Leveling the market's playing field with adManager

So the good news for your small business is that you're on the Web. Microsoft Office Live Small Business made that easy. The bad news is: Everybody else is on the Web too—or at least it may seem that way.

So how do you make yourself stand out in an almost infinitely vast bazaar, filled with vendors many times your size who have marketing budgets that dwarf yours?

Enter adManager, a feature of Office Live Small Business and a marketing tool that can help you rise above the noise. AdManager gives you the ability to reach the customers who are looking for what you have to offer. All you have to do is make some intelligent choices about what search words they will use when they go looking on the Internet for products like yours.

Making yourself known

Let's say that you have a company that designs and makes exceptional baby clothes. But you are a small operation whose main asset is the quality of your product. You are a tiny company with a great idea, without the massive financial resources it takes to draw the world’s attention. If you could only make yourself known, your products are good enough to sell themselves.

You know that millions of people are out there using search engines to find products like yours. With adManager, you can purchase and manage keywords on Microsoft Live Search, powered by MSN.com and Live.com—some of the most popular destinations on the Web. With the right keywords managed the right way, your company can rise to the top of company names that come up in customer searches. You can connect with customers who are searching for what you sell.

Once you have adManager, you can, within minutes, set up your personal account and begin selecting your desired key words or phrases. Then you create your text-based search ads, determine the bid amount for each ad, and use Microsoft adCenter to distribute your search listings across the Live Search network, which, as was mentioned, includes MSN.com and Live.com.

Optimizing your search advertising

But adManager does much more than allow you to get your search listings out there. It also allows you to manage and optimize your search advertising strategy. Establishing a monthly budget and maximum cost per click, you can track your results and optimize your keyword budget. You can see, at a glance, which search engines and keywords are driving the most traffic.

AdManager has an interface that is so easy to use that you can do your keyword purchasing and target keyword placement for selected cities all in a matter of minutes. And you can optimize your search advertising budget while spending very little time managing the whole process. Best of all, you don't have to employ expensive agencies or outside contractors, who can be extremely costly while delivering uncertain results. You have to pay only when a searching customer clicks through to your Web site from your keyword ad.

AdManager works with Microsoft adCenter, which delivers and places your keyword ads on MSN and Live Search, putting you potentially in touch with 39 million motivated buyers. AdManager has comprehensive reporting that not only helps you determine which keywords are cost-effective for you, but also which ones are driving customers to your sites from other search engines, including Google and Yahoo.

Advertising in the big leagues

Office Live Small Business puts you on the Web with a credible business presence, and adManager gives you the tools and the power on the Internet to vie with competitors who formerly ruled the marketplace simply by virtue of their size and marketing power. AdManager allows a small business to advertise and target the right customers as if it had a large corporation’s advertising budget.