Black Hat SEO Digest

10 things every webmaster should know about PPC and SEO

I’ve been at this a long time and I figured it was time for a few things to just be said – and said simply so newer webmasters can at least be aware of the pitfalls they are going to face.

10. It takes time to rank with SEO.  If you are counting on a website to earn  right away you are going to need to utilize Pay Per Click advertising. (see number 9)

9. Pay Per Click is a great way to donate a couple weeks pay to Google when you don’t know what your doing.  One should not consider this a mistake to learn from.  One should instead consider this your part to keep the technology stocks high!

8. Dumping more money into a failing campaign just because you’ve already spent a couple weeks pay is a great way to repeat number 9.  Read the definition of insanity.

7. Spending small fortunes on “ebooks” about PPC won’t help you avoid number 9.

6. Paying SEO companies doesn’t exclude you from doing number 9. Remember it’s your job to keep Googles stock prices high!  It does however help the SEO company continue with their own practice of number 9.

5.  Search engine optimization is a great way to get visitors to your site.  However, you are dependent on Google for 80 percent of the searchers.  Regretfully they really prefer that you do number 9.

4. Your expenditures of time and money to rank well to avoid number 9 will only last as long as the current algorithm Google is running stays the same.  They track everything you do and will notice if you aren’t repeating number 9 often enough and change it.

3.  You may not have a choice but to continue to do number 9. At some point in time Google will have so much information about you that they may just blackmail the money out of you with out serving ads.  Don’t think your facebook buddies know it all.  Someone else is watching and they REALLY want number 9 to continue.

2.  At some point Google’s motto of “DO NO EVIL” slowly changed meaning.  It used to mean do no evil to anyone.  It changed (somewhere around the ‘we are taking over the world’ phase) to DO NO EVIL TO PEOPLE WITH OUT A COMPUTER – REALLY STICK IT TO ANYONE DOING NUMBER 9.

1.  This thing has been removed because it did not comply with our quality guidelines.  We regret any concerns this may cause you and have added you to the list of people who may never see the number one thing Ed wanted to let you know about PPC and SEO.

Cash in on your Competitors’ Work – SpyFu Ad History

Popularity: 27% [?]

Tags: 10 things, ppc, seo

PPC = DANGER WILL ROBINSON!

Disclaimer:  If you are loaded or something ignore this!

I got an e-mail a couple days ago from a brand new reader.  He had finally decided he was done trying to get rich quick and was following along with the 30 day plan so he could learn enough to really make it on his own.  It wasn’t our first communication and I’m positive he was on his way to making something ‘real’ and ‘lasting’ for himself.  I’d gotten the ” I made some money” mail from him as well.  Sure it wasn’t 10k a day or anything, but it was several hundred dollars off of a few hours work… and it’s probably going to keep earning him.

But all GRQ (Get Rich Quick) junkies eventually  have the monkey hop back on their back and screw stuff up all to hell. I’m being nicer here than I was to him in my reply…..

His problem:  HE WENT AND TRIED TO DO PPC WHILE NOT HAVING THE MONEY TO DO IT. 

O.K. not a sin or anything, but he spent the money he had set aside for domains and hosting and earned nowhere near enough back.

He had read up too:  Explode your PPC Campaigns in 6 easy steps,  and the Uber Guide, along with some reading over at Nickycakes, and Wickedfire.  I read most of those blogs too – but I DO NOT (repeat – do not) allow whatever the flavor of the day is to distract me.

What broke the man?  Well apparently this man REALLY REALLY wanted to get his hands on  Nickycakes Xbox (really that is what started it…. I’m not just saying it to mess with nickycakes at all).

So he made his landing page, picked an offer from an affiliate network that will remain nameless (No sense making a good affiliate program look bad), and started trying to do PPC for zip submits.  At a profit of negative 1200 he stopped.

All because he read that you have to spend to test… and I guess doesn’t grasp the difference between a couple hundred bucks and 1200.

Seems what really happened is he just didn’t understand the limits, didn’t keep enough of an eye on things, etc…

My take on PPC:

I suck at it.  You will notice I don’t talk about it much.  I do some sure – small campaigns that I’ve been playing with for years.  I don’t make enough to brag about and I actually lose money most of the time directly  (I make it up in later mailings since I’m always building a newsletter or something).  It’s hard work, and it takes you paying attention, having money to spare to test, and a personality that likes tracking, and paying attention to the small details.

If I have to use a spreadsheet to see if I’m losing 30 cents a day, or 3000 a day, there is a problem and I’m not happy.

So unlike our little buddy here (who is back on track) focus on something till you are good at it.  If you decide to go the PPC route – I gave you some links up there to help you.  Don’t come to me about it though – I’ll probably pick on you and talk about it on the blog.

(other issues I’ll behave promise).

Cash in on your Competitors’ Work – SpyFu Ad History

Popularity: 23% [?]

Tags: black hat ppc, newbie ppc, ppc