Some are more expensive, some work better with certain products, and others need to be
carefully optimized to see any ROI.
WEB DESIGN AND MARKETING SOLUTIONS FOR BUSINESS WEBSITES
352
Paid search results
Google has a lot of supporters and detractors. Some people dismiss it as a fad of the next
Internet stock bubble; others consider it the model of future business. Regardless, one
thing is for certain: the company has single-handedly reinvented how companies advertise
on the Web. Through its AdWords program, businesses have a way to promote themselves
to target audiences without making huge financial commitments, and websites that were
formerly too small to attract advertisers now have a means of serving relevant ads to their
readership.2
Companies are finding the medium so effective that Forrester found 91 percent of companies
???using, piloting, or expecting to pilot??? paid search programs, second only to e-mail
marketing, and widely eclipsing traditional banner advertising, RSS, podcasting, mobile
marketing, and more.3
Paid search results (also called sponsored search results) are really a two-pronged strategy.
When an advertiser creates an ad, it appears on the search engine results page, as shown
in Figure 15-2.
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