Clix Marketing PPC Blog

Want some free expert advice on how to improve your Google AdWords campaign? Send me a few of the keywords youre bidding on, including the geographic location if you’re using geotargeting. I’ll critique your ads and landing page live on PPC Rockstars, at 4 PM EDT today (April 27). Send your info to david@clixmarketing.com, and include your pone number if you’d like me to cal you during the show.

A few minutes after Guy Kawasaki’s keynote address at the Search Engine Strategies in New York this past March, I ran across Guy signing copies of his book Reality Check in a booth on the show floor.

I said, “Guy, I got death threats just for Retweeting what you said!”

(I hadn’t really; I was just making fun of the fact that while tweeting and retweeting during the keynote, I saw several (many) Tweets that were sharply critical of Guy and the Twitter tactics he was describing. Some of these were pretty darn vitriolic, and several were written by well-known people in the Search business.)

Guy replied, “Huh? What are you talking about?” He hadn’t yet heard about the negative reaction to his speech. That few minutes of blissful ignorance didn’t last long.

The brickbats tumbled forth, some of them from good friends of mine, and people who have earned a lot of respect:

He thinks Twitter is a tool. I think Guy is a tool.

It’s Come To This: Hiring Someone To Tweet For You

Is Guy Kawasaki Singlehandedly Ruining Twitter? (Part I)

Guy Kawasaki Twitter Spam

Guy Kawasaki: Twitter Spammer

The Spam Logic of @GuyKawasaki

And read the comments to this Sphinn post.

Guy is a friend – a year after he left Apple, I was hired to manage most of the functions he covered. I was, and I remain, surprised by the extent and depth of the criticism. I think I’m probably missing something -

So in the interest of trying to clear the air a bit, on Monday, 4/20 at 4 PM EDT (GMT-5), Webmasterradio.fm will broadcast my live 1-hour interview with Guy. We’ll discuss  wide range of topics, buy mostly his views on Twitter and whether his Twactics are spamming the Twitosphere, or legitimate value-added promotion.

To get a head start, watch the full keynote address here, augmented by simultaneously viewing the slides he used (PDF), and then read the articles via the links above. You might also like to see the resources Guy’s assembled on the topic, which includes the Full Story of Tweetgate.

Then, anytime before or during the interview, send your questions and comments to me and/or guy – @szetela and @guykawasaki. If you want to make your tweets part of a threaded conversation (as you should), include the hash tag  #ppcrockstars in your tweet. We will capture and archive the interview Tweets here. If you’re reading this after the beginning of the live show, you can download an archive from iTunes and other sources – see the top of this page.

Tune in today at 4 PM EDT for my interview with Google’s Conversion Optimizer on PPC Rockstars. Is Conversion Optimizer the best-kept secret in PPC? Hear how this amazing free tool works, and how you can operate it to increase lower-cost conversions!

Last Wednesday during SES New York, we streamed a live second episode of the Drunken PPC Rockstars Roundtable. Fans of the series (all 3 of you) will recall that the last episode took place during the SMX West Webmasterradio Search Bash – where an attempt was made to position the Roundtable as entertainment for the party-goers.

Needless to say, we were not entertainment by any definition of the word – not just because a tiny fraction of the audience was actually interested in PPC, but also because the sound system was such that few audience members could actually understand a word we were saying.

So last week we adopted a different setting and tone: several PPC luminaries (and rising stars) goatherd round a table at Dave & Buster’s on Times Square, just after the Clix/aimClear SchmoozeFest party. This time it felt like an intimate gathering of friends, sharing a few (yes – just a few) drinks and gabbing about our favorite topic – all things Google AdWords and PPC advertising.

I will be live-Tweeting during the broadcast, which will start at 4 PM EDT today and go for at least an hour. Can’t wait? You can listen to or download the archived version here.

Thanks to my fellow Roundtablers from that night:

Richard Stokes – AdGooroo

Christian Wenzel – Pepperjam

Chana Hershberg

Michael Flores – Ardis Health

Matt Van Wagner – FindMeFaster

Akin Tosyali – Clix Marketing

WebmasterRadio producers extraordinaire Jorge Hermida and Jim Hedger

African drummer and drum vendor Hosea Ben Judah

And while I have your attention: want to win a free ticket to IM Spring Break this week, and help a worthy charity? Make a donation to Gilda’s Club and enter for a chance to join the Searchoratti on the beach in Florida.

Update: even if you don’t listen to the whole thing, you must hear this short excerpt featuring Grandmaster Matt Van Wagner jammin’ with Hosea Ben Judah. That Hosea and Matt in the photo above.

Catch Hosea featured on YouTube here, and at the tail end of this muisc video – Whine Up by Kat deLuna.

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• Marissa Mayer: Putting a Bolder Face on #Google: http://bit.ly/G7Uhw #
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• @keyrelevance OMG – I just realized: I haven’t had u as a guest yet! MASSIVE FAIL! Want to tape this week? in reply to keyrelevance #
• @keyrelevance <blush!> in reply to keyrelevance #
• RT @guykawasaki: SXSW agenda http://adjix.com/dc5e (see also http://sxsw.alltop.com/) #
• RT @storyspinner: New Post on SMG: Advanced Paid Search Techniques http://twurl.nl/0i4dlp #
• RT @aknecht: Interesting article: Do these mysterious stones mark the site of the Garden of Eden? http://is.gd/lfTe #
• My New Blog Post: PPC Rockstars Tomorrow: Stephan Spencer ( http://tinyurl.com/bvxzas ) #
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• @oilman don’t bother – instead, fire up “Blast from the Past” or “Monkeybone.” in reply to oilman #

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Tune in to PPC Rockstars today to hear my interview with none other than FindMeFaster’s Matt Van Wagner, the finest opera singer in PPC. Hear our prognostications on changes we think are coming in 2009, as well as our favorite new PPC tips.

Tomorrow’s PPCR guest is Scott Brinker, president of Ion Interactive, developers of the LiveBall platform. Tune in to hear us discuss – with some great examples posted here - the next wave in landing page design and optimization: Conversion Paths.

A special PPC Rockstars today: Landing Page expert Tim Ash of SiteTuners joins me for another episode of PPC Clinic. We’ll critique keywords, ads and landing pages for two lucky listeners, and provide valuable optimization advice that will help pump conversion rates and sales. See the resources here, and tune in today at 4:00 PM EST.

Want your PPC campaign critiqued by experts on a future show? See instructions here.

Want some free expert advice on your PPC campaign ads and landing pages?

Next Monday we’ll be broadcasting a special episode of PPC Rockstars (http://www.webmasterradio.fm/Advertising/PPC-Rockstars/) with landing page expert Tim Ash, author of THE book on the topic, “Landing Page Optimization.” Tim and I will look at audience-supplied ads and landing pages, and give specific advice on how to improve both.

If you want yours to be analyzed, please send an email to me at david@clixmarketing.com, with the subject line “Rockstars Analysis.”

Include:

1. 2-3 keywords you’re bidding on

2. The geographic target of your campaign

3. The url of your landing page

4. Your phone number

We’ll notify you in advance of our on-air analysis, and possibly call you for questions before or during the show.

Be sure to tune into PPC Rockstars today at 4:00 PM EST for my interview with Perry Marshall, “The Wizard of Google AdWords.” Perry’s been at the PPC game longer than almost anybody, and his books and resources started me (and plenty of other PPC Experts) on the path to PPC success.

If you miss the show, watch this page for the archive.

Join me and my guest John Lee of Hanapin Marketing as we dissect two PPC campaigns. Hear incisive (brutal?) critiques of ads, landing pages, offers and forms. Embarrassing for some – gold mean of ideas for others!

See here for links to the campaigns we’ll critique.

Like what you hear? Let us critique your campaign – go here.

Want some free expert advice on your PPC campaign ads and landing pages?

Over the next few months I’ll be taping PPC Rockstars shows with PPC experts like Tim Ash, author of the bible “Landing Page Optimization.” We’ll look at audience-supplied ads and landing pages, and give specific advice on how to improve both.

If you want yours to be analyzed, please send an email to me at david@clixmarketing.com, with the subject line “Rockstars Analysis.”

Include:

1. 2-3 keywords you’re bidding on

2. The geographic target of your campaign

3. The url of your landing page

4. Your phone number

We’ll notify you in advance of our on-air analysis, and pssibly call you for questions before or during the show.