If you are looking to gain traffic online, then there are many different types of platforms you can go for. You could try to develop traffic organically through SEO or head on over to social media, such as Twitter, to get engaged with users. However, by far the most popular choice is to develop a campaign with pay per click advertising. The next problem is with choosing with PPC advertising network to go with – in general, there are three platforms you can choose to run a campaign with – here are the main pros and cons to each one.

 

Google AdWords

Google practically invented pay per click advertising back in the early 2000s with AdWords. It is a dominant force for Google too, generating some 97% of all their revenue. The AdWords platform utilities the Google search engine, as well as Adsense publishers.

Pros:

• Lots of traffic – there are billions of searches daily on Google, aiding you to get the right amount of exposure your adverts need.
• The ‘heart’ of PPC – It is hard to say there are better PPC alternatives to AdWords, simply because it has been around for so long and so well optimized.

Cons:

• Can be expensive – there are a lot of advertisers on AdWords, which can make it easier than normal for a bidding war to start.
• It can take time to learn everything there is AdWords has to offer.

 

Facebook Advertising

Although Facebook advertising does not utilize a search engine, it is still a form of pay per click advertising where advertisers only pay once the web user has clicked onto the advert.

Pros:

• Facebook is a bank of information – due to the amount of information each user has on Facebook, it is a goldmine for getting the right people to see your advert and click onto it.
• There are billions of users on Facebook.
• Many different ways to target users – Facebook allows you to look at different ways of targeting users, such as age, demographic, geographical locations or even the types of interests the user has made clear they have (something AdWords cannot do).

Cons:

• Advertiser’s block – Facebook users tend to ignore adverts, resulting in a low click through rate achieved.
• Due to advertiser’s block, effort is most likely needed to keep adverts fresh to the target audience.

 

Yahoo! Bing PPC Network

In layman’s terms, the Yahoo! Bing network provides advertisers with all of the search engines, apart from Google.

Pros:

• Better customer service than Google. The customer service supplied with the Yahoo! Bing network is much better than Google, where you can easily contact support by email or over the phone.
• Due to the lower demand (due to there being less advertisers), the cost per click of keywords tends to be less than the same keywords in AdWords.

Cons:

• Traffic to the Yahoo! Bing network, even when combined, is still less than Google.