Fun with advertising

OK, like I need another hobby.

I was playing with Google today, and saw the AdWords link in tools. These are the little ads that show up whenever you do a search in Google. I started playing with it, and decided it wouldn't hurt to drop $30 or so just to see the internals, so I signed up.

Now, what to advertise? Well, I've been trying to drum up support (i.e. users who have a vested interest in helping me) for my web mail client. So, I figured that would be as good as anything else.

You set a "bid" for what you are willing to pay for a click-through, and also budget the max amount you want to spend. The rates run from about 5 cents to $1, depending on factors like how well your ad matches the keywords you are trying to associate with.

Whenever one of your designated keywords is searched for, Google displays your ad...well, that is not quite right. It is also based on whether or not your current budget is already spent for the day and other factors...they aren't really clear on why they decide your ad should show.

I'm going for the big $1/day, so at best I'll get about 10 click-throughs a day. It tells me that my current click-through rate is about 0.25%. The Impr. field (in the image here) tells you how many times google has displayed your ad.


BTW, please don't click on my ad for fun :) I'd kinda like to get real traffic. If you're reading this and are interested in my web mail client, just go to alphamail.uoosl.org.