Keyword Rockstar Review

Firstly, why am I an authority to provide a Keyword Rockstar review? Well, early 2009, I was one of a lucky few who got to road-test this killer software program and straight away I saw the potential and vision that the owner and creator (Jon Shugart) had for his tool...

Since then it has been progressing in massive leaps and bounds - both in features and functionality.

What first drew my attention to Keyword Rockstar was that Jon is an "in the trenches" Adwords expert. He is in there on a daily basis, driving huge volumes of traffic to his campaigns. In the process, he had uncovered some super-effective techniques in getting Adwords to cough up clicks for as little as 2 and 3 cents a piece.

Indeed, one of the major selling points of Keyword Rockstar is it's ability to generate dirt cheap clicks from Google's content network via banner ad's, but if that is all you have heard about the software, then you are definitely missing out on the full picture.

This tool automates the whole process of setting up your PPC/PPV(CPV)/Media Buy campaigns and handles tasks such as your Keyword research, content placement research, competition landing page analysis, competition ad analysis, competition Keyword analysis, campaign building on search, placement, or content on all the major networks as well as the ability to generate image/banner ads.

Really. Cool.

Getting started

Okay, the first thing that you need to do is to download and install the software. It is easy to install and the first thing you will notice is that the interface is user friendly and really intuitive. I love the fact that when you boot it up you are greeted with a feature suggestion/user feedback box.

Actually, this is pretty indicative of Jon’s attitude toward having strong customer support and a willingness to listen to peoples ideas as well as their gripes in order to make Keyword Rockstar an even better tool for everybody (what's even more impressive is that he often take action on these items)

The software program can be easily used by both beginners and experienced affiliate marketers and it is a key component that I have used to build tons of successful PPC campaigns.

Here is a breakdown of all the current functionality found in Keyword Rockstar at the time of writing this review:

Keyword Research

Obviously, it is very important to research the Keywords that one is considering to use for an ad campaign, and Keyword Rockstar has this functionality totally covered by extracting data in real-time from Google's Adwords Keyword tool. By using Googles data Keyword Rockstar is always able to provide fresh Keyword data that is not based on old and outdated estimates and sources (which, unfortunately is what some other tools do). With a couple of quick clicks Keyword Rockstar will provide you with data like:


You can choose which data to collect, and which you would prefer leave out. Obviously the more data you collect then the longer the data retrieval is going to take.

Sometimes I have let Keyword Rockstar run all through the night when I need a ton of keyword data, but I generally only do this when I am identifying Keywords for use in AutoBlogs rather than PPC campaigns, which I prefer to keep more tightly focused.

I love the fact that Keyword Rockstar completely automates the proxy management for you, because it means that you get all of this data, SuperFast. Early versions of Keyword Rockstar required that you manually manage the proxies, and to be honest it was kind of clunky in this respect (and really, really slow).

However, now you can just create a project and hit the start button and Keyword Rockstar will automatically use proxies for you. This was a 10x speed enhancement improvement and the rate at which Keyword Rockstar can now handle data retrieval i think is unparalleled by any other Keyword tool.

Domain Availability Research

This is one of the least widely discussed features of Keyword Rockstar, but it is really super-powerful. I have used this feature to unearth 100's of Keyword rich domain names - pretty cool since we all know that Google is showing enormous favoritism in its rankings to domain names that contain the Keywords being searched for. This function allows you to;

PPC Search Network Campaign Builder

Keyword Rockstar has an extremely powerful search campaign builder that allows you to do just about any type of PPC search campaign quickly and pretty much effortlessly. The search campaign builder will:


One thing I am particularly persnickety about is using tools that store my data externally to my own computer; I mean, how can you be truly sure that all your data collection and hard work is safe or won’t be misused?

Jon was straight up about this issue from day one and designed the program to be used from your desktop and to store the data collected on your computer. This makes Keyword Rockstar stand apart from some competitors’s who insist that the information be stored on their own databases. Big tick from me.

Google Adwords Placement Targeted Campaign Generator

When it comes to PPC, placement targeting is my specialty. It’s one of my bread and butter tactics. A lot of marketers overlook this highly lucrative area of PPC, which is fine by me!

PPC Content Network Campaign Builder:

When creating content campaigns I recommend that you break up your image ads and text ads into separate campaigns, but you have total flexibly over this and ultimately you can decide what works best for you.

The content network is where Keyword Rockstar really shines, especially with its capacity to create banner/image ad's (you see some examples of Keyword Rockstar’s banner creation here). With the content network campaign builder you have the ability to:


One of the great features of Keyword Rockstar's content network (and placement targeted campaign) builder is that you can use tokens in your content & placement campaigns just like you can in search campaigns – this is awesome for creating dynamic landing pages or getting the Keyword in your text ads.

At the moment, the tokens only work in the text ads and not the image ads, however it seems that Jon is working on a solution for possibly implementing this, but he wanted to go ahead and provide the text ad token capability for the time being.

Image/Banner Ad Builder

This is actually part of the content campaign builder’s functionality, but I have made a separate page here with more information regarding this feature.

Media Buy Banner Builder

This was a more recent addition to Keyword Rockstar’s arsenal, keeping in tune with Jon’s desire to develop a single keyword tool that can handle campaign creation across all of the major PPC networks. The benefits of this are obvious: no longer do you have to be tied down to one traffic source – Google’s Adwords. Keyword Rockstar’s Media Buy Banner Builder has:

PPV campaign builder

The PPV (CPV) feature of Keyword Rockstar is a bit light-on for my liking, and currently only has the ability for URL generation capability, it would be nice to see some other functionality here, but I am sure it is coming. One small gripe that I have (and it's pretty small!), but since when has CPV (cost per view) traffic been known as PPV (pay per view)...?

Apart from Keyword Rockstar software you also get access to...

Private Community Site:

Early on Jon was decided to build a community site for Keyword Rockstar users so that everyone could get involved in Keyword Rockstar’s development as well as providing a central location for learning, sharing and growing!

This private forum has quickly turned into the place to be for all PPC marketers; for newbies it's a great place to learn and ask questions, and for the more seasoned PPC marketers it is a great place to network

Webinars and Ongoing Training

Regular case studies, webinars and training are also another key feature when you purchase Keyword Rockstar. One of the first training videos Jon Shugart did was a case study promoting a Clickbank eBook about chicken coops (of all things.)

In this case study (as with all of them) he left none of the details out, and you can see everything, including the landing page, PPC campaigns, and how he used Keyword Rockstar to build them.

He had an adspend on the content network for both image and text ads from august 30th to September 8th 2009 of $601.97 with a commissions being $882.26 leaving a net profit of $280.29, which is a 46.5% ROI. Now campaigns like this always need to be monitored and refined over time, but that's not bad for a few minutes work, eh?

In my experience it is very rare to see this kind of in-depth training for any IM products these days...

Software 9.5/10
Training 10/10
Support 9/10

This review is a work in progress, please check back for regular updates.