The Art of PPC: Why users click them

In the last class session, we learned about SEO and how it is used to improve page ranking in organic search result. As Prof. Kagan mentioned, another search engine marketing strategy is Pay-Per-Click (PPC). This blog post provides insights into PPC and possible explanations on why users click them.

What is PPC? According to www.wordstream.com/ppc, PPC is a model of internet marketing in which advertisers pay a fee each time one of their ads is clicked. Essentially, it is a way of buying visits to your site. The most popular form of PPC is Google AdWords due to Google’s popularity. The million-dollar question is, “Do people clicks on sponsored results?”. As a user who rarely clicks on sponsored results, the answer is surprising. See the infographic below provided by www.wordstream.com.

I was intrigued by the result and attempted to understand the reasons behind it. Below are few reasons why I think PPC is getting the clicks:

• The real estate of the Search Engine Result Page is skewed towards PPC

As we can see from the search result page, almost 85% of the Search Engine Result Page (SERP) is filled with sponsored results.

• Google’s purely commercial model makes it easy for users to click on PPC

Why click on texts when the items you’re looking for show up with images and prices?

• Bottom of the page Ads

Moving on to the next ? Perhaps these sponsored results are what you’re looking for.

In summary, it is by designed to have users click on sponsored results. After all, Google’s AdWords provides the bulk of Google’s advertising revenue. 

Sources:

• http://www.wordstream.com/articles/google-ads
•  https://www.inc.com/jeff-haden/how-google-is-killing-organic-search.html