Google Offers Free Hosting

The move could encourage businesses without a web presence to sign on to the Adwords program, a paid search ad program.

According to the Adwords blog, “You can use a hosted business page to tell people more about your business when they click on your ad. For example, if you own a restaurant, you might write about your award-winning cannoli; if you are a tailor, potential customers would be thrilled to read about your 48 hour turnaround on alterations.”

Many small, local businesses don’t advertise online because they don’t see the benefit of hosting an entire website. The Adwords landing page program is different because businesses don’t need to find content for several pages, they only need a simple landing page with limited information like address, phone number and special services.

The new service allows business owners to create a simple landing page for the business even if they don’t know HTML. The offer isn’t a full-fledged website complete with domain name, but for businesses just getting their feet wet with online marketing, it is a good place to begin.

The program is available to businesses signing up for Adwords Starter Edition.

Tags: AdWords, Google, search marketing