network and still growing and which has shrunken the whole world into a global village, with online businesses mushrooming, it is high time to start advertising and surge ahead in this rat race of getting visitors to your site. Yahoo/Overture is a great place to make a start. There are many who have used Yahoo/Overture and have had great success. It is a market strategy which will direct swarming traffic to your site and that in turn will boost your sales and result in profit.

Often it is seen that to make money, you require money. But by using services like Yahoo/Overture and other such types of low cost or free market strategies, it is often possible to get overwhelming results faster and on a big scale. Many of the online companies have learned this fact the hard way. Your company should, however, not be one of them.

If your business is focused on a very particular, small market, you are going to love search engines. The more focused you are, the easier it is to win on the engines.

Search Engines and Small Markets

Once you have identified a small market and built a site, you need to start thinking about Internet marketing. Search engines present the best marketing platform on a dollar for dollar basis. There are two specific ways to go about the process.

Pay-per-click advertising on search engines is a great way to immediately reach your target audience. Google Adwords and Overture represent the two best ppc platforms. Place ads using these two platforms and the ads will appear on the search results for Google, Yahoo, MSN, AOL and a host of other search engines.

The second platform for getting in front of your market on the search engines is search engine optimization, better known as seo. The goal in seo is to identify the keyword phrases your prospects are using to find things. You then try to get your site ranked in the top three or four positions when the relevant search engines return results for any of the searches. The upside of seo is you don’t pay for advertising and rankings tend to stay high once you achieve them. The downside is it can take a couple of months before you appear high in MSN rankings and up to a year or longer on Google.

Regardless of the approach you take on the search engines, your focus on a small market gives you a huge advantage. By focusing on a lucrative, defined area of the Internet, you have limited the number of competitors you must take on. It is far easier and cheaper to market to “San Diego Mortgage Loans” than going after “Mortgage Loans.” The first phrase has a limited number of competitors while the second phrase is contested by huge sites with lots of advertising dollars. To this end, make sure you stick to your area when pursuing your marketing. If you offer services in a location, only advertise for keywords incorporating that location. Having a person three states over call you is just a waste of time.

Advertising for small, defined markets on the search engines is inexpensive compared to general markets. It is also easier and quicker to get seo listings.

Whether you are new to Internet marketing or frustrated by the experience, the concept is undisputedly a challenge. As they say, there is more than one way to skin a cat.

One Internet Marketing Approach

Before we get into a one particular internet marketing approach, we need to define what we mean by approach. Internet marketing is entirely different than brick and mortar marketing. The structure is composed of a number of factors including long and short term strategies, indirect branding marketization and traffic analysis. If you can master these subjects, you will have the right approach and be successful.

To achieve a better marketing approach, you must conform to the basic outline of every successful site. You need to realize there are distinct short and long term strategies, and that they mesh. Short term strategies are all about pay-per-click search engines while long term strategies are all about search engine optimization.

Pay-per-click search engines [ppc] have serious benefits and limitations. The primary benefit is they create immediate traffic to your site. They allow you to get prospects on to the site and determine how they convert. The downside of going ppc is they add significantly to your overhead and the traffic may be of middling to poor quality.

To properly pursue PPC advertising, you should stick to Google Adwords and Overture. They have the highest quality of traffic. When using these platforms, you should start with as wide a scope of keywords as possible. Track the results through your server stats to determine the specific phrases that produce paying customers. Turn off the ads for keywords phrases that don’t produce revenues. This will improve your return on investment.

Long term Internet marketing is all about search engine optimization, a misunderstood subject if ever there was one. The advantage of seo is you generate free traffic. This is accomplished by moving your site into top ranking positions on MSN, Yahoo and Google. No other search engines matter. As your rankings improve, you can begin turning off corresponding ppc advertisements. Eventually you will able to entirely eliminate your ppc cost, effectively converting the site to a free marketing position.

To nail search engine optimization, you must focus on the needs of your prospects. Your view or opinion on your product or service is irrelevant. You must identify the exact things your prospects are searching for and create or modify pages on your site to provide a solution to that need. To conduct this research, you need to do keyword research.

Wordtracker is the secret weapon of profitable sites. The site provides a list of the exact keyword phrases being used by your prospects, the number of searches a day and the number of sites competing for top rankings on the keyword. You can enter your primary keyword phrases and quickly see which phrases you should use to produce the most traffic as quickly as possible. You might be thinking you can use Overture for this as well, but Overture should only be used to determine if there is general traffic for a subject. It

Branding is a phrase used for Internet marketing by those who do not really understand the Internet. The Internet is huge, making your branding efforts a waste of time if it is your primary goal. The only time branding should be used, in my humble opinion, is in the form of indirect branding. This occurs when you dominate every keyword phrase for your particular area of interest. To do this, you should create pages for every need identified for your prospects. When they see your listings over and over, your brand is established. Put another way, branding is a secondary benefit of your marketing, not the primary goal.

If you pursue this internet marketing approach, you should reach a point where you are earning significant revenues and little for marketing. Put another way, you are maximizing your profit margin, which should be the goal of every site owner.