There is a large number of available ppc search engines. As a general rule, the larger the pay per click engine is, the more you have to bid to get the top rankings for your keywords. If you are looking to use a ppc search engine, you will need to look into the different engines to find out the costs on bidding for keywords and the amount of traffic the engine generates.

Some of the major PPC or pay per click search engines in the United States are Google's Adwords program and Yahoo! Search Marketing. Google's Adwords program can give you access to the results page of the Google engine. The Adwords text ads can be displayed on other websites also. Yahoo! Search Marketing, formerly known as GoTo and Overture, provides paid results to major search engines such as Yahoo!, MSN, AOL and Lycos.

Using either or both Yahoo! and Google's ppc search engine marketing programs can provide you results; however, these search engines can be very expensive. You may opt to use smaller ppc search engine services. These services can provide results from many metasearch engines and cost less; but these smaller programs are at a definite disadvantage when compared to major players such as Yahoo! and Google. You can also look into thematic search engines - these are search engines specifically tuned to serve your particular industry or a targeted audience.

There are several points to consider before settling on a pay per click search engine. The best thing to do prior to choosing one is to test the search engine. Never begin with a large investment, start with the minimum instead to see how it performs and to gauge the levels of traffic it can generate and convert into customers. Here are a few more items you need to look into too see if the search engine is a viable option for your business: Does the search engine have major partners and affiliates, if so, who are these partners? Are there fraud prevention mechanisms in place? How many searches are performed in a single month? Look into the search engine's terms of service including those of its affiliates and partners. Search for those that impose strict guidelines when dealing with affiliates.

Do not go in blindly - do your research and learn all you can about the search engine, this way, you can protect yourself and your investment.