April 11th, 2007 by James Omdahl
Ok, so we didn’t spend a million bucks yesterday…but we very well could have. At least that’s what Ask is telling us. Let me explain…
In my continuous hunt to find a single second-tier search engine that can provide both quality traffic and conversions, I decided to open an Ask.com Sponsored Listings account yesterday. I must admit, every time I open one of these second-tier accounts, I’m discouraged by the knowledge that most likely the search engine will not have enough volume to make the account worthwhile.
So it came as a surprise that Ask not only has a lot of traffic, but has more traffic than both Google and Yahoo. Not only that, but the click cost on some of the insurance terms we’re using here at InsureMe are 8 to 10x that of those in Google and Yahoo. Based on Ask’s cost estimation tool, it looks like a person bidding in the #1 position for the term “car insurance” on Ask could expect to spend $1,061,800 per DAY. That’s 11,930 clicks at about $89.02 PER CLICK.
What? Don’t believe me? Well, here’s a screen shot straight from Ask’s cost estimation tool:
Amazing, eh?
Realistically, I’m guessing that this is a fluke in the Ask system. No one in their right mind would spend $89.02 for a click on a term like “car insurance” - and I have a hard time believing that Ask could deliver 11,930 (non-fraudulent) clicks per day.
Even if this is a fluke, how can Ask let their numbers be this far off of reality? I know most PPC cost estimation tools shouldn’t be trusted, but wouldn’t showing huge numbers like this to new/smaller advertisers scare them away? It just seems stupid to me.
Sometimes it’s like the second-tiers aren’t even trying to succeed - they’re just looking to churn customers until it is time for the next name change. It’s sad really.
Oh yeah, and if you were curious, day one with Ask was a total disappointment. We got over 50 clicks and ZERO conversions - on a site that should normally convert 20 something percent on PPC traffic.
I think I am going to start referring to these things as second-tear search engines…
April 11th, 2007 at 2:33 pm
Ask..not ..want not…
My experience was similar and what was even more fun was when they charged my credit card on the 24th of the month for the next months advertising. I got it reimbursed..but it was very aggressive for them not to wait for the 1st of the next month. What happens when your bonus is tied to revenue I guess.
This was last year, so I dont want to prevent anyone from getting their own taste of Ask. Maybe they have improved?
The ads that got indexed too, I found were on some interesting websites that I wasnt thrilled about. Its important to control where your ads show up as you may not want to be associated with some websites….
You may want to follow the military standards on this. I guess I couldnt resist sharing my feelings.
…dont Ask, dont tell.
April 11th, 2007 at 4:21 pm
Glad Im not alone Ken
Your credit card story reminded me, when I was signing up for the account I had set my max daily spend at $500. When I got to the billing section of the sign up, Ask suggested that I make a deposit of $9,000!
$9,000, yeah right! I wonder how hard it would be to get a 9k deposit back from those guys…