13 Deadly Sins of AdWords – Introduction

In the world of Pay-Per-Click (PPC) there is Google AdWords and there is everyone else. Despite the efforts of Yahoo (the interface makes management maddening), MSN (trying hard, but just not enough search volume), and others (Ask.com, Business.com, etc.), AdWords is the sheriff in town. Therefore, while these sins may be forgivable on another engine, they are deadly in Google AdWords.

13 Deadly Sins

The 7 deadly sins (avarice, gluttony, sloth, lust, wrath, envy, and pride) associated with early Christian doctrine were vices that would doom the soul to eternal damnation. The 13 deadly sins I will discuss are errors that will doom your PPC efforts. The sins can be divided into two major categories; fatal and injurious. Fatal sins are self-explanatory. They can single-handedly kill the effectiveness of your PPC efforts and send your money into a bottomless pit (Google’s bank account) never to return. Injurious sins will only hinder your progress, but these can be easily remedied and forgiven.

However, this post will not simply list all 13 sins so that you can take a cursory glance, have a couple of neurons fire and then take no action whatsoever. When I first read Stephen Covey’s “7 Habits of Highly Effective People” I read one chapter/week. This allowed me to take a week to implement each habit and avoid being overwhelmed. In this vein I will be writing about the 13 deadly sins one at a time so that you can take a few days to actually analyze your AdWords account and repent.