PPC Reference Marketing Management

Off the Pay per Click radar for a while, I’ve been busy working on a new project. It’s time to take a quick look around and blow the dust off the server..

While browsing last week, I came across an interesting site. The site is clearly designed as a promotional tool for the various interests of its operators, and indeed the commentary attempts to steer readers toward whatever they happen to be pushing. But the interesting side of the site is the commentary on their PPC campaigns, and how they approach quality scoring, keyphrase selection reduction, and how they ultimately reduce CPC.

Well, its day 2 of Elite Retreat, and for me, just another day at the office. For the Jam, its day 2 of yet more excellent commentary on topics including community building, buying and selling properties, monetization, arbitrage, and more. Keeping in mind that the presenters themselves have loads of personal experience in their respective fields, the posts just keep getting better as proceedings unfold.

In fact - the posts @ Pepperjam are LIVE, which means I’m reading these as each presentation concludes. Its not all that often I’m impressed, but these posts read like a hotly anticipated ebook as its being authored. If you needed a business case for attending - now you have it.

Its about time someone put the meat in the pie, and the Pepperjam blog is doing just that. No longer just names and games, the blog is giving us the lowdown on what is actually transpiring at Elite Retreat, including specific subject matter presented by the hosts. Shoemoney is their first speaker, and the topics are definitely worth a read.

Simple gold includes using crazy egg for landing page/heat map analysis, and of all things waiting till you have 1000 uniques per day to monetize (a good idea I hadn’t even considered). The platinum is there too, with in depth discussions on arbitrage, recurring subscription, and direct ad sales. He even goes into what was behind his famous Adsense check and how he earned it.

I recently visited Shoemoneys blog (one of my favs) to take a look at what he’s up to today. Lo and behold, his latest post was one of those no bollox types that cuts to the crunch. Titled 5 ways to make passive income on your Website, he’s describing the good and bad aspects of 5 specific methods.

He covers Affiliates, Contextual, Donations, Subscription, and Direct Ad Sales. These are only 5 of literally dozens, but he provides that all elusive lowdown we’re always after. He’s successfull enough to have a valid perspective, and his style, while unpolished, is far more informative and useful than most out there (like I said, one of my favs).

I decided to profile a number of PPC vendors/affiliates today, just to ensure the info I have to hand is correct. This is of course a major departure from what they actually publish.

In fact, sifting through the bullshit is like researching the latest & greatest SEO practices.. 90% waste of my time, 5% indirect waste of time and 3% a qualified ‘investigate further’. I suppose its like the old saying ‘you get what you pay for’, but still, I like to think theres a little truth in the usual marketing banter of PPC vendors.