Pay-per-click definition

Pay-per-click advertising -- where you pay the owner of a Website (like Google, for example) that has featured your ad for their visitors to click-though to your Website -- is typically part of a direct sales program with the objective of converting clicks to website users to sales.

You will bid against other companies for top positioning on these sites, but you only pay when someone clicks to go to your site. Pay-per-click may, to a lesser extent, be used for brand building, although that is more commonly done with pay-per-view ads.

But remember, just like paying a salesperson to make a call when no sale is made, you pay for the click even if you don't make a sale.