Ask.com PPC - 1,642 Click and How Many Conversions?
Well, it was a fun week with Ask pay-per-click, but all ridiculously bad things must come to an end. That’s right, after only one week with Ask’s PPC program, I have requested that my account be shut down and that what is left of my deposit be refunded.
Why?
Because after seven days of bidding on ask, we received 1,642 clicks and 6, yes S-I-X, conversions. For those of you who can’t do the math in your head (like me), that’s a whopping 0.365% conversion rate. And to put this in perspective, we expect at least a 20% - 30% conversion rate from our Google or Yahoo PPC accounts.
All I can say is I’m glad I wasn’t bidding the suggested $89 a click for my keywords.
Based on this experience, I’d say that if you are an affiliate in the insurance vertical, and you don’t like throwing money away, you might want to avoid Ask’s PPC program for the time being. I’m not sure where their traffic is coming from, but I don’t think it’s from Ask.com’s search engine.
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Comments
Do a little research into IAC and you'll get a feel for where the traffic is probably coming from. Why am I not terribly surprised with that conversion rate?
Posted by: Kellie | April 18, 2007 01:18 PM
Well, I just decided to throw away a small deposit on GoClick. I have a page that usually converts at least 20%, even on G's content network (when they get around to throwing me a hit). Since the bids were so low on GoClick, I figured I could live with 2% conversions!
Well, 400 clicks later, I didn't even have one click through to you guys, much less a conversion. I sat there and watch my stats...it went like..click, bounce, click, bounce....almost 400 times until my deposit evaporated. Lesson learned.
I am having some luck with a couple of smaller search engines - just have to keep the bids low, and not get greedy - raising bids doesn't tend to increase sales.
Since I have always concentrated on organic traffic, a couple of the smaller engines are good for learning until I'm ready for prime time.
I would not put GoClick in the "learning" class - unless it's learning how to go broker. LOL!
Posted by: QuoteUS | April 18, 2007 02:02 PM
Boy, sounds like GoClick is a blast :) I am happy to hear you have found some smaller sites that work for you QuoteUS.
Kellie, good point about IAC...I wasn't aware they owned iwon, but I certainly wouldn't want my insurance PPC ads showing up there.
Posted by: James Omdahl | April 18, 2007 02:14 PM
Agreed about GoClick.com. They are a completely waste of money. Spent over $1000 with them and just got dodgy traffic from places like Romania and Russia even though we selected traffic only from UK and USA/Canada.
Posted by: Nadeem (Azam.biz) | April 23, 2007 02:30 PM