Pay-Per-Click Advertising
Pay-per-click advertising, also known as PPC (or Google refer to it as CPC - Cost per Click), is an extremely cost effective advertising and marketing medium.
You choose which keywords and phrases consumers type into their computers on search engines and bid on those words to get visibility on the search engine results pages.
When someone searches for a keyword that you are bidding on, and providing your bid is high enough to be visible to the person searching for your products and services, if they click on your advertisiment you get charged for the click through to your website by the search engine.
The image below shows where 'sponsored links' or PPC ads are placed on a Google SERPS page.
If you are a new entrant into the market with a new website and you are unsure about whether search engine marketing will bring you new business with a sufficient ROI, then PPC advertising is the best way to start developing a search engine marketing initiative.
A PPC campaign can be developed in a short period of time (24 to 48 hours) and you will start receiving 'qualified' visitors to your website almost instantaneously.
It provides instantaneous results and enables you to analyse the
return on investment prior to investing in an SEO strategy.