PPC Search Engines & Affiliate Links

[cameron]

I want to take a stab at some PPC advertising by linking directly to the affiliate site with my tracking code. Just wondering which PPC search engines allow this, and which ones are recommended.

[Chris]

Most other than Google, but many many affiliate programs have rules against this (or guidelines you must follow).

[chromate]

I think google does allow it but there can be only one per search or something. I'm not too clear on it. A lot of affiliate programs provide lists of keywords that you can use for PPC purposes as well as words you're not allowed to bid on.

[MarkB]

And you also need to mark you link as an affiliate link (using 'Aff' or similar). I believe that's a must for Adwords?

[chromate]

I didn't think you had to do that anymore, since they brought in these new rules. But I can't remember where I read that - so it may be wrong.

[5starAffiliates]

I have a whole section of my blog (below) devoted to the new Google Adwords rules and tips for getting better results with the new rules.

In a short nutshell - no longer need to use the word affiliate in your ads. But more importantly only one ad can go direct to the merchant so that one ad may be the merchant's in which case you cannot direct link. To be on the safe side you just need to build landing pages on your own site for all your Google PPC.
I also have tips for making a good pre-sell landing page to help your conversions.

Hope this helps and best of luck!

[RyaninZion]

Isn't it also "illegal" to build landing pages?

According to the Google AdWords affiliate policy:


We also monitor and don't allow the following:

* Redirect URLs: Ads that contain Display URLs that automatically redirect to the parent company.
* Bridge Pages: Ads for webpages that act as an intermediary, whose sole purpose is to link or redirect traffic to the parent company.
* Framing: Ads for webpages that replicate the look and feel of a parent site.

Seems like what you are suggesting is to build what Google calls Bridge Pages.

I may be wrong...?

[chromate]

The bit to notice in the bit about bridge pages is "sole purpose". As long as the landing page has some additional information that's of some use then there shouldn't be a problem.

Though, I know Google has been cracking down on bridge pages recently.

[Cutter]

I've noticed a lot of affiliates set up "review" sites for PPC.