First, you must be tracking your conversions. It can be with Google Conversion Tracking or something else. I use Adwords Conversion Tracking or I use reports in Prosper 202 (free). Prosper or Tracking202 will work for the big 3 search engines so you can do this with Yahoo Search Marketing or MSN Adcenter too. But if you aren’t already tracking which keywords are converting, that needs to be your priority.

Here it is, the big secret to finding super profitable keywords that maybe nobody else has…..

Part 1 – search PPC campaigns

You have probably been running some broad or phrase match keywords in your campaigns. In Yahoo, there is no such thing as exact match, so if you have a campaign there, this will always work.

In Adwords:

1. Run a Search Query Report for the campaign or adgroup you want to improve. This will tell you exactly what people actually searched for.

2. Sort out the column for keywords which actually converted for you.

3. Take these keywords and make them into phrase and/or exact match keywords to add to your campaign. You can also see how many times it was searched for and may be able to get an idea of what to bid on these words. Hint, you can usually bid more for these words safely. Remember, these keywords are all proven winners.

4. You owe me a beer. Or sign up under one of my referral links.

If you are doing this with YSM or Adcenter, they probably have similar tools for reporting on the websites. I never use them because I do it using Prosper202 on my own server.

In Prosper, you may need to import your subids. They have excellent tutorials on this. Then:

1 Go to Analyze

2 Select Keywords

3 Select your date range, “show converted clicks” and hit “set preferences

4 Download to excel if you have enough to warrant it, sort and add these keywords as phrase and/or exact match keywords to your adgroup.

Now, you may see some keywords that are so ridiculously long tail that they may never come back again. It won’t hurt to add them to your campaigns, but you may want to look for a phrase match term you can take out of there. Example:

If you see that you got a conversion from “super awesome michael jackson ringtones that my mom won’t hate”

shorten it to “super awesome michael jackson ringtones” and/or  “super awesome ringtones” or “awesome michael jackson ringtones”. You get the idea right?

Part 2 – Content network campaigns

OK, now we’re only talking adwords, but you can do things like this with lots of other platforms. I don’t have time to get into it all because I should be working instead of telling you how to compete with me. By now, you’re getting the idea anyway.

1. Run a Placement Performance Report

2. Add the converting websites as placements within a content network adgroup.

3. Some websites won’t be available for placement targeting. You could contact them directly to place an ad on their site. Or contact them directly to suggest they ad their site for placement targeting. You may have to tell them how to do this.

4. You will be able to modify your bids for each placement according to it’s value.

5. Now you really owe me a shot of cheap whiskey or maybe a whole case of Black Velvet, you decide.