Google Ad Words - In a nutshell, Pay-Per-Action ads are part of a new pricing model within the Adwords system that allows you to pay only when specific actions, that you decide, are completed by a user who clicks your ad.

The ads are displayed in the same way as Adsense ads.  In some ways it’s like bidding on the content network except it’s not only Google who decides where the ads are displayed. The publisher (the website owner) also chooses specific Pay-Per-Action ads that are relevant to their site, to run in new ad units that they create.

Before you start a PPA ad campaign, you must understand exactly what Google expects from you when you set up your initial campaign. Among the information that you'll need to provide includes:

-    A description of your product or service. Take your time crafting a well-written description as it will be read by publishers.

-    Your company name and your product name, a description of your company, your URL, and a maximum of 50 keywords. You may also upload your logo, if you have one.

-    A description of the required action. You must determine what action you require of visitors – for example, will you ask them to sign up to your list or purchase a product or service – and write a description of that action.

Again, take care when providing this information as publishers will use it to determine how they are going to place your ads.

Google Adwords PPA Price

If you want to be successful with PPA, focus on your price. If you set a price that’s too high, you're likely going to price yourself out of the game. On the other hand, if you set a price that is too low, you're going to scare publishers away. 

The best way to determine where to set your starting price for a CPA campaign is to determine what your cost per conversion is for your Pay Per Click ads. Depending on how well your ads have done, either raise or lower the price for your PPA campaign.

Fortunately, PPA and PPC are similar in the way they are run. For example, the ads for both PPA and PPC campaigns must be relevant: The text of your ad must match your landing page text. 

Furthermore, both your ads and your landing page must match the information on the product that you provided to Adsense publishers. Ensuring that your ads are relevant will help in two important ways:

1  It will help you convert visitors to customers.

2  It will enhance your quality score.

PPA is a fairly new program; in fact, it was just introduced in 2007. As a result, it's still going through the growing phase where Adsense publishers are still learning the nuances of the PPA system. Google is also continuing to tweak the program as publishers provide feedback.

Because PPA is still in the BETA test phase, you're likely going to have to work somewhat harder to achieve the results that you want.

Check out our plan on How to dominate your market to see what we advise.