10 Steps in PPC Process

1. Set Goals for Cost per Conversion: Your PPC campaign will be profitable only if the total cost per conversion is lower than your break even point. Your goal should be to get most conversions with lowest cost per conversion. Good conversion may still lose money if the cost per click is too high.
2. Build Initial Keyword List: Use the available tools from Google Adwords, Yahoo Search Marketing etc. to build an initial keyword list which contains all the keywords that you think anyone interested in your product will type in the search engines.
3. Build Initial Keyword Bid List: Determine what your conversion rate will be on the clicks you get from the keywords in your initial keyword list. This is just needs to be an educated guess at this point. After launching your campaign, you will get the real data to replace your estimates. Determine the maximum amount you can pay for a particular keyword bases on your cost per conversion goal. You can calculate this by multiplying your cost per conversion goal with your estimated conversion rate. For example if your cost per conversion goal is $20 and you estimate a 2% conversion rate, you can afford to bid up to $0.40 ($20 x 2%) per click. Then use your PPC vendors tool to check that if you can buy the keyword for that amount or less, if yes, add it to your initial Keyword Bid List, and note the maximum bid amount. If not put it on a backup list.
4. Determine Landing page for each keyword: The landing page should be relevant to the keyword or phrase. Don't give your home page as landing page for a specific keyword. If you are bidding on keyword phrases that do not correspond directly to any pages on your web site, create specific landing pages that speak directly to your ad copy, and direct users from that landing page to where you want them to go.
5. Write Ad Copy: Write ad copy for each keyword. In Google, you can write several ads for each. Try to include the exact keyword in the ad copy, which will generate higher click through rate.
6. Launch Ad Campaign and Analyze Results: After completing the above 5 steps launch your campaign: Generate reports every day. The report should include the keywords that are getting a lot of click but no/low conversions, keywords that are getting very high conversions, keywords that are getting no click and which ads are doing better if you are running multiple ads for some keywords.
7. Make Adjustments in your Campaign: Based on your analysis, adjust your campaign for better results. Change the copy of your ads, lower the bid amount or stop bidding for the keywords generating traffic but not results. Increase the bid amount for the keywords performing better than expected for higher placement which will drive more traffic.
8. Refine Keyword List: Remove unprofitable keywords and add new potential keywords which produces more profit.
9. Use date gathered from your PPC campaign in your SEO Campaign: After knowing exactly which keywords are driving traffic and converting into sales, your search engine optimization team can target that appropriate keywords in their campaign.
10. Continue Monitoring and Adjusting: Monitor your results, look for changes and adjust your campaign accordingly. New competitors may enter the market, bid prices many change, or users may start to search for more specific terms. If you are not monitoring, your campaign performance may come down. Run at least high-level reports weekly and detailed reports monthly.