• June 26, 2006

After surging during the holidays, the price of purchasing keywords ebbed dramatically last quarter, according to DoubleClick's most recent quarterly report about search pricing. The "cost-per-keyword" fell to around $30 in the first quarter--from around the yearly high of $59 last December, according to the report. Year-over-year, cost-per-keyword was relatively flat. To arrive at a cost-per-keyword, Performics combines cost-per-click with the volume of clicks; the figure represents the average cost to a marketer of purchasing a keyword for the entire month. The report confirms an earlier study, released last February, which found that keyword prices were trending down by the beginning of the year. -- Wendy Davis