googlegamble 2

Last year I went to the University of Toronto and I also worked on contract for another University in the city doing website design. My webwork paid for my courses in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) and covered the cost of my lovely little laptop! Both in class and on the job, I learned a few things but nothing was more of an eye-opener than the day my client for web design showed me how she was using Google Ads.

Like many people, I was barely aware of the bland little ads on the left of the screen; the idea they actually did something useful seemed unlikely. As many of you will already know, they generate billions of dollars in ad revenue but a more interesting question is, “How can educators get some of that money?”

Ten years ago I worked on contract at Macromedia; I was in charge of the redesign of their website and there was much discussion of banner ads: to have them or not. I wanted the site to generate some revenue because my experience in business suggested to me that it’s always good to have a bit of a revenue stream. But the banners were as irritating as TV commercials and they didn’t generate much in the way of money. So, this year, when the marketing manager in charge of promoting the University’s courses told me she was going to use Google Ads, I wasn’t overly impressed.

As you can tell, I’m a beginner at this but this is my understanding of what happened when the Google Ads and the new site hit the web:

1. The marketing manager chose a number of words and, when anyone used one of those words in a Google search, a little ad for the University courses showed up on the left of the screen. Over 2 months, 1.5 million of those impressions appeared. No charge.
2. It’s no surprise that a very small percentage of people actually clicked the ad - in fact only one-tenth of one percent, or 1,500 people. Each time anyone clicked, it cost the University two bucks. Cost: $6,000.
3. Of the 1,500 ad-clickers who reached the University website, an amazing 10%, or 150 people, actually signed up for a course after each plunking down $600. That’s $90,000!
4. Of course it’s not all Google and good design. The University in question has a great ‘brand’, there’s still a calendar being sent out and word-of-mouth is also a factor. But the same courses had enrolment of 120 in the previous term so there was a direct 25% improvement, worth approximately $20K.

At the risk of saying what every 10-year old and every marketing manager already knows: These little ads work and organizations are going to use them more and more. If you’re going to buy something, the first thing you do is to get online and check it out. Whether you’re formally searching or visiting a related site or mentioning it in your mail, the little ads will be there. And if the University’s use of them can stand as a test case, it benefits both customer and supplier.

Google does very well by all this, of course. If one small marketing program in one University can benefit, then start multiplying $6K by all the other programs in all the other companies and all the other organizations…

We’re happy for them, no doubt. But the life blood of the web is content. The key question, in my opinion, is this: Can the content suppliers of the new webworld get the costs of content development covered by some of this flow of cash? Next week.

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