InformationWeek SMB TechEncyclopedia

A marketing system on the Web in which the advertiser pays when the user clicks on its advertisement and goes to its site. This is a more interactive, results-oriented method compared to paying for just the placement of a banner ad on a Web page regardless if anyone clicks on it.

     Pay-per-click search engines, such as Yahoo! Search Marketing and 7Search.com, are search sites that return the results of a search based on how much the advertiser bid for placement. The one that bid the most gets its offering to appear first in the results list; the second-highest appears second, and so on. After all paid advertisers are displayed, all the other results appear just like regular search engines. If the user clicks on a paid advertiser's offering to go to its Web site, the pay-per-click search engine charges the advertiser's account for the bid amount. For more information, visit www.payperclicksearchengines.com.