Week 1 - MKTG 349 - AdWords

Today in class we got an overview of Google's AdWords and how it works.  AdWords is a very powerful tool that allows users to market themselves, their company, and/or a product or service they may have.  AdWords work by offering users the opportunity to advertise through Google's search engine as well as their partnering companies.  This powerful tool seems to be the future of marketing, and falls under the concept of inbound marketing, which is something that I learned in my Marketing 348 class.  The idea behind inbound marketing is to create awareness without interrupting any sort of medium.  For example, when you go on YouTube to watch a video, you typically have to sit through an advertisement before you can watch the video you wanted to see in the first place.  That sort of obnoxious advertising is traditional marketing.

Going back to my Marketing 348 class, there are two types of marketing: Traditional and Inbound.  Both my Marketing 348 and 349 classes seem to focus on Inbound Marketing.  After reading getting an introduction to Adwords and reading through some of the AdWords introductory links, I can really see a parallel between inbound marketing and the AdWords.  The whole idea behind AdWords is to create awareness without creating a nuisance.  AdWords is a great investment for people and businesses looking to create awareness.  I say its an investment because you do have to put money into AdWords.

AdWords charges account users per click, meaning for every time another user sees your ad, and clicks on the link, you get charged a certain amount of money that was previously determined by the account user.  AdWords tracks many other metrics besides clicks, one in particular is CTR, or click through rate.  Click through rate is the tracking of how many people not only saw your ad, but how many actually clicked on the link to view the website.  You can view the CTR through specific keywords, ad groups, and the entire campaign as a whole.  According to the AdWords introductory website a good CTR rate is 1% or higher.