Google Adwords is the king of search advertising. A whole lot of folks use Google’s pay per click system to reach out to prospects. But with the state of economy getting worse and small businesses feeling the pain of their cash strapped customers, many have to find other ways to spread the word around about their services without breaking the bank. While you should approach some of these services with care, you should definitely give them a try to figure out if they work for your business.

Google Adwords Alternatives:

1. Yahoo & MSN: this is really a gimme here. A lot of folks start with Google Adwords and then graduate to other services such as Yahoo. Others, start will all there engines. I personally like the first approach, but I have done it both ways. Sometimes, it’s possible to get much lower bids on these alternative networks, but they are getting competitive as well.

2. Facebook Social Ads: I have been critical of Facebook social ads in the past, but you can’t question the innovative technology behind the social ads. For instance, you can target 55 years old folks who are small business owners and live in the city of San Diego. That’s extremely valuable if you have data on your audience. You can also create a Facebook page and advertise that instead of your own landing page. Definitely worth testing.

3. StumbleUpon: Stumbleupon ads can drive lots of traffic to your site. Not only you get what you pay for, but if folks give your site thumbs up, you are going to get free traffic. I remember spending $100 for a week on StumbleUpon. I am still getting free traffic from StumbleUpon without me having to actually do anything.

4. LinkedIn Ads: Linkedin DirectAds are made for small businesses who want to spend money on LinkedIn to reach out to business professionals. Folks on LinkedIn do not play around. My conversion rates are higher on LinkedIn than Facebook, but I suppose it all comes down to your product. DirectAds is still primitive in comparison to Google, and you will have to pay on a CPM basis. But nevertheless, you get nice exposure among some serious folks on LinkedIn.

5. ClickRiver: Clickriver can be a goldmine or just a waste of time depending on your niche. I have used Clickriver successfully on my technology sites, but I have heard folks who haven’t had that much success in some other niches. Being able to show your ads below Amazon products is too huge of an opportunity for me to pass by. It’s definitely worth the try.

There are thousands of other networks and methods that you can use to buy traffic to your site (see here). But you shouldn’t spend all your fortune on these outside-the-box ideas. You should always test, test, and test some more. When you hit the jackpot, you know it.

Did I miss anything?

Innovation is the only way to survive in a hyper-competitive market. If you can’t stay relevant in your area of expertise, you may as well choose a different career. This concept applies to us pay per click marketers as well. Google, Yahoo!, MSN, and all other search networks are changing all the time, and old methods won’t work in these new days. You are going to have to constantly innovate, optimize, and find other ways to grow.

But folks often think of innovation as recreating the wheel or coming up with something out of this world. The fact is, you don’t have to actually create a new box for yourself to continue your growth. There is such a thing as gradual, evolutionary innovation. In other words, you don’t necessarily have to add new search networks to grow your PPC business. It is possible to improve the existing campaigns and find innovative ways to increase your CTR, quality score, and reduce your bids.

It’s true that folks keep jumping on these new networks (e.g. FaceBook, LinkedIn), and that is just fine, but that is not innovation. That’s early adoption. Folks who jump from one network to another are often left frustrated by their lack of success and keep jumping in hope of better results. But innovating is a few steps above adoption, so unless you take these extra few steps you are going to be an adopter and not an innovator.

Which one are you? Are you an adopter or an innovator?