Customer Reviews

Pay Per Click Search Engine Marketing For Dummies

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Unlike Peter Kent's other book called "How to Make Money Online with eBay, Yahoo!, and Google" this book is awesome. (The other book I just mentioned is NOT recommended AT ALL.)

In an easy-to-understand language (as all Dummy books are) it tells you how to set up and use Pay Per Click (PPC) marketing to get web traffic. It doesn't start off in the complete newbie mode like some books (i.e. turn on your computer, establish an Internet connection, go to a search engine...) It doesn't waste a lot of time trying to bring a complete computer illiterate up to speed (since there are other Dummy books to do that). It gets right to the nitty-gritty.

It talks about a lot of things I didn't know about PPC marketing and how to maximize the technology to get the most amount of traffic to your website.

Truthfully I'm not a huge fan of the Dummy book series and try to avoid them as much as possible since they tend to cover too much super basic information before getting to any real meat.

However, I've noticed that specialized Dummy books like this one versus the general Dummy books (like Computers for Dummies, the Internet for Dummies, etc.) have a lot of useful information very specific to the title of the book. It assumes that the reader doesn't have to be taken by the hand to first understand what a computer is then what the Internet is before understanding Pay Per Click marketing. It just jumps right in and that's great. I think I will get more of these specialized Dummy books in the future.

This book is highly recommended if you really want to understand PPC marketing which, if you've noticed, there aren't a lot of books on the subject out there yet.

There's a bunch of web sites out there, I don't know that anyone knows just how many. If you have one, and if your income depends on how many 'eye balls' are attracted to your site, then you may want to consider Pay Per Click (PPC).

I say that you MAY want to consider PPC, but only after you have optimized your site to attract the attention of the search engines. In fact, I'd say this book is really the second of a two volume set you need to have. The first is the same author's 'Search Engine Optimization for Dummies.' But you also need this one.

For the small cost of this book, you will understand how PPC works with all the major and several of the minor search engines.

Basically, the search engines make money by offering better placement to companies that pay money. On Google it's the list of companies off to the right and across the top. Do a search for 'printer.' You'll see companies like HP and Epson that want you to click on their site enough that they'll pay Google a few cents to be sure their names show up.

You may decide that PPC is or isn't worth using. But in order to make that decision you need to know the rules of the game. Here they are.

Titles in the Dummies series range from very, very bad to very, very good. "Pay Per Click Search Engine Marketing for Dummies" is definitely very, very good. Peter Kent also wrote "Search Engine Optimization for Dummies" which is also very, very good and should be read before "Pay Per Click".

"Pay Per Click" shows off Kent's talent for leading the reader step-by-step through some moderately complex territory. Kent writes in a clear and concise style, without a condescending attitude and, happily, without corny jokes. He walks through the concept of pay per click advertising, calculating ROI, selecting and bidding on keywords, creating landing pages (a very important concept), finding the right words for your ads (a very tricky) concept and then the pluses and minuses of the various services.

Kent truly does cover the waterfront of pay per click advertising. If you're looking for a highly readable and information introduction to the subject, this is it.

Jerry

This book is more targeted to get you up and running with starting a Pay Per Click campaign. This book spends alot of time with just setting up accounts with Google, Yahoo and MSN.

This is not a book if you have already PPC campaigns running. I would recommend a more advanced book.

If you're completely new to PPC and SEM, then you may well find some introductory value to the concepts and underpinnings of web advertising. It's certainly well written from that perspective, including 'Advertising 101' issues such as measuring your ROI. You're certainly not going to become a PPC master from this book alone, though obviously most Dummies books are not meant to do that.

The broader problem is that this was published in 2006 and the Internet landscape has changed considerably since then. PPC/SEM is significantly more competitive, and the strategies for getting your ads in front of customers have gone beyond keyword suggestion tools and building landing pages - and also become much more expensive. I'd be interested in seeing a revised version of this book for the 2010 SEM market.

I thought this book was very helpful. I had started a new job with no knowledge of PPC and found this to help me understand the basics.

This was a well written, easy to understand book for those who want to understand the world of PPC. It does however, need to be updated.

Unfortunately the information in this book is outdated. The world of the Internet chages so quickly it is difficult to get a book to market with current information in a timely fashion.

I had purchased this book only because I highly enjoyed the another Peter Kent's volume: Search Engine Optimization For Dummies (For Dummies (Computer/Tech))

Important to say, that at the time I bought this book, in my shelf sits more than 10 books on this topic and I run PPC campaigns for 5 years already. And the book with a title DUMMIES - if written by such author as Kent, are invaluable. There are gems gems gems inside! Sadly, that a real "dummy" will definitely miss them, and in contrast, those who might get a lot from those gems - experienced PPC warriors like me - will just avoid book, because of the title.

And here is what I need, to say. As you probably know, that Dummies books are usually annoyingly full of screenshots of how to make so commonsense things, like I wonder sometimes, why they do not force the author teach how to switch on the computer, before move to cover PPC or SEO topics.
And here is where this authors genius steps in.

- Thank you to Peter, that he avoided to copy paste half of Google Help menu, I can imagine, his fight with dummies staff on a topic.
- Book in fact is 3:1 in or 4:1 - it covers a topics what hardly are covered in other books on topic - like landing page optimization, website usability and even website branding and positioning - in context of PPC! All those pearls are thrown to readers under 'dummy" title, which I consider unfair to author.

Anyway, there is one of the best book as for experienced and same for dummies.

I have purchased the 2011 edition of this book and received instead the 2006 edition. I tend to consider an Internet year a "dog year" e.g. one year equals seven human years.This means I have received a 35 years old book....while I payed for a new one. Amazon has provided a refund but I am still afraid to try again.
Jorge