Are you like most of the people who begin their Google AdWords campaign at Google’s website and not their own? They sign up for an account, load up some keywords, and sit back and wait for the sales to come in. But many times, unless they already have a high-converting website to begin with, this strategy will only accelerate failure.

Now do not get me wrong. I am the first person to tell you that a great tactic for testing your website conversion percentages is to use a Google AdWords campaign to drive immediate traffic to your site; but there IS one catch to this strategy. You have to be TESTING. If you have not done something to your website – in other words, if you haven’t changed a headline, an order button, a color, or something…then what variable are you going to be testing against?

If you are already failing miserably at getting people to buy something from you, then in your case, throwing thousands of dollars into Google AdWords may be futile. However, what I notice is that most companies are somewhere in between this scenario. That is, they have a decent website with an acceptable level of conversions and they use Google AdWords to drive more traffic to that site in the hopes of making more money. And some of them are hugely successful in spite of themselves.

But what if you spent a little money to “fix” your website. Maybe you need an updated logo and a fresh website design. Next, you need to make sure that your web pages are actually relevant to what your visitors are searching for. Maybe you need to consult a professional who knows a little about SEO (search engine optimization) and can help you come up with good, optimized copy and a smooth presentation with a strong call to action. For the sake of discussion, let’s say that you can get all of this for $2,000.

So you spend $2,000, but here is what you get back. First of all, Google will “see” these changes and determine that your site is more relevant than it used to be. If you are doing other things correctly in your AdWords campaign, you will be rewarded with a lower price per click. But that’s not all. Because your site is now more relevant, Google has a tendency to reward that relevancy with higher organic rankings. “Organic’ listings are the FREE listings that are underneath and to the left of the paid ads. Keeping in mind that if paid clicks cost you $5, it does not take a rocket scientist to deduce that 400 free visitors to your site brings you to break-even on your website expenditures ($2,000 / $5).

But do not forget…your click cost with Google will more than likely drop as well – so you get the best of BOTH worlds – lower paid clicks and more free clicks. What? You already have an AdWords campaign management company and they have not worked with you on your website? Or you have been managing your own campaign and have never heard about this strategy? Or did you formerly use Google AdWords, but gave up because you could not make the numbers work for you?

These days, competition is fierce and it takes a lot more than just clever bidding and deep keyword research to become successful in search marketing programs, such as Google AdWords. It takes what I call the “total package”, which includes not only knowing how to use Google’s website, but how to structure your OWN website as well. If you can master these two with efficiency, then you, my friend, are going to be successful in managing a profitable Google AdWords campaign.