Pay per click (PPC) is an online advertising model
used on search engines, advertising networks, and content websites, such as blogs,
where advertisers only pay when a user actually clicks on an advertisement to visit
the advertisers' website. Advertisers bid on keyword phrases relevant to their target
market. When a user types a keyword query matching an advertiser's keyword list,
or views a webpage with relevant content, the advertiser's ads may be displayed.
Such ads are called a sponsored links or sponsored ads, and appear adjacent to or
above the "natural" or organic results on search engine results pages, or anywhere
a webmaster or blogger chooses on a content page.
Although many pay per click providers exist, Google AdWords, Yahoo! Search Marketing,
and Microsoft adCenter are the largest network operators as of 2007. Minimum prices
per click, often referred to as costs per click (CPC), vary depending on the search
engine and the level of competition for a particular phrase or keyword list ? with
some CPCs as low as US $0.01. Very popular search terms can cost much more on popular
search engines. The PPC advertising model is open to abuse through click fraud,
although Google and other search engines have implemented automated systems to guard
against abusive clicks by competitors or corrupt webmasters.
AdWords is Google's flagship advertising product
and main source of revenue ($16.4 billion in 2007). AdWords offers pay-per-click
(PPC) advertising, and site-targeted advertising for both text and banner ads. The
AdWords program includes local, national, and international distribution. Google's
text advertisements are short, consisting of one title line and two content text
lines. Image ads can be one of several different Interactive Advertising Bureau
(IAB) standard sizes.
Yahoo! Search Marketing is a keyword-based "Pay per
click" or "Sponsored search" Internet advertising service provided by Yahoo! Yahoo
began offering this service after acquiring Overture Services, Inc. (formerly Goto.com).
Goto.com was an Idealab spin off and was the first company to successfully provide
a pay-for-placement search service following previous attempts that were not well
received
Microsoft was the last of the "Big Three" search
engines (Microsoft, Google and Yahoo!) to develop its own system for delivering
pay per click (PPC) ads. Until the beginning of 2006, all of the ads displayed on
the MSN search engine were supplied by Overture (and later Yahoo!). MSN collected
a portion of the ad revenue in return for displaying Yahoo!'s ads on its search
engine.
As search marketing grew, Microsoft began developing its own system, Microsoft adCenter,
for selling PPC advertisements directly to advertisers. As the system was phased
in, MSN search showed Yahoo! and Microsoft adCenter advertising in its search results.
As of June 2006, the contract between Yahoo! and Microsoft has expired and Microsoft
is displaying only ads from adCenter.
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