So I took the plunge today and went through the Qualified Google Advertising Professional test. I guess I hadn't as of yet taken the test because I didn't see the need and I didn't really think that I was ready. I was wrong on both counts.

The Test
The test itself cost $50.00 and takes an hour and a half, 109 questions, all multiple choice. Nothing terribly complicated, mathematical, analytical or otherwise. If you’re familiar with AdWords, you shouldn’t have any trouble. You can take the test as often as you like, but you do have to pay the $50.00 each time.

Beyond the test fee you have to have an account in good standing for at least 90 days and meet a minimum spend requirement. $1,000 for individuals and $100,000 for companies. If you want the company certification you have to have two certified individuals.

I have been buying advertising from Google for some time and didn't prepare for the test, but had no trouble passing the test. (I had been a little overwhelmed by their learning center and went through maybe 20% of their tutorials; check out the Learning Center and you’ll see what I mean.)

The Criticism
My main criticism of the test was in relation to some of the payment and billing questions and some minor ambiguities.

In terms of the billing questions, I don't see how understanding of the billing process or what the procedure is to reinstate your account if your credit card is declined has to do with being an advertising professional. I have yet to see our account be declined or have other billing issues which really seems like an accounting function more than a media buyer/campaign manager issue. Oh, and none of my clients or our accounting team uses prepay bankers notes, which I learned is primarily for international customers, so again, where is the relevance? I'd say the Quality Score on those questions is low-and your ad is not showingJ

There were also some minor grammatical problems that I would have expected to be vetted, but Palin and Biden got through, so I can't expect too much I guess. The main issue with ambiguity that I saw was that a couple of the questions just weren’t clear or straightforward. Perhaps this was done by design, but in any case, could use some improvement.

The Plug
I took a look at the promotional credits and marketing and I believe now that there is some real value in taking the test and being certified. I'm going to suggest to our folks to all get certified to get the Company seal.

I would recommend all search marketers take the test as it's a small investment and gives some additional credibility to your work.

Here are the benefits that Google specifically cites:
Google's recognition as a tested and Qualified AdWords Individual or Company.
The official AdWords Qualified Individual or Company Logo, which can be displayed on your website and in many other materials to showcase your skills and help attract clients.
Distinction as a skilled professional.
A Professional Status page which profiles your business name and displays Google's validation that you're an authentic Qualified Individual or Company within Google Advertising Professionals program.
Promotional credits at a higher value, which can be applied to new client accounts to help bring in more business.
The first point doesn't carry too much weight with me as Google recognition will of course be slim to none. If it gets me better prices or better position, great, but odds of that happening are low.
It nice to have a logo to put on the web site saying that we are certified and independent certification is always a good thing, but it never stopped us from getting clients before, and I don't think the mere mention of it will close more deals.
Distinction-again same as above-get me more clients? maybe
Professional status page? Ok, thanks. There are still plenty of times that I've seen the logo displayed with no link to the status page. Did these people just rip off the logo like I did for this blog?
Promotional credits-Great! Not huge money, but promotional credits are issued in sets of five valued at $100 each. Any credits are of course great and can be passed on as first time "try before you buy", discounts or other such incentives.

The Commentary
All in all I think the test was fair and would suggest that campaign managers take the test for no other reason that to put some weight to search engine marketing. Too many small companies are suckered into thinking that they can set up a Yahoo Search Marketing account or Google AdWords account and everything will work out fine. There are some real complexities, or should I say, nuances, to online advertising and media buying in it’s various forms that shouldn’t be discounted. So I’m going to swing to the “me too” in terms of certification. You’ve got all these other badges out there that people flaunt and use to substantiate their industry; PMI, CCIE, MCSE, Six Sigma Master Black Belt. Why doesn’t media buying? It would seem that our industry is maturing to a stage that could benefit from some independent certification and that would have to be done by some one besides Google.

Advertising Small Businesses Online

There was an interesting article on Search Engine Land today that I thought I would reference and comment on.

The article entitled: How Much Are SMBs Spending On Online Advertising? talks about both the average spend of specific vertical industries.

They looked at tier two industries, specifically jewelers, hair salons/barbers, spas/beauty salons, and health/fitness clubs. Let me know if you know the difference between a hair salon and a beauty salon. Maybe you can get your manicure at a beauty salon and can't at a hair salon?

What you'll see from their graph is that the average spends across all of the verticals is something less than $60 per month. This was a shocker to me as we typically see average spends north of $300 per month. At $60 per month I have to wonder what kind of results they see. Both positioning and the number of days on rotation have to be nearly invisible based on the conversion rates that SEM typically sees, not to mention banner ad CTRs. Let's imagine you can get a $0.50 CPC, 120 visits and a 2% conversion rate, can those two new customers pay for the advertising?

For these industries I can see it making a difference in terms of customer acquisition cost vs. lifetime value. Jewelry is a big hit up front, with high margins; hair salons, barbers and beauty salons that do a good job can retain customers for quite a long time and health clubs typically get 6 month or a annual memberships; so I can see how those two customers per month can have high profit margins.

I know I've ignored things like churn and retention rates, but I highly doubt that the average beauty salon is thinking of it either. What I hear from clients and prospects is typically "it works" or "it doesn't work", with a small percentage living the branding dream and saying, "Hey, I just want to be out there".

Yellow Pages? Forget about it...

It's about 6 pm for the print yellow page companies and they go to bed at 9. The companies that have been producing the directories know it all too well and have issued dire predictions of their own. They are all pushing hard in the online space hoping to recoup some of the dollars they are poised to lose on the print side. More people everyday are starting to go online to look for information about businesses, services, products, you name...not stuff that they buy online but information about their local merchants.

"report released in July by researcher Borrell Associates, which predicts the print Yellow Pages industry will collectively lose $5 billion in revenue by 2013. "

http://www.btobonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080811/FREE/702961218/1109/FREE

Here's a story from today. Nice anecdote from BtoB Magazine about a company that stumbled into online advertising and realized that local internet ads can drive more qualified traffic at a lower cost.

http://www.btobonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080827/FREE/508523106/1009/SEARCH