Earlier I talked about how to start your research on PPC competition by looking at the results in Google. We found that there is not a great deal of competition for the 10 spaces on the first page of results. Today I will cover how to make some checks on price competition.
First the AdWords Traffic Estimator Tool:
Vespa surprisingly is the cheapest cost range and the highest volume. The estimated cost per click is what Google thinks will keep your ads in the top three 85% of the time. So at 25 cents it is likely that you can be in the top three for “vespa” and “vespa granturismo 200″ most of the time based on the competition we saw — there were only 2 competitive ads. “Vespa scooter” will need a bid over 45 cents. So we can expect that there are many potential clicks for “vespa,” let’s see.
So “vespa scooter” is not only the most expensive but also not terrificly high volume. “Vespa,” on the other hand, had no retailer competition only bulk bidders — like eBay. Unless you have checked the results at several times during a day and throughout the week don’t take for granted that you saw an accurate cross-section.
There are no phenomenal places to find data on number of competitors — but here are some options.
- SpyFu — Data here varies widely. On the plus side SpyFu publish the date that they take their snapshot of results. So it is a good comparison to the data you see and makes an estimate of average click cost.
- KeyCompete — Some free information, more for pay. What you can get here are realistic numbers on total competitors in the space.
These two return interesting data.
- Vespa: 7 - 15 competitors, 407 clicks/day, average cost 19 cents. KeyCompete assess the top five as strong for the term.
- Vespa Scooter: 13 - 106 competitors, 8 clicks/day, average cost 28 cents. KeyCompete assess the top five slightly weaker than for vespa.
- Vespa Granturismo 200: Neither returns data. We know that there is at least one competitor here but it reiterates that there is little traffic.
In the next installment I will put it all together using “vespa” as example.
Tags: Google · SEO4 Comments
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4 responses so far ↓
Can also give Keywordspy a try. KeywordSpy.com is a Keyword Research Tool that helps identify what keywords competitors use, with results actually reflecting what advertisers are using at the current time. - http://www.keywordspy.com
Keywordspy Scam Alert!
Firstly I do believe the concept to use such a service is great. Finding out what my competitors are doing is really a good idea. Unfortunately the way KeywordSpy go about it just doesn’t cut it for me.
Firstly what made me signup was the fact that I could see all the keywords my competitors were using. This is great in theory, but after I signed up I found that most of the keywords many of my competitors were using were rubbish. It seems that all my competitors were using keywords that were not working for them. After I signed up I found that over 2/3 of the keywords I received from my competitors were useless.
Secondly I decided to signup was to find the keywords with little competition.
Sure they supply these but out of the few that were actually related to my industry, the analysis was way out of date. All the keywords that Keywordspy said only had 1 competitor really had at least four.
And the final reason for never touching Keywordspy, is they recurring charges. As a merchant I feel it is the customer’s choice weather to stay, this does not apply for Keywordspy. I only wanted to test it for the first month, so three weeks later I logged on to cancel my account. THERE IS NOT AUTOMATED WAY TO DO THIS!
Here is the email I received..
Dear xxxxxx,
We regret to hear that you want to cancel your account with us.
To cancel your subscription, please click the link below and follow the KeywordSpy Subscription Cancellation procedures:
We will process your cancellation upon receipt of the Subscription Cancellation Form. Please note that cancellation request cycle normally takes 3-5 working days to complete.
We wish to join you again in the near future as we continue to include and integrate more features in our system.
Please feel free to contact us if you have any additional questions.
Sincerely,
KeywordSpy Support
I have to fax them a copy of a form which is available on their website. The issue with this, it has to be faxed and can take 2-5 working days. Even if I was to fax my application across I would run out of time and be billed for next month. I am unsure of the law on this but shouldn’t the consumer have the right to email KeywordSpy and ask to have their billing authority revoked?
After all this I declined to fax the form and contacted my bank. They told me to send an email to KeywordSpy stating that they no longer have any authority to bill my card. If they bill me again my bank will create an investigation causing a chargeback to Keywordspy,
I am very disappointed with this and believe that the consumer has the right to choose, not to be forced into a silly scheme intended to cost even more.
Thanks for the heads up.
[...] year I wrote a 3 part series on assessing PPC Competition. Today I received a comment on one of the posts about a customers experience. I have never [...]