Feb 18, 2010 Posted in Marketing Ideas

Google’s Highest Priced Keywords Approach $100 per Click

According to AdGooroo, in the third quarter of 2009, Adwords advertisers were paying $99.44 per CLICK for the keyword “Mesothelioma.”

To put it a different way, somebody (lawyers, presumably) were placing ads on Google and paying almost $100 every time someone clicked on their ad and come through to their site.  Isn’t that amazing?

In case you’re wondering, about the word “mesothelioma,” it seems lawyers have ramped up paid-search ads based on lawsuits related to the asbestos-causing lung cancer.

Back in the day when I was working for WorldWideLearn.com I was shocked to find out that some advertisers were paying $30 per click for keywords related to online degrees and online education.  But once you do the math on high-priced and high-margin produccts and services like these, you can see how such lunacy can be justified.

My point is that someone is dropping the ball.  Google Adwords is essentially an auction-based pricing model but there are a number of intricacies that allow advertisers to lower their click costs.  Anyone paying nearly $100 per click is clearly not aware of Google’s unwritten rules and really should be looking at getting some help.

The thing I wonder is with Google shutting down so many advertisers for not setting up their campaigns properly, would they shut down any advertiser willing to pay $100 per click?  If anyone has a few grand kicking around, it would be an interesting test of Google’s commitment to relevancy.