You may be surprised to see Google ads for Gentle Wisdom, as well as the Google ads on my site. I am using Google AdWords, probably only temporarily, to advertise my new series on the basics of following Jesus. In case anyone wonders, I am not spending money on this, at least not my own money. My ISP sent me a free advertising voucher, and I have redeemed that for a short advertising campaign. When the voucher amount is used up, the campaign will probably finish. This is what the ad looks like:
Gentle Wisdom
Thoughts on life from Peter Kirk
Please let us know how this works out. I like the tagline, especially about following Jesus and the part knowing the power of the Holy Spirit. It casts Christianity as a life-changing relationship rather than a religion, which is absolutely the right way to put it!
Thank you, Tyson. I will try to keep you and others up to date.
By the way the ad campaign is running in the UK only, at least for now.
This campaign has now finished, at least for now, because the original £80 voucher funds have run out. So I am reporting back, if only for Tyson, and for my own records.
It took some time for this campaign to be approved. I’m not sure if it was delayed because the subject matter was considered dubious, although it meets Google’s written guidelines.
The ads appeared over a period of eight days, 23rd to 30th March. There were 27,450 impressions (appearances of the ad on a page) on Google search pages and 255,113 on the Display Network, i.e. as ads on various websites. My ads received a total of 197 clicks, 100 on search pages and 97 on the Display Network, at an average cost to my account of £0.40 per click. The most popular of my search terms was “About Jesus”, with 10,371 search page impressions and 46 clicks.
Was this worth it? I don’t know. I haven’t had any feedback from people who said they read the ad. These clicks account for 197 of the 363 visits to date to my page Why should I follow Jesus? But in fact over 300 of those 363 visits were in the period 23rd to 30th March, suggesting that quite a few of those who found the page in response to the ad returned to it later. And I estimate that 35-40 of these people clicked through to How can I become a follower of Jesus?
I thank Google for letting me try this out free of charge. I don’t think I will be renewing the campaign at the moment – unless of course someone who reads this would like to sponsor that. But I am pleased that a significant number of people read my brief presentation of the gospel through this campaign. I hope and pray that it changes their lives for the better.