EBOOK DETAILS
File Size: 6.38mb Zipped, 9.86mb Unzipped.
Number of Pages: 205
Format: Adobe Acrobat (.pdf)
Subject: A guide to getting started with and profiting from Google Adwords.
Other Information: Comes with multiple free bonuses including a crash course, a quick start guide and a transcript on how to profit with Google Adwords.
ABOUT PERRY MARSHALL (AUTHOR OF THE DEFINITIVE GUIDE TO GOOGLE ADWORDS)
Perry Marshall is a direct marketing expert. Perry is a published author, sells a number of products offering marketing advice and also offers a marketing and publicity service for a number of companies.
ABOUT THE DEFINITIVE GUIDE TO GOOGLE ADWORDS
Before I begin this review I want to let you know my experience with pay per click (PPC) advertising. I had tried PPC once before reading The Definitive Guide to Google Adwords, based on a recommendation in The Rich Jerk’s ebook. However, The Rich Jerk does not cover PPC in a great level of detail and as a result I didn’t really have a clue what I was doing. I simply deposited the money in the PPC account, entered all the keywords related to my website that I could think of from the top of my head, created an advert and ran the campaign. Although, I noticed increased traffic and increased Google Adsense earnings – I was losing money, I wasn’t tracking my PPC traffic and I didn’t know how to improve adverts or keywords. As you can see although I had experience of PPC before reading Perry’s guide, I didn’t know what I was doing and I would definitely consider myself an Adwords beginner.
In Perry’s words, The Definitive Guide to Google Adwords teaches you ‘How to Beat the Learning Curve and Generate Instant Web Traffic with the World’s Fastest Direct Marketing Machine’. In my own opinion, it is an extremely comprehensive guide to Google Adwords (weighing in at over 200 pages) which takes you from getting started with Adwords right through to mastering the Adwords system. The ebook is split into the seven broad chapters; ‘Getting Started’, ‘Managing the Basics’ and ‘Making your Traffic Pay’, ‘Tools, Tips and Tricks’, ‘Your Questions Answered’, ‘Improving your World’ and ‘Further Help and Services.’ But how well does Perry explain the complex Adwords system?
Perry begins with ‘Getting Started’ which is broken down into the following subsections:
- Google Adwords & The Art of War: Thill, Addiction, Obsession Fun!!
- Why Google Adwords is So Important and Why You’re Lost Without It!!
- Building a Campaign from Scratch: A Step-by-Step Example!!
- Anatomy of a Real Life PPC Campaign!!
- Your “Getting Started” Ad Content Checklist!!
- How to Advertise in Local Markets!!
In this pretty self explanatory first chapter Perry explains how to get your first Adwords campaign up and running. By far my the most useful section of this chapter to me was ‘Building a Campaign from Scratch: A Step-by-Step Example’. For the campaigns I have started this has been my blueprint. Screenshots are included every step of the way and I found it really easy to perform all the necessary research (something I didn’t have a clue about beforehand) and then create my first Adwords adverts. When I want to create a campaign I just get this section on screen and then follow it – it really is as simple as that. I also found the ‘Getting Started Ad Content Checklist’ very useful as a summary to the chapter. My main criticism of this chapter is that Perry recommends certain tools & services that cost a fair amount of money – some of which are pretty much essential to running your Adwords campaign. Having purchased this ebook I wasn’t expecting any additional expenditure apart from my Adwords fees so I was a little disappointed with this. However, in general this chapter does a great job and is responsible for improving my understanding of Adwords and getting my first adverts online.
The next chapter is entitled ‘Managing the Basics’ and covers:
- Campaigns, Adgroups & Keywords: How to Break Them All Down!!
- Keyword Status: How Google Rewards You For Relevance!!
- Andrew Goldman’s “Goldilocks Theory of Good Ad Copy”!!
- Expanded Phrase Matching & The Power of Negative Keywords!!
- Turning Solid Traffic from Ultra Generic Keywords!!
- Google Adwords Cheat Sheet!!
This chapter follows on nicely from ‘Getting Started’ and explains how you can improve the efficiency of your Adwords campaigns. Whereas the main aim of the first chapter is simply to get your Adwords campaign running, ‘Managing the Basics’ shows you how to organise your adverts, keywords etc, so that they are more relevant. How Google rewards you for relevancy is explained in greater detail by Perry, but in simple terms more relevant adverts get better Click Through Rates (CTRs), lower keyword costs and better positions, so it’s definitely in your interests to have relevant adverts. Overall, I found this to be another great chapter. Perry includes lots of sample adgroups as examples to help you learn, and shows you how to improve the relevancy for all of them. I’ve applied these principles to my own Adwords campaigns (which have been running for a month at the time of writing) and I’m pretty happy with the conversion rates. I know that there’s still room for improvement but I’m pleased with the results after one month.
The third chapter is ‘Making Your Traffic Pay’ and discusses:
- Converting Your Traffic to Sales: The Most Critical Success Ingredient!!
- Your Most Strategic Number!!
- Perry Marshall’s Web Traffic Conversion Cheat Sheet!!
- The Importance of Tracking Conversions and Sales!!
- Hands On Conversion Tracking: A Real Life Example!!
- Moving Products Like Hotcakes, But Barely Breaking Even!!
- Using Google’s Conversion Tracker!!
- What are Turn-the-Corner Keywords, and Why are They Critical!!
- Value per Visitor and Affiliates!!
- Google’s Stricter Affiliate Policy: Why It’s Good News for You!!
- The Absolute Paramount Importance of Split Testing!!
With this chapter Perry makes a very good point about Adwords – Your traffic is useless unless you can convert it into customers. The most useful part of this chapter for me was the advice on turning content traffic (Google Adsense) on or off for your Adwords campaign as it’s not really something I had considered before. Plus there’s a great tip in there which will help you avoid a bidding war and save quite a lot of money, whilst sacrificing only a little traffic. However, my overall impression of this chapter is that it wasn’t as good as the previous two. Although it is well written, contains plenty of examples and is easy to follow I found that I didn’t learn as much from this chapter. The first two chapters taught me how to set up and manage an Adwords campaign – something I could not do before reading this ebook. With this chapter I already had a general idea of how to write adverts and landing pages that would convert (maybe due to my experience as a seller on eBay), and this chapter affirmed my ideas rather than teaching me any new skills.
Perry then goes on to discuss ‘Tools, Tips & Tricks’. This section covers the following topics:
- Google Image Ads: Taking Advantage of Another Great Medium!!
- Site-Targeted Adsense!!
- Tweaking your Account with Google’s Bells and Whistles!!
- Cool Tips & Tricks for Generating New Keywords!!
- The Power of Capitalisation!!
- How to Test Your Product Idea Before You Develop Your Product!!
- Special Report: Do Less, Earn More & Live Better!!
This part of the ebook contains a lot of additional information about advertising using Adsense adverts on other people’s websites, rather than through the Google search via Adwords. Like with the other sections of the ebook, Perry explains the material well and includes plenty of examples. However, I’ve not experimented with Adsense as an advertising medium yet, so I can’t comment on how effect
ive it is. Perry also uses this chapter to discuss the other tools Google offers Adwords users and offers a few more tips. Again, although this is a good chapter it just wasn’t as useful to me as the first two.
After this Perry goes on to answer readers questions in the chapter ‘Your Questions Answered’:
- What to Do When Keywords Cost $5-$10 per Click!!
- When You’re Up Against Stiff Competition: A Tidy Summary!!
- FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions!!
This chapter does exactly what it says on the tin – answers customer questions related to Adwords. Obviously, the value of this chapter is unique to the individual and the problems they are having. In his answers Perry conveys a lot of good information, but most of it can be found in other sections of the ebook.
The sixth chapter is ‘Improving Your World’ which includes the following subsections:
- An Unusual Application of Pay Per Click!!
- Shade for the Children: Feeding & Clothing Orphans!!
The above are bullet points are two articles by Perry which make up this chapter. Unlike the rest of this ebook these articles are not really instructional but still a good read nonetheless.
In the final chapter Perry goes onto explains sources of ‘Further Help & Services’ which includes:
- How to Get More Help with Your Campaigns!!
- More Tools & Resources from Perrry Marshall!!
- Epilogue: Restroom Confessions of a Millionaire Marketer!!
The beginning of this chapter contains a list of links for extra services from Perry. Then the epilogue teaches you how to build a list of customers and get backend sales. This was useful information and is a very valid strategy, but it was nothing new to me.
In conclusion, I would definitely recommend Perry Marshal’s The Definitive Guide to Google Adwords to anyone who wants to get a foothold in this market. I’m being completely honest when I say I didn’t have a clue about how to use Adwords properly before reading this guide. At the time of writing I’ve run multiple campaigns – some successful, some not – and achieved average click through rates of 1.5% and conversion rates of 20%. There’s room for improvement for sure but I now know what I’m doing. I can use the Adwords program to generate traffic and I can convert this traffic into newsletter subscribers. It is a big increase in spending compared with what I am used to, but that’s the price you pay for instant traffic. My intention when reading this ebook was to learn how to use Google Adwords to generate valuable website traffic and this ebook gets full marks because that is exactly what it has taught me.
GOOD POINTS
- The detailed step-by-step instructions with screenshots really help. You can implement the information as you read.
- There’s plenty of examples which again are a great help. If something doesn’t click at first, a different example often aids understanding.
- The ebook is really well written and easy to read. Perry provides just the right mix of instructional information, real life stories and examples, which makes the ebook really enjoyable to read.
- It’s great value for money. I’ve paid a similar price for ebooks which are less than fifty pages in length and quite happily done so. However, with over 200 pages in the main ebook plus all the free bonus Perry really has delivered.
BAD POINTS
- There are additional tools and services which you have to pay for. I wasn’t expecting to have to pay more than my Adwords fees.
HOW I HAVE GAINED FROM THE DEFINITIVE GUIDE TO GOOGLE ADWORDS
As I mentioned earlier in the review I’m getting an average click through rate of 1.5% and converting this traffic at around 20% Not only have I gained new subscribers but I’ve also learnt how to use Adwords – a useful skill that I did not have before reading this ebook.
Tom Parker offers many more free, impartial reviews of Internet Marketing products that have helped him succeed online at http://www.theebookcavernreviews.co.uk/ If you want to be notified when new reviews are added to the website then join The Ebook Cavern Newsletter at http://www.theebookcavern.co.uk/ebookreviewsignup/
(You may reprint this article on your blog, ezine, newsletter or website providing the article remains unchanged and the About the Author box is included and unchanged.)
Author: Thomas Parker
Possibly Related Posts:
