Expert Feature: A Different Way of Thinking About Paid Placement
I write and speak a lot about the search engines, like Google.
There are all kinds of strategies, tactics and things that you’ve probably all heard a hundred times before about how to get to the top.
Of course, there really is no “top” or number one position anymore, because the search engines – especially Google – are personalizing the search engine results page (SERP) for you and me personally.
It’s taking our personal search history, what we interact with, and who we know (through Google+) to determine what actually shows up at the “top”.
This is a good thing because the search results are more relevant to us individually.
SEO professionals hate it because we don’t really know what people are seeing in the SERP, whether our work is paying off, and we don’t have a good sense of the control we need to get up there.
The Only Way to Get Top Position These Days
One way of getting to the “top” that we do have a modicum of control over is paid placement or pay per click (PPC) advertising.
These are the ads across the top and right hand portions, and on some search engines, along the bottom.
If you want to be at the top, you just throw more money at it. Easy.
There are many strategies you can take to lower your cost per click, but that’s for a different article.
PPC is great, because you can get right to the top, for a very competitive keyword phrase. You just have to be willing to pay for it.
Unfortunately, many (most?) advertisers try to snag the sale at the moment the person clicks the ad.
They assume that the person clicking their ad is ready to whip out their wallet and insert credit card at that moment.
The truth is, the typical buyer really isn’t quite ready to commit to the relationship yet.
Usually people are kicking tires, doing their homework, investigating their options, and mulling it over.
They’re just not quite there yet.
If your ad, landing page (where the potential customer lands after they click), and all the copy is saying “BUY! BUY! BUY!”, it may be a complete turn off.
An Alternate to Selling
Instead, I suggest that you change your ads, landing page and copy to “woo” people rather than trying to hook them.
Instead of trying to close the sale on the spot, give them an option to get something free.
Give them a report, a video, a white paper, a coupon, or something else that has some intrinsic value, and in exchange, they sign up for your newsletter or even an auto-responder.
An auto-responder is a series of e-mails that are pre-programmed to send after some event happens, like signing up for your newsletter.
It can be an orchestrated sales pitches that include videos, testimonials, more information or even more free stuff.
Of course, from then on (until they opt out), you’ll send them your valuable newsletter, which continues the relationship for as long as they want it.
The point of all this is that your paid ads can be a great source of lead generation, and not just a quick sale.
Stop Selling, Start Wooing
The more you woo people with a soft sale, the more you can continue to market to them with your other material (newsletter, freebies, etc.), and then when they are actually ready to buy, they will.
They’ll appreciate that you didn’t try to just sell them on the spot (we ALL hate being sold to).
And with your follow-up material, you can build rapport and a level of trust with them.
I’ve said in many many of my classes, “If your potential customer doesn’t trust you, they won’t give you their money. You have to earn their trust, and then they might give you their money.”
