Use the Google tools in your Adwords account to figure out the top bids for the keywords you are using
. The fastest way is to start with a bid of $50 and you will then see the first bid under that which is actually the current highest bid for that keyword. Keep entering the next lowest bid to see how much you must bid to be fifth or sixth on the list. Then bid this amount. You'll save a lot of money this way.
Another thing that will help you get better results with your Google Adwords campaigns is to study your competition. If you are using pay-per-click to advertise an affiliate program and someone else is competing with you, study their landing pages. If they are running their ad on a regular basis, it means what they are doing is working...so you should study what they are doing.
Do they send people to a pre-sell page or directly to the program they are advertising? This is where you usually can separate the amateurs from the pros. Affiliate marketers who stay in the game have learned to use squeeze pages to capture contact information to build the all-important list.
Hardly anyone will buy a product the first time they go to the website. Follow-up is vital to converting your pay-per-click traffic. If you don't capture contact information, you cannot follow up with benefit-laden emails that convert your prospects to buyers. If you send people directly to the product page, you are losing hundreds and probably thousands of dollars every year. Capturing contact information is not difficult and can make the difference between success and failure of your overall Internet business.