How to advertise on Google without a website

October 27, 2011

For years it’s never really been an option to advertise your business online without actually having a website to direct visitors to. Why would you want to I hear you ask? Well, perhaps you run a small bakery business where you don’t necessarily need a website yet you still want to show up when visitors search for ‘bakery in bournemouth’.

Thanks to the new advertising service launched by Google, AdWords Express, it’s now possible to send visitors to your free Google Places page. Google Places is a business listing service which allows you to add contact information, opening hours, photos, reviews etc. for your business. For a demo, check out the Media Lounge Google Places page.

This service is particularly exciting due to the volume of mobile searches being performed. Currently, around 20% of Google searches are local, for example, ‘plumber in bournemouth’. This figure is rising as more and more people are using smart phones and searching whilst out and about.

AdWords Express only works with local searches and allows you to advertise your business on the main Google Search results or on Google Maps. It works in the same way as Google AdWords so you create your adverts and choose your keywords. You only pay when a visitor clicks on your advert and your position depends on how much you’re prepared to pay for a click and how relevant Google thinks your advert is (known as the Quality Score).

AdWords Express is designed to be simple and easy to setup. You can be up and running in a few minutes with no online advertising experience or knowledge required. When setting up your ads you provide the following information:

• Choose your business category
• Write your adverts
• Set your monthly budget
• Create your Google Places page or point to your existing page

By choosing a category that best suits your business, you don’t need to spend time researching your keywords. Google does all this for you. It also manages your campaigns for you and optimises your adverts automatically to ensure your conversion improves over time.

AdWords Express is a great way to get started with online advertising and is perfect if you don’t want to spend money on a website.

Related posts:

1. Google +1 = Advertising Revenue
2. Proof why it’s so important to rank on the first page of Google
3. Does Google read flash?
4. Ecommerce Website Critique – LK Bennett