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Decoding the Jargon

PPC

Pay-Per-Click · Also called pay per click, paid search (loosely)

Performance marketingTerm

A way of buying ads where you pay only when someone clicks your ad, not when they merely see it. People also use PPC loosely to mean paid search work in general.

Example

Meera's Google Search ads are bought on a pay-per-click basis. If 80,000 people see her ad and 4,000 click, she pays for the 4,000 clicks only.

How you'll hear it

“We run PPC for the Pune store, mostly on Google Search, and pay only when someone clicks through.”

Don't confuse it with

  • CPC: PPC is the buying model, CPC is the price you end up paying for each click.
  • CPM: under CPM you pay per thousand impressions whether or not anyone clicks.

In India: Ad charges on Google and Meta for Indian accounts carry GST on top of the spend, so the invoice is higher than the media spend shown in the account.

Related terms

CPCCPMSearch adsAd auctionBid

Want to use this at work? AI-led PPC Excellence is aFactor's 16-week program for paid ads.

Sources

  1. Cost-per-click (CPC): Definition, Google Ads Help
  2. Understanding bidding basics, Google Ads Help

Checked 1 October 2026. Examples use a fictional business; figures are illustrative.

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