PayPerClick or PPC is a way to advertise to a specific group of people who are searching for your information using keywords or a keyword phrase. It’s called Pay Per Click because you, as a business owner, only pay for the advertisement when someone clicks on it.

The clicks are good because they’re clicking on your URL and heading on over to your website where you can close the sale and make a profit.

There are different PPC programs through various search engines and companies however the most popular PPC service is Google AdWords.

It’s free to participate in AdWords however, before you head over to Google to sign up there are a few questions you’ll want to answer including:

1. How many people are looking for your products or services? Keyword tools will help you find this information and it’s key to creating an effective PPC campaign.

2. How much will your click’s cost? Google’s traffic estimator will tell you how much it’ll cost you each time someone clicks on your ad. This is important because you can quickly spend thousands of dollars and if that’s not in your budget you need to design your campaign carefully.

3. Who are your competitors? Using Google, search for your keywords and pay attention to the ads that pop up in the right hand column of your search results. These are your competition. Study them carefully. Scan through the first couple of pages. When you see an ad that’s a repeat, you’ve gone through your competition. If there are more than 50 ads, you may want to reconsider a PPC campaign with those keywords.

Setting Up Your First Ad

Once you’ve determined the keywords you want to include in your ad, it’s time to write your first PPC ad. AdWords has a strict character limit. You get 25 keywords for your headline, 35 each for the next two lines of text, and then your URL. This means it’s time to get creative. You want a headline that captures attention and hopefully promises a benefit and then two sentences that inspire curiosity, evoke emotion, and motivate clicks through to your website.

Each PPC ad you create will be optimized for keywords and should thus send readers to a relevant web page. If, for example, you have a PPC ad selling a dog training eBook and people who click through land on a page that sells dog care information you’re not going to have the same conversion rate as if you sent them directly to a sales page for that dog training eBook.

Once your ad is written, the rest is easy. Simply log onto or create your Google AdWords account and follow the steps. Set your budget low, you can always adjust it, create your ad, enter your billing information and you’re good to go. Oh, one final thing. Track the success of your PPC ads. You can fine tune them for optimal results, delete them and start over or add to your campaign.

Website traffic is good; in fact for many business owners, driving traffic to their website is their primary business-building traffic. And while traffic may be all well and good, what you really want is targeted website traffic. You want the people visiting your website to be potential prospects. You want them to be future customers, not tire kickers or looky loos.

Here are seven effective strategies to guarantee targeted website traffic.

#1 PPC ads. Of course, not all PPC ad campaigns generate targeted traffic. You have to study your prospects and design keyword-specific ads that send traffic to a web page related to the ad. For a website about dog training where they have to dig to find your potty training information, you’re not sending the right kind of targeted website traffic to the right place. Send them directly to your potty training product page.

#2 Classified advertisements. Use the same advice and strategy as with PPC ads above.

#3 A squeeze page, opt-in list and targeted email messages. A squeeze page is essentially a way to capture the email addresses of people who are actually interested in receiving your information. True, they may be after your giveaway but that’s okay – they’re still a qualified prospect. Once you have their email address, you can begin sending them informative, entertaining and slightly promotional messages, all of which are designed to send them directly to your website – targeted website traffic.

#4 Article marketing. Article marketing is one of the most effective ways to generate targeted website traffic. When you publish quality content, and it gets published online on article directories and republished on other websites, you’re reaching a wider audience. The link(s) in your article and in your bio box can all send targeted traffic right back to your website. The more articles you publish, the more targeted traffic you generate. It’s a simple equation.

#5 Blog and guest blog. Use the same advice and strategy as with article marketing above.

#6 Social networking. Social networking can send tons of traffic to your website simply because people are curious about you and your business. However, if you’re strategic about your social networking strategy you will occasionally include links to your website with attention-grabbing posts or headlines. The result: targeted traffic.

#7 Comment on blogs and forums. On most forums and blogs when you participate and comment you can post a link to your website in your signature. This does generate curious folks who just want to know “who said that?!” However, when you participate in forums and blogs that are relevant to your website and industry niche, you’re sending targeted traffic to your website.

You can also try unique approaches like posting reviews on websites and directories for products related to your industry and include a link to your website in your review profile, for example reviewing on Amazon.com. You can post answers on Yahoo! Answers and you can post videos or Podcasts on directories and drive traffic to your site much like you would with article marketing.

There are a number of creative ways to drive targeted traffic to your website. Targeted traffic is where the money is. Analyze your traffic-generating strategies and tactics to ensure you’re sending the right kind of traffic to your website.

If you’re looking to build an online business, you can’t go wrong with affiliate marketing. It’s a great way to build an online income and work from home. It’s extremely low risk and it’s easy to learn. Here are a few tips to get you started.

#1 Choose an affiliate niche topic you’re interested in. You’re going to be writing, thinking about, planning and talking your topic for as long as you own your business, so it helps if you enjoy your topic.

#2 Choose affiliate programs that have a solid reputation for:

• Paying on time
• Converting visitors into sales (you’re sending them the visitors, it’s their job to make the sale)
• Providing excellent customer service
• Providing a superior product or service (one you can feel proud to represent)
• Making sure their affiliates have all they need to succeed

#3 Spend time researching your audience, researching keywords and building a solid content foundation. Content is what is going to drive traffic to your website; it’s what is going to increase your search engine page ranking, and it’s what is going to bring visitors back time and time again. The better your content foundation, the more affiliate sales you’re going to make. Content will be in the form of:

• Reviews
• Articles
• Reports
• Case studies
• Interviews
• Courses
• Audio and video content too!

#4 Make sure you have a marketing strategy that is based on realistic goals, a sound budget, and has testing and tracking strategies in place to measure success. Your marketing strategy will change and grow as your business changes and grows, so you also want to create a plan to regularly assess and fine-tune your marketing strategy. Tactics you may want to consider include:

• PPC
• Banner and text advertising
• Social networking
• Article marketing
• Newsletter/ezine marketing
• Joint venture partnerships

#5 Create profit goals and a plan to make them happen. Planning is one of your most important responsibilities as an affiliate marketer and internet entrepreneur. Plans include goals, steps to make them happen, and a system of measuring success. Plan to plan – it’s essential for success.

#6 Never stop learning; just make sure you take action too. Continue to learn about affiliate marketing because internet marketing is a continually changing field. There will be new strategies to try, new products to represent and new forms of content and content topics to create. Your audience may even change as you grow.

#7 Be patient. The internet is full of get rich quick schemes and they’re just not true. Affiliate marketing is a great way to build a business and make good money. However, it takes time, work and patience. Follow the advice of legitimate affiliate marketing experts, plan and take action. You can do it!

If you’ve chosen to start an affiliate marketing business, you’ve chosen well. This is a powerful business model with the potential to attain good profits. Take your time, follow your plan and you’ll succeed!