PPC stands for Pay Per Click - a popular advertising technique on the Internet. And can be very effective if done correctly.

You can find PPC ads on websites, advertising networks, and especially on search engines. PPC advertising involves sponsored links that are typically in the form of text links, text boxes or image/banner ads.

The cost of ppc depends on the size of the ads and the advertisement network the ads being placed into. The costs of the same sized ads on google are obviously more expensive than other smaller PPC players although lots of them are catching up. Google adwords is still the number one player in this PPC field.

Follow up:

On search engines, PPC ads are usually placed close to search results, where an advertiser pays a particular amount to visitors who click on these links or banners and land on the advertiser's squeeze page.

In essence, PPC advertising is all about bidding for the top or leading positions on search engine results or partner network listings --- more on this in the adsense, which is the opposite side of the game that involves well established websites which have organic traffic and use PPC ads as a good way of monetizing the traffic for the website owner.

PPC is also called "keyword auctioning" because advertisers are buying or bidding on keyword phrases that are relevant to their products or services - the higher the bid, the higher the spot on the search results or better quality of the participation websites the ads will be placed on. the more the people will find the ad (and click on it) to go to their websites.

Because advertisers only pay the bidding price every time a visitor clicks through the website, so PPC is also called performance based advertisement.

PPC advertising is also known under the following names/variations:

Pay per placement
Pay per performance
Pay per ranking
Pay per position
Cost per click (CPC)

PPC advertising is usually done with the following standard procedures:

1. Setting up an account with a PPC search engine and/or deposit funds.

2. Creating a keyword list.

3. Bidding on the ad placement, including the key words or phrases.

4. Writing out an ad copy.

5. Setting up the 'landing pages' for your ads.

6. Placing the advertisement in the search engine.

Done properly Pay Per Click advertising can be a very effective way of promoting a business 'online'. The key benefits are:

Get launched immediately. - As soon as your PPC account is funded, and the ads or campaigns are set up, they can go live simultaneously and your website starts receive targeted traffic. Some advertising networks will check the keywords and campaigns manually others don't require any of such. So if you are looking to set up an ad campaign on an affiliate product with a new registered domain or newly set up website which doesn't have any search engine rankings, this is a quick way to get things moving.

Obtain specific, pre-qualified, and quality traffic. PPC provides you with a well-targeted traffic. The ads are only shown to visitors who are actually looking for specific products and/or services that you offer - those who are more likely to become a 'lead' (and convert) and complete a transaction (either by buying your product or subscribing to the service that you are offering.

Widen your reach. PPC advertising provides additional traffic to your site, aside from the natural or "organic" search engines.

Like all things in the world, there are always two sides of each story. There are advertisers reaped millions through PPC and also there are people gone flat who never made through to the other end of the tunnel. A pay per click campaign needs to be well planned. Here is a quick check list:

Know your products and services you are going to offer. And know your customers.

Stay within the budget. Determine your daily or monthly budget; and stay with it. This means keeping your budget in mind, avoiding bidding wars if possible.

Track your ROI. All well established PPC search engines provide a script for the advertisers to install on their websites to track the conversion rates. This is a valuable tool in determining statistics such as return on investment (ROI), acquisition cost-per-visitor, and conversion rates (the percentage of visitors who are converted into customers or leads).

Bid just right. Know how to bid right - a bid that is too high can exhaust all of your money, while a bid that is too low can make you lose that spot. When it comes to this, there are certainly tricks of the trade. It depends on which PPC search engine you are advertising with, the rules can be different. Considering the wide choices of search engines out there, I'd say read the guidelines from the provider to decide your bidding strategy.

Watch the bottom line. Measure your profit margin against your spending or expenses. Know when to stop and terminate your PPC program - if you spend more on advertising but have little or no sales at all.

Find the right keywords. Decide which keyword phrases to bid for. Do some keyword research, either by actually looking at existing search terms or with the use of online keyword suggestion tools, to know which terms are mostly used when searching for items that are related to your business. Focus on specific keywords, not on general ones.

Write effective ads. There are several approaches to this:

Discount offers
Testimonials
Celebrity/famous endorsers
Money-back guarantees
Free trials or sample offers
Freebies
Major benefits ("Lose weight")
Direct instructions ("Click here")

Professional copywriting is essential to the success of your internet business, hire a professional if you have the budget, or read more under article marketing section for useful tips and become a professional yourself.

Maintain a professional-looking site. Update your website regularly and check for spelling and grammatical errors, broken links or images.

The website should be user friendly without fancy graphics and flash animations. Place a 3 min attention grabbing video on your squeeze page if that explains the purpose of your products, avoid anything longer than a few minutes. They get shut down more than they get watched as the internet market is a fickle place and people's attention span is shot.

Always include contact details will not only create a good impression among potential customers but also necessary if you offer products and services.

Last but not least, Find yourself a good web host provider. You can read more on the importance of finding yourself a good web host under webhost section, it can really make or break your business as a website is the only presentation your prospects can see on the internet. This is also the very thing that makes the internet the century's greatest invention because it is a such a competitive field and equalizer that it provides an invididual the same attacking weapons which are available to a fortune 500 company.