There are 4 reasons why I tell my clients to avoid Pay-Per-Click (PPC) programs.

Organic vs. PPC: Depending on the study, only 15%-20% of search engine users click on the sponsored ads, as there is a known bias towards clicking on advertisements. Of the people that do click on the ads, the very expensive ads on the top of the page get the lion share of the clicks. The vast majority of searchers prefer the organic search results.

Click Fraud: Most pay-per-click programs come with a management fee, where a company receives a percentage of the click revenue as their fee. In my mind this creates a conflict of interest, as the company has an incentive to get you as many clicks as possible. The other model often used is the “click guarantee” where a company guarantees a certain amount of click thrus for a set price. With this model, a company could bid very low say 2 cents a click and then have a bank of computers in Bangladesh click on your ad. It’s easy to see why online advertising is such a profitable venture for the online yellow page companies. Amazingly, these companies always meet their guarantee, while the client rarely if ever gets any calls or clients. Finally, your ad will be clicked on by competitors and salespeople constantly.

Google Syndication: Please look at the Google ad on the left hand side of my BLOG. As I write this post, an attorney from Minnesota is “advertising” on my BLOG. If you click on the ad, I make money!!! Why in the world would an attorney in Minnesota be advertising on an Arizona Lawyer Marketing BLOG. Well, chances are the attorney signed up for a click guarantee program, where he was promised a certain number of clicks based on selected keywords. In order to reach the desired number of clicks, Google finds it necessary to syndicate the ad to websites like mine that contain those same keywords. Because of this, a number of domain parking sites like www.personalinjurylaw.com have sprouted up, where the sole purpose is to capture Google adwords revenue. The end result shortchanges advertisers who will receive lower quality clicks as a result of these practices.

Key Word Exaggeration! (This is my word-should I copyright?). Key Word exaggeration is how most people are sold on the internet. Sales people will often quote staggering traffic figures for keyword phrases like “Los Angeles Personal Injury Lawyer” that they get from the search engines. For example, in January ’07 Yahoo advertising says 2687 searchers typed in that exact phrase! at It is no wonder why so many PPC advertisers throw money at this phrase and other vanity phrases like it. But the reality is that the majority of search engine traffic in the legal field comes from long tail searches—searches that are unique and are rarely repeated. How do I know? I have access to the traffic reports of thousands of legal websites. For example, in Los Angeles we have the top two websites that rank for the phrase “Los Angeles Personal Injury Lawyer”. In a week those two sites might get one visitor who types in that exact phrase. Variations of the phrase may yield 4 on a good week. The good news is that each site receives traffic from over 140 other unique searches in a given week thanks to their optimized content. So what about all those sites that are doing PPC for that phrase and getting tons of hits but few calls? My theory; various forms of Click Fraud, Ad Syndication, and Keyword Exaggeration.

The bottom line is that attorneys should stay away from PPC programs until they become more transparent and click fraud is eliminated.