Tag Archive for: PPC

The Benefits of PPC Advertising for Small Businesses

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PPC (Pay-per-click) marketing is an online advertising model that can be a useful tool for small businesses to reach their target audience and produce leads and sales. The following are some major advantages of PPC advertising for small businesses:

Personalized Marketing
Businesses can target particular audiences using PPC platforms based on variables like location, age, gender, interests, and search intent. As a result, companies can produce highly targeted advertisements that are more likely to be pertinent to their target audience and, consequently, more likely to result in sales.

Cost-Effective
Since PPC advertising is cost-effective and only charges for clicks on ads, small businesses can take advantage of it. By doing this, companies can avoid wasting their advertising dollars on customers who have no interest in their goods or services. A daily budget can also be set by businesses on many PPC platforms, giving them control over their spending.

Measurable Outcomes
PPC platforms give organizations access to comprehensive metrics and reports that show how many clicks, impressions, and conversions their ads are generating. This information can be used to improve Return on investment, test multiple ad copy and targeting options, and optimize marketing campaigns.

Quick Results
PPC advertisements can generate clicks and leads almost immediately, giving businesses quick results. Businesses that need to create maximum leads or sales, such as those that offer seasonal goods or services, may find this to be especially helpful.

Enhanced Brand Recognition
Users will still see a company’s brand name and message even if they don’t click on PPC ads, which can aid in promoting brand recognition and awareness. For businesses that are just getting started or operate in a crowded market, this can be especially crucial.

Flexibility
Because PPC advertising is flexible, businesses can change their ad campaigns as necessary. Businesses can quickly make changes to improve their results if a specific ad or keyword isn’t performing well. Businesses can also pause their advertising campaigns if necessary and pick them back up later.

PPC advertising can, in conclusion, be a powerful tool for small businesses to reach their target market and produce leads and sales. It offers flexibility, increased brand visibility, targeted advertising, cost-effectiveness, measurable results, and quick results.

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6 ideas to improve the conversions of your PPC campaigns

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The optimization of your PPC strategy is essential to maintain or improve your ad campaign’s performance on search engines. Knowing what steps to take or where to start can be confusing, so here are some tips on how to optimize your PPC campaign:

 

  1. Keywords

In a PPC campaign, keyword selection is paramount. To choose your keywords, focus on those that appear in the largest volume of search. It is best to limit yourself to 15-20 keywords per ad group. Poorly chosen keywords can cost you money, so it is a good idea to have a web marketing expert to help you. To learn more, read our blog posting on keywords.

 

  1. Search words vs. negative keywords

It is important to regularly review your list of search words and the keywords being used by Internet users. You could be surprised by what you find.

You want to be vigilant about what search words you DO NOT want to be targeting in order to optimize your ROI. This is called negative keywords, which lets you exclude search terms from your campaign in order to only target the right customers and increase clickthrough. This list of negative keywords can be shared among all your Google Ads campaigns.

We recommend that you list all the negative keywords you want: such as products or services close to yours but you don’t offer, words linked to job postings, names of your competitors, scandals or sensitive subjects you don’t want to associate your company with.

 

  1. Ad Testing

In all marketing initiatives, testing is recommended to maintain effectiveness. Web advertising allows testing opportunities like no other medium. You can create 3-4 banner ads (with different visual and copy elements) for the same keyword groups and then see how their clickthrough performance compares. You can then get a better return on investment. Repeat this process as often as needed, and remember, Google Ads uses an ad rotation system that shows the ads that are performing best throughout your campaign.

 

  1. Geotargeting

This may seem logical, but do not forget to indicate the geographical area in which you wish to have your ads shown. If you only provide services to the Montreal area, it doesn’t make sense to target the whole planet. If you analyze the Geographical Report and conclude that some Internet users are coming from locations that you do not want to target, you can exclude those locations (city, region, country etc.) the same way you do for negative keywords. This avoids wasting your advertising budget.

 

  1. Conversions

Conversions are considered customer actions that your company believes are valuable. They can include purchases, signups, downloads, web page visits or lead generation. To optimize your tracking of conversion actions, consider the following questions:

  • Does your conversion follow-up work?
  • Does the conversion action align with your company’s most important KPI (Key Performance Indicator)?
  • Is the conversion tag on the correct page of your web site or is the Google Analytics corresponding to the correct page and action?
  • Are you tracking too many conversions?

Web marketing experts recommend you follow no more than two conversion actions on Google Ads. For example, for an e-commerce website, it could be sales (a primary KPI) and shopping cart add-ons (a secondary KPI).

In contrast, with Google Analytics, you can follow secondary conversion actions like newsletter signups, downloads of a catalogue or activity on a chat.

The problem with following too many conversions is that each one has a different value; therefore, the overall picture can give a distorted perspective on your actual return on investment of your advertising dollars.

  1. Budgets

A PPC budget requires monitoring and regular adjustments which means you should allocate your budget according to the ad campaign or keywords performance. Keep in mind, often the name of your company or your brand has a high conversion rate, but this doesn’t mean you should invest more on these keywords. The more targeted for conversion, the better.

Bonus Tip: Bing Ads now offers a tool to estimate conversions based on your budget to make it easier and quicker to optimize your budget.

 

Final Advice

Improving and optimizing your PPC campaign is an on-going process based on Internet users behavior and search trends over time. The more you carefully target your keywords and ads, the more you improve your campaign’s performance and optimize your budget.

If you don’t have the time, patience, or knowledge to manage your Google Ads campaign, Amauta Marketing is here to ensure the best possible return on your investment based on your budget.

 

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9 most frequent mistakes in a PPC campaign

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PPC advertising is an online marketing technique for search engines. Companies using this technique pay each time an Internet user clicks on their ad to visit their website. Its biggest advantage is that visitors are brought to their website immediately. However, there are many traps to avoid. Here are 9 of the most common mistakes preventing companies from getting maximum benefit out of their PPC campaigns.

 

Mistake #1: Not targeting by geographical zone

Whether you’re a local or international company, geotargeting your audience is extremely important. Avoid unnecessary expenses and only target regions that offer a maximum return on your investment. For small companies, a maximum return can only happen in a 30-kilometer radius on average. Furthermore, companies selling high-end services can benefit from a return on their investment by targeting high-end regions. Finally, big companies benefit by adapting their campaigns by country. A wide range of factors should be considered and can play a direct role in the campaign performance: such as available revenue, needs, spending habits, currency value, etc.

Mistake #2: Forgetting to remove undesirable websites

The excluding option allows you to remove partner sites with low yields originating from Display Search Network. Avoid losing thousands of dollars by removing websites or pages that are not a direct link with your target audience. To do so, select Networks tab then select Show All Details link beside Automatic Placements and remove all underperforming or undesirable websites.

Mistake #3 : Ignoring keywords corresponding options

Often times, PPC newcomers do not know the existence of the four corresponding keywords types. These options allow control over which searches will trigger the ad display and maximize client’s campaigns and budgets.

Here is an example with “Red Kite” as keywords:

  • Exact keywords: This type of search allows you to precisely target a particular group of potential clients. All searches with the exact expression « Red Kite » will trigger the ad display.
  • Exact expression: Searches containing one of the exact keywords, an expression or a variation will trigger the ad display. For example: “Red Kite” or “Miami Red Kite”
  • Large request: This type of search allows you to display your ad to a very large audience. Searches containing typos and synonyms, associated searches and other pertinent variations will trigger the ad display. For example: “Kite” or “Ki-te”.
  • Large request modifying: Searches containing modified expression (or close variations but no synonyms) will trigger an ad display regardless of the order in which expressions are captured. For example +Ki+te.

There are many ways to create keywords. Keep in mind that a large keywords search is often less expensive than an exact keywords search and that it can be relatively well controlled with the exclusion of negative keywords. You can therefore do a larger search with lower offers while diminishing the search volume and doing another search with higher offers while using exact keywords. The trick is to simply keep those that work best in the campaign and put on pause those that perform less.

Mistake #4: Not using negative keywords 

Negative keywords are your filters. The addition of negative keywords is simple, it will make your life easier and will diminish search volume. You can find a long list through Google keywords tool in the tab “Keywords” and selecting “See all search expressions”.

Mistake #5: Not separating the two types of campaigns

Here we can only blame Google. Google strongly suggests to new Google Ads campaign creators to choose a Search Campaign. Google is of the opinion that a Display Campaign would be too complicated to manage for a newcomer. It is incredibly wise for companies to have segmented campaigns in relation to a Search Campaign. The reason is simple: in all likelihood, the performance will be definitely better in the search network with Selective Display. The separation of these campaigns offers maximum control on budget allocation, which allows you to harvest a higher return on investment in the first steps of the campaign. After maxing out your investment budget, it is logical to start developing the display network. A quick solution is to copy your campaign in Google Ads Editor, to rename your campaigns based on the network and to adjust the selected networks in the parameters tab.

Mistake #6: Selecting keywords with weak targeting

Lots of companies make the mistake of choosing too vague and too large keywords. Word relevance is paramount in PPC advertising if one wants to have a good return on investment. For example, a company selling cheese has “appetizer” as a keyword. Even though cheese could be considered an appetizer, the word appetizer is too large and too many elements can be included in that category: canapés, shrimp bites, macaroons, deviled eggs, etc. It is way more efficient to choose keywords that communicate not only the product or service (cheddar cheese, goat cheese) but also the intention (in this case “online fine cheese”). These better targeted keywords will bring back a higher yield.

  • Large request: This type of search allows you to display your ad to a very large audience. Searches containing typos and synonyms, associated searches and other pertinent variations will trigger the ad display. For example: “Kite” or “Ki-te”.
  • Large request modifying: Searches containing modified expression (or close variations but no synonyms) will trigger an ad display regardless of the order in which expressions are captured. For example +Ki+te.

There are many ways to create keywords. Keep in mind that a large keywords search is often less expensive than an exact keywords search and that it can be relatively well controlled with the exclusion of negative keywords. You can therefore do a larger search with lower offers while diminishing the search volume and doing another search with higher offers while using exact keywords. The trick is to simply keep those that work best in the campaign and put on pause those that perform less.

Mistake #4: Not using negative keywords 

Negative keywords are your filters. The addition of negative keywords is simple, it will make your life easier and will diminish search volume. You can find a long list through Google keywords tool in the tab “Keywords” and selecting “See all search expressions”.

Mistake #5: Not separating the two types of campaigns

Here we can only blame Google. Google strongly suggests to new Google Ads campaign creators to choose a Search Campaign. Google is of the opinion that a Display Campaign would be too complicated to manage for a newcomer. It is incredibly wise for companies to have segmented campaigns in relation to a Search Campaign. The reason is simple: in all likelihood, the performance will be definitely better in the search network with Selective Display. The separation of these campaigns offers maximum control on budget allocation, which allows you to harvest a higher return on investment in the first steps of the campaign. After maxing out your investment budget, it is logical to start developing the display network. A quick solution is to copy your campaign in Google Ads Editor, to rename your campaigns based on the network and to adjust the selected networks in the parameters tab.

Mistake #6: Selecting keywords with weak targeting

Lots of companies make the mistake of choosing too vague and too large keywords. Word relevance is paramount in PPC advertising if one wants to have a good return on investment. For example, a company selling cheese has “appetizer” as a keyword. Even though cheese could be considered an appetizer, the word appetizer is too large and too many elements can be included in that category: canapés, shrimp bites, macaroons, deviled eggs, etc. It is way more efficient to choose keywords that communicate not only the product or service (cheddar cheese, goat cheese) but also the intention (in this case “online fine cheese”). These better targeted keywords will bring back a higher yield.

Mistake #7: Not testing your ads

Testing ads is part of a PPC campaign development process. This step is indispensable to determine which words, sentences, and final offers to call out to your target audience. It allows you to improve and optimize campaign performances. For starter, try to test 3 ads per ad group. Test first 3 different ad models. Once you have 300 clicks sampling per ad, you should be able to start determining keywords performance and underperformance. Make sure to not only evaluate click rates. A high click rate can indeed affect a campaign even though it doesn’t generate conversions. For the second phase of testing, experiment by refining your keywords to generate more conversions. You should notice that by using strong adjectives such as “powerful” or “free”, your ad generates more positive results. Once again, keep your first winning ad as a model.

Mistake #8: Sending Internet users to the home page

The PPC golden rule is to control the user experience as much as possible. Use research, tests and analysis to discover exactly what makes them tick. Provide an attractive visual experience in response to their needs. If you send a user to the home page, you will see your budget quickly fly away when they click on your “Mission Statement” or “Site Plan” before leaving the page. Instead, use a landing page as close as possible to their search intentions. This should include heads, content, copy, images, and call to action buttons.

Mistake #9: Not following up on conversion

What abruptly ends a PPC campaign is the absence of conversion follow up. Conversion data is important because it allows users to quickly understand the campaign, ad groups and keyword’s financial return. This data affects all aspects of ad campaign optimizing from performance tests to landing pages up to bidding adjustments.

 

 

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