There are many companies out there that specialize in PPC campaigns, especially Google AdWords. Google AdWords can either be a very effective tool for small businesses, or the biggest drain on their marketing budget. It makes sense to have someone who really understands Google AdWords create and manage your campaigns for you, but if you’re looking to handle your PPC efforts on your own, here are 5 steps for a more effective PPC campaign.
This should be the rule for ANY marketing that you do, but it definitely pays off when you’re working with Google AdWords. You really need to understand what a prospective client might type in for a search when they’re looking for a company like yours. What are you looking for and how can your product or service help? Keep in mind where a client might be in the sales cycle, and create campaigns based on different levels of interest. What do we mean by that? Maybe you want to attract searchers just getting started in their search, in which case you should use keyword phrases a “top of the funnel” searcher might use, and send them to an informational page. You’re building awareness about your brand and are not likely to close the deal with this searcher, so hard-core sales content on a squeeze page won’t work. The more you create campaigns with your customers in mind, including the keywords you’re using, the text in your ad, and the final landing page you send them to, the more successful your PPC efforts will be.
This alone can make or break an AdWords campaign; more accurately, your budget! There are four keyword match types:
So, which one is best? Again, broad match casts a wide net, and if you’re not committed to constantly monitoring your AdWords account, you’ll run out of budget with little to show for it. Exact match is, well, very exact. If you’re looking for a VERY specific audience, this can be great, or your ad may almost never show up! Start with phrase match and learn what works and what doesn’t; it’s the best way to dial in on how to bid correctly.
It’s rare to create a winning ad copy right out of the gate, so you need to test. Create two versions of your ad, and then watch. Which got the most clicks? The most conversions? Turned into sales? You can see all that in AdWords and you should watch, measure, refine and retest. Always. One and done won’t work in AdWords. Keep tweaking and fine-tuning until you hit the sweet spot. Keep the good one and trash the others, or even better, keep the good one, trash the others, and then create another ad to try and further one-up the performance of your best bad. You can’t be complacent with PPC!
When you’re creating ads, you’re limited; you only have a handful of characters to work with across two headlines and a description, but you can compensate for these limitations by taking advantage of ad extensions and link headline text.
Not only do ad extensions let you pack more information and links into your ads, but they give you more writing opportunities to differentiate your ads just by taking up more space in the search engine results. Ad extensions include:
There are numerous ways to enhance and improve your PPC campaigns, but following these 5 steps for a more effective PPC campaign is a good start. Not sure you want to undertake the task of creating and managing a PPC campaign? Engage the services of a small business marketing professional to help you out! Paid search can be a very powerful tool if done correctly!
Running a small business is not easy. New startups especially struggle when it comes to…
If you’re a small business owner, you want your website to be creative and interesting…
One of the easiest yet most overlooked sources of new business for small businesses is…
Marketers have a lot of different tactics to choose from when promoting a small business.…
Creating a marketing budget for your small business is essential for achieving your marketing goals.…
Link building is an important aspect of search engine optimization (SEO) and plays a significant…