Google Adwords

Photobycate

Is anyone using Google Adwords to advertise there photo website? If so, what is your experience?

Thanks,

aerialphoto

Photobycate wrote:

Is anyone using Google Adwords to advertise there photo website? If so, what is your experience?

Thanks,

I have a couple of sites involved with adwords - not my "photo" site really though.

I've seen quite a number of hits from it, but nothing overwhelming. The only problem I've had is nailing down the costs. It seems like I started off at one very reasonable price for the keywords I included, then after a couple of months they went up, and then up, and then up again. The keywords that cover one of the businesses started off at $.10 for each hit, now they're up to $.40...from what I understand the prices shift with the popularity of those keywords. If your set of keywords yields a ton of hits then the price will tend to go up for you. It makes sense, but I'm not sure I'm seeing a lot of benefit out of that particular ad campaign.

For another ad campaign I am advertising for a smugmug site (this one). Since late last year my "ad" has shown over 42000 times and I've yielded 36 clicks to the site.

kygarden

I have one of those accounts and it all depends on what budget you set aside as far as how many times your ad appears and how often you get clicks to your site. I guess I've had about 200 clicks to my site after about a month - with a $40 per month budget setup on adwords. They show your ad a LOT from what I've seen, but you don't get that many clicks from all the times it's shown. Mine has shown thousands of times but has had only 200 or less clicks for example. I've not had any sales as a result of the ad, but I plan on giving it a few months to see what happens. If nothing happens, I may suspend it rather than keep throwing money at it. Of course I realize there are many factors as to why I may not have sold anything - content, type of person clicking to my site, etc. I just know it seems like everyone in the world has a DLSR these days and is out there trying to sell photos...so that probably works against me too . I probably need to try something more local and in person for sales of prints.

aerialphoto

kygarden wrote:

I guess I've had about 200 clicks to my site after about a month - with a $40 per month budget setup on adwords. They show your ad a LOT from what I've seen, but you don't get that many clicks from all the times it's shown.

The amount of "impressions" (how much your ad is seen) also depends a lot on your keywords. If you use a ton of common words to describe your ad/site then you'll get a lot of irrelevant clicks.

When I set up an account for our aerial photography business I tried to be more specific than just saying "Aerial photography". We specialize in mapping and photogrammetry so I tried to include that in the keywords, and I included words that would (or should) limit the searches to local clients only.

If budget becomes a problem and you get a ton of clicks with no revenue you can try limiting the exposure your ads get on places than just "google.com". You can configure it to show ads on google's search partner sites, and content networks.

For most of us I'm not sure just having decent meta-tags in the description is just as effective as paying for the exposure.

thenimirra

I started out using it, but gave it up. I got several hits but nothing ever came of it, and I ended up using the money I was spending on it per month to pay for business insurance.

When I'm making a little more cash, I will sign up for Adwords again because I'm sure every little bit counts.

Photobycate

Thanks All,

I was wondering if it was worth spending the money on this but I'm still not sure. Hits are fine but if they do not generate any money I don't see the point.

kygarden

I think it's worth trying, personally. You never know until you try. People blow/waste more money on lottery tickets in one week than you'd likely spend for a month or two of an adword account (depends on your budget)....so it's not like it's going to break the bank or something you can't back out of. I say try it out and see what happens. I figure a little exposure is better than nothing, even if you don't get any sales from it...at least people see your site and maybe pass on the link to others.

Photobycate

I'll take a look at it again and maybe give it whirl. You are right about those lotto tickets

Tampa-Photography

Adwords can be very effective if you know what you're doing.

It is also very easy to throw your money away if you don't.

I am a big fan of Peter Kent, author of "SEO for Dummies" and "Pay Per Click Marketing for Dummies" and I highly recommend his books to my marketing clients.

I have a book reviews page and FAQ's about pay-per-click marketing on my website at www.TampaBaySeach.net if you're interested. And I have shared more details in some other posts in this forum - just search for "Adwords"...

Photobycate wrote:

Is anyone using Google Adwords to advertise there photo website? If so, what is your experience?

Thanks,

Photobycate

Thank You Jeff this is terrific.

Tampa-Photography wrote:

Adwords can be very effective if you know what you're doing.

It is also very easy to throw your money away if you don't.

I am a big fan of Peter Kent, author of "SEO for Dummies" and "Pay Per Click Marketing for Dummies" and I highly recommend his books to my marketing clients.

I have a book reviews page and FAQ's about pay-per-click marketing on my website at www.TampaBaySeach.net if you're interested. And I have shared more details in some other posts in this forum - just search for "Adwords"...

Tampa-Photography

You are very welcome!

I love your work by the way - the urban shots are amazing. Most of our clients want portraits on the beach, and it can get a little boring from a creative standpoint - we often wish we could do more portraits in an urban setting (we have the urban settings, just not the client-demand!).

On a side note, I am not that familiar with SmugMug, but I'm curious (both from a photography perspective and from a marketing perspective) - are you able to go in and edit the Title Tags, Keywords, and Description fields for each page of your SmugMug-based website?


Jeff

Photobycate wrote:

Thank You Jeff this is terrific.

davidweaver

The best way to get more work is word of mouth. The best way to get word of mouth advertising to pay off is to shoot a lot at a lot of places and get to know those in the 'know' to recommend you. I'm getting lots of request for SXSW gigs at the moment due to hard work the last few years.

Photobycate

Thanks for the great compliment. It is always a thrill to get a thumbs up from your peers. Most people forget that "urban" has a landscape all it's own and can be beautiful when looked at as "human made" instead of nature made. I was out shooting on Sunday in a small industrial area of Astoria Queens and was just blown away by all of the color, texture, shapes, grunge-iness (not sure that is a word) that surrounded me. I had a blast and should be finished post processing mid week.

SumgMug is a fabulous place to have your portfolio. You can make any changes to your site that you want at any time. All very simple to do and if you are HTML or IT challenged like me you can get all the help you need from the experts here at Dgrin.com.

Tampa-Photography wrote:

You are very welcome!

I love your work by the way - the urban shots are amazing. Most of our clients want portraits on the beach, and it can get a little boring from a creative standpoint - we often wish we could do more portraits in an urban setting (we have the urban settings, just not the client-demand!).

On a side note, I am not that familiar with SmugMug, but I'm curious (both from a photography perspective and from a marketing perspective) - are you able to go in and edit the Title Tags, Keywords, and Description fields for each page of your SmugMug-based website?


Jeff

CG Photo

I use adwords but the number of jobs I have received only a few jobs from it. Not really worth it.