Pay Per Click Conundrum – Google the cash hole ?
Every month some prognosticator predicts yet again the demise of Google. It seems like a repeat of when they used to say the same about apple. So what would justify something like this : Don’t by Google Advertising!
Google accountants, who cheer in glee, as Google revenue continues its relentless climb would not even dignify this with a response. And yet Yahoo executives, who know who is eating into their ad share revenue would glumly agree. Google’s Adword advertising model is absolutely roaring along.
Would Google’s popularity hurt the customers? No, its a win win for them with more advertisers, more choices and google pumping more resources into faster servers etc. How would this work at a auto or car auction if the bidding area was suddenly flooded with triple the number of bidders. Bidders who perhaps stopped off on their way to a casino ? Would the trucks be cheaper or more expensive?
If you normally have 1200 potential buyers at your saturday afternoon car auction then one bright saturday afternoon 40 additional bus loads of happy go lucky gamblers stop by on their way to the casino, do you think that your cars going to be auctioned for higher or lower prices?
You truly hope that they beeline for the bus doors immediately afterwards, because if they wander over to join the auction, the prices of all autos will go up, up, up. And was this good for you or the Auctioneers? You already know the answer to that one.
If those cash rich players on the way to the local casino actually don’t spend all their time in the bathroom, they are likely to bid on a few cars just for the hell of joining a live gambling arena.
If more than a few of those guys don’t head right back for the bus, you and your bidding budders are going to have some cash rich competition who won’t even listen and smell the exhaust or kick the tires a bit. They are simply going to stand there and bid.
Deep pocketed bidders without a sense of ROI can bid certain keywords to near unreasonable prices.
How about paying 10 dollars per click for the keyword “marketing”? A little too expensive right? ( and broad while you’re at it, lol ) Just 101 clicks later and you have topped the magic thousand dollar mark. I hope you have a real expensive product to sell, ha ha.
Having fun yet?
Suppose I told you that while a few of us having been noticing this trend lately, that a few guys have been taking action. A few weeks ago, while consulting for a real estate friend, Randy, I noticed that over 40 real estate brokers were bidding in Google for 3 key phrases and almost no one in Yahoo.
By Friday of the same week, Google was reporting over 9,000 searches on just 3 related key phrases – Fly condo, Fly Condos and Fly Condos Toronto.
Not only did the competing real estate agents bid the Google prices above the dollar mark, but they also clicked on each others ads by the thousands. I know this because several of them filled in my form after clicking on my ads too. In the meantime, my Yahoo costs stayed serenely under 15 cents per click.