Alternatives to Google Adwords for Getting More Traffic and More Customers

Many small businesses have reaped significant benefits in the early 2000’s by using Google Pay Per Click (PPC) AdWords. Some also supplemented these  PPC campaigns with the PPC programs offered by Yahoo and Microsoft  (Bing). In the early part of the millennium, these PPC programs were a great idea, and they may be a great idea still for some businesses. However PPC pricing has become higher by as much as 100% or even more due to competitive bidding. The keywords that are being sold per click are actually auctioned, and the greater the demand for specific keywords, the higher the price goes. In some cases, businesses that started in the early 2000’s and relied on Google AdWords for their customer base have seen their budgets double and triple, and for many this was no longer sustainable. Businesses cannot spend more for advertising than their net income, yet this was the situation being faced by many businesses after 2011, when prices for most keywords have doubled or tripled over their cost a decade earlier.

Many businesses responded by hiring experts to optimize their campaigns including the text of the ads and the content of their sites. The problem is that almost every business using a pay-per-click program has been using the same tactics.

However there is a solution. There are many ways to substitute or replace Google AdWords or at least reduce AdWords use and supplement this advertising with other methods. The methods have been well documented and work for all kinds of businesses. This is particularly important in areas such as law, real estate, and financial service, all of which have extremely expensive costs per click on Google AdWords. Rather than trying one of these techniques, it is best to adopt most of them. Some of them cost time and others cost money, depending on how comfortable you and your employees are with doing these steps on your own as well as your collective writing skills. These techniques involve generating organic legitimate traffic from people who are looking for the kinds of goods and services you actually provide. They do require a great deal of effort and skill, either yours, your employees, or consultants like us that can be hired by the hour.

1. Add content to your website at least five times a week.
   Google rates the quality of websites by many different measurements, but after their updates, of the last few years, content is the most important factor determining how high your website will rank organically for your given keywords in your location. The amount of timely content that is added on a weekly basis is measured and your website is ranked by blog importance. If you can get comments on your pages and articles, all the better because that counts as fresh content too. Content must be well-written as well as related to the keywords of your goods or services. Google has algorithms that reduce your rank for poor writing as well as writing that is copied from other sites or sources. Google indexes all text, and if your site has copied material, it is penalized with a duplicate content penalty. If you have a talent for writing that is great, if not, get an employee to write. Some companies have no resources on staff, and they should hire a copywriter. Our firm has copywriters and copyeditors on staff, and we are willing to write on any topic you can think of.
2. Stumbleupon Paid Traffic.
   Stumbleupon has a pay-per-click advertising method that is keyword based and is a lot cheaper than Google Adwords PPC. As a supplement to writing more content for your site you can get traffic  from Stumbleupon. We have used Stumbleupon for our own traffic needs and we recommend it for yours. Our firm is capable of organizing such a campaign for you and can do so immediately.
3. Press Releases through Reuters.
   Press releases take your best and most relevant content and put it in front of reporters everywhere. Make the content excellent because editors of major and minor newspapers and magazines are always looking for interesting free content. We can write and submit this content for you. We have experience writing and have success with PR Newswire as well as the relationships with them and reporters that can wind up in placement for you.

With these three techniques, we can transform your business to one that is leaking cash to Google to one that is sustainable and can get customers without ransoming all of your income to Google. Find out more now by calling us today at 646-853-0573.