Every year many billions of dollars are spent to directly buy visits to websites.

There are several ways to do this but the most common are “click ads” or “pay per click” – Google AdWords being, as usual, the 600 pound gorilla in the room. In fact this is Google’s primary revenue source.

Millions of companies, world-wide, big and small, run click ads.

Should you?

Click ads have several advantages. They are almost instantaneous – you can be generating business within a day of setting them up, and you only pay when someone actually “clicks” – goes to your website. They are a superior tool for researching out your potential customers – who they are, what they want, how they search and what matters to them.

On the other hand, like the mafia, you have to keep on paying. No pay, no click, no visit, no business. In that sense they are like traditional advertising, as opposed to your organic search listings which can produce for years once you get high rankings, without spending a time – but it can take months to years to get there.

So, SHOULD you run click ads?

There’s no one-size-fits-all answer to that question. The answers do fit into a few general categories:

1. You should run click ads as a research tool and to find out if it will be worthwhile to continue to run ads.

2. You should run click ads for a time, until you can get high enough organic search rankings so you don’t have to continue to pay for to get visitors.

3. You should run click ads as a supplement to your organic search and other marketing efforts, because there is a positive ROI (Return on Investment). It will increase your bottom line.

4. You should run click ads as a supplement to your organic search and other marketing efforts, because otherwise you just aren’t going to get enough business.

5. You should run click ads as a supplement to your organic search and other marketing efforts, because there is some aspect of your business, some critical product or service or geographical area, where you just can’t compete for organic searches.

6. You should run clicks ads, now and forever, as your primary marketing effort, because organic search and other marketing efforts are just too difficult or too expensive, and because there is an excellent ROI for click ads, properly run.

Now that is pretty much the whole list of possibilities. Probably laying them out like that, you can start to see how to think about this. You really have to understand your business model, because it involves answering questions like

– How much business do I need for my business to be viable, expand, generate the kind of bottom line I’m looking for?
– How much can I afford to pay for a new customer?
– How much do I have to spend to get a new customer (of various types, or for various services or products)?

A lot of times when you start out you may not know all the answers to make an intelligent decision. That is where door #1 comes into play.

There is no better research tool than click ads.

Google provides in-depth analytics on your campaigns that help you determine detailed information like you wouldn’t believe. They provide for running “A/B” tests to compare which of two ads, or landing pages work better.

I am not exaggerating when I say this has revolutionized market research. Intelligently run click ad campaigns can, in two or three months, and for a few thousand dollars, find out more and more reliable information than you could get spending $100,000 and taking six months to do in-depth market research studies, surveys and focus groups. It can even generate new business and pay for itself while you are doing it.

THEN you’ll know whether the ongoing answer to the question is #2, 3, 4, 5 or 6.

Should you pay for visitors? Almost guaranteed, the answer is, “Absolutely, you should give it a try.”