How To Make Money With Google AdWords

It used to be, back in the "Good Old Days" of Internet Marketing, that just about anyone with a copy of the eBook GoogleCash could make some money with Google AdWords. You simply found a product to promote from ClickBank, created a couple of ads where you linked directly to the vendor's website (marking your ad (aff) to show it was an affiliate ad), created a list of relevant keywords and then just sat back, waiting for those commission checks to roll in.

Ah yes, the "Good Old Days".

Well, the "Good Old Days" are gone, it's true. Now Google limits the number of ads pointing to a specific website to only one. The person with the highest bid price gets the link. This makes it almost impossible to do any "direct linking" anymore. You no longer need to mark your ads showing that you are an affiliate but nowadays you almost always have to have your own landing page where you direct your traffic.

In addition, with their recent update called the "Google Slap", Google has made it an absolute must that your landing page be one that is relevant to the ads you write and the keywords that you choose to bid on.

All-in-all, it is much harder to make any AdWords money today than it was even a year ago.

But it is still definitely possible to do so. You just have to work a bit harder doing your research before "going live" with your AdWords campaigns.

The first step to take is to find a hungry market. Most people tend to find a product to promote first and then they try to find the market to promote it to. This is like putting your socks on after you've put your shoes on. You've completed the correct actions but you've done them in the wrong order.

Next step is to do your keyword research to find the relevant keywords for your campaign. It is important to group your keywords into small Ad Groups which contain a common keyword or theme. You would not want to show an ad with the headline "Need AdWords Software?" with keywords like "adwords ebooks" or "find adwords tutorial". You'd want keywords like "buy adwords software" or "adwords software reviews" to match a headline like that.

To make this "common keyword" technique much easier, I've developed a keyword research tool called "Your KeyWord Assistant Pro" which makes grouping keywords into tightly focused groups (ready to paste into AdWords) a snap.

After coming up with your keyword lists you're ready to create your AdWords campaign. Make certain that your landing page (the webpage that you're directing your visitors to) is relevant to your ads and keywords or you are going to be penalized by Google in the form of outrageous minimum keyword prices. Should you find this happening, here's a technique to use to see if your landing page is the culprit.

Select one of the "expensive" keywords and do a search for it on Google. Make a note of the URL of the website that is in the #1 position of the natural search results. Then go back into your campaign and temporarily change the destination URL of your ad to the URL of the top website from the search you just did. Then proceed to see what the minimum bid that Google is now requiring. If it has dropped to a much more reasonable price, your landing page needs to be rewritten to reflect this keyword phrase.

To really learn how to make money with Google adwords you probably need to grab a copy of a first rate AdWords eBook. The one that's at the top of my list is Adwords Miracle. It covers the points that I've touched on briefly to a much greater depth as well as teaching you how to find products on ClickBank, write "killer" ads and much more!

There is definitely money to be made with Google AdWords today. You just need to do your research better and be prepared to create your campaigns differently than was required in the "Good Old Days"!