I'm thinking about trying this and I thought I read on here that some of you have done it.
What has been your experience with it? What is a reasonable budget to set?
Any thoughts or suggestions for me?
I see they are offering a free trial and a $75 credit. I don't want to jump in too fast but thought it may help give me a boost, especially as I'm trying to get back into weddings. TIA for your input. 
I recommend trying out the AdWords Traffic Estimator (linked below). Enter the word or phrase you want to buy and the max amount you want to pay per click (cost-per-click or CPC), and it will show you the traffic for that search term and give you an estimated monthly budget.
You'll probably also want to look under Advanced Options and edit the location to narrow down your ads to a specific metro area, unless you want nationwide exposure.
https://adwords.google.com/select/TrafficEstimatorSandbox
We started out slowly with a daily budget of around $2, but we eventually dropped AdWords since most of our business ended up coming from word of mouth, Yelp, and Google Places.
Thanks for the reply. I am trying to navigate all of this and it is a little confusing to know the best thing to do. This could get very expensive too.
After reading your post I took at look at the other places you mentioned- I am not even listed on yelp (not sure how big that is here).
Thanks again!
Whoa, what is that? Could someone who has used it explain how it works before I get on Google and get all confused?
Whoa, what is that? Could someone who has used it explain how it works before I get on Google and get all confused?
Whenever you do a google search for a term -- let's say "wedding cakes" -- in addition to regular results you will also see text ads along the right side of the screen (and sometimes at the top of the screen). These ads are auctioned off to the highest bidder in real-time every time someone does a google search.
The bids come from people who buy AdWords -- they set their maximum bid price for each search term (targeting anywhere from the entire world to an individual city). If you have a high enough bid for the "wedding cakes" search term in your area, your ad will appear in the block of ads on the right side every time someone in your area searches for "wedding cakes". Once your daily budget is reached, your ads will no longer show until the following day. Note that you only have to pay when someone clicks on your ad.
It's a brilliant system, and I would argue it's single-handedly responsible for Google's dominance in search. It's also incredibly complicated (millions of auctions are executed every second of every day). Before AdWords, the most common web advertising model was paying a small fixed fee every time your banner ad was displayed in a rotation, regardless of whether or not it was clicked on.
Here's more info and how to start. They apparently have a help line you can call to help get you started too.
http://www.google.com/ads/adwords2/#learntab=1&sourceid=awo&subid=ww-en-ha-sl32
Ah, that is what those are, I don't ever look at them, I used to, but it is never what I am looking for.
Just wanted to mention that you can buy google ad words credits on eBay. Might save you some money.
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