If they don’t want you to bid on those terms, they should raise their bid, run multiple campaigns, and protect their terms. If it were me, I’d do what I could do to put you so far back in the results and so expensive to work my name that you would seek other prey.

So I think what you’re doing in this regard is excellent. It promotes more advertising, HIGHER paying advertising to be more specific, and more PPC money in the overall kitty. Which in turn means higher PPC payouts to those running click ad sites and affiliate related pages. Overall, it puts more money in the stream for everyone.

Keep on keepin’ on!

Chuck Crawford

Without being sleazy or trash talking any of your competitors, you’ve simply made visitors aware of another option that’s available to them in the world of SEM services. For everyone posting on this topic here and in the rest of the blogosphere, this is our business so everyone obviously has a strong opinion.

In brick and mortar, companies spend endless resources to position their brand next to – or better yet – in front of/above their competitors in the supermarket aisle, at the bar, in the strip mall, at tradeshows, etc. Kudos to you for incorporating this competitive PPC method to acquire customers.

Just searching ‘Commission Junction’ I found at least 15 other CPA/rev-share programs bidding on that branded keyword. Searching ‘Constant Contact’ there are the same number of companies offering email marketing software. You’ve gotta love competition; it’s why we’re all employed!

Some people have the idea that ethical business means you can’t “infringe” upon your competitors’ customers, while other people subscribe to the “it ain’t illegal if you don’t get caught philosophy. Bah.

I say that as far as ethics are concerned, being honest, obeying the laws, and keeping contracts/TOS goes a LONG way. Yeh, that pretty handles it, I think. Many would disagree, though.