Also, how PPC helps you reach your customers
Pay-per-click advertising plays an important role in any marketing strategy. That may be a bold statement for some, especially since this advertising strategy intimidates many small and medium-sized business owners. And if you’re like many people, you can’t help but wonder, “Does pay-per-click work?”
You figure that if you pay Google even a small amount, say $ 1.00 per click, your advertising budget will be exhausted in no time considering all the Google searches that are performed on a daily basis.
Let’s explore why this assumption could be stunting growth and how pay-per-click advertising drives profit and brand awareness.
First, what is pay per click?
We’ve all seen search engine results labeled ‘Ad’ at the top and bottom of a search engine results page (SERP). Pay per click (PPC) is a marketing strategy that allows advertisers to place ads online and pay the hosting platform (eg Google or Bing) when someone clicks on their ad. The marketer using the PPC strategy hopes that the ad will lead the user to click on the marketer’s app or website and purchase a product or service, or take some other valuable action. Search engines host PPC ads, which display ads at the top and bottom of the SERPs that are relevant to your users’ search queries. Pay per click with Google AdWords is one of the best options. Bing is another, as many computers today come loaded with Bing as the default search engine.
Google AdWords: paid search
One of the most popular PPC advertising platforms is Google. What could be better than placing your ad in front of the same person who is searching for what you are selling in real time? The moment they enter their search query, Google displays a relevant paid search result to show them exactly where to buy that product or service.
How paid search works
Each search query point on the search engine results page (SERP) triggers an instant auction for the keywords that the user enters in the search bar. Advertisers bid on these keywords in advance when setting up their marketing campaigns through the advertising account. The search engine then determines the winning bid for that keyword based on a combination of factors, including bid amounts and the quality of the ads. The winner gets the first position, and others fall below them at the top or bottom of page one, page two, etc.
Offer adjustments
Don’t see any results? Advertisers can adjust their bids at any time, based on the best criteria for their campaign. For example, let’s say a particular marketing campaign works well on mobile devices. In that case, the advertiser can increase their bid by a certain percentage to ensure that their ad is shown more frequently on cell phones and tablets.
Conversion tracking and cost per click
Why is conversion tracking important? Because you need to know how much money you are making (or losing) with an ad. It’s the only way to determine if your cost per click (CPC) is affecting your earnings.
Negative keywords: Google
With so much emphasis on bidding on the best keywords, you might not think about adding keywords that you don’t want to rank for. However, keeping those words in mind can eliminate unproductive clicks (the clicks you pay for whether or not they turn into sales).
For example, if you’re a pizzeria targeting the keyword phrase “Florida pizza,” you don’t want to attract job seekers by delivering pizzas. Therefore, you may want to enter “pizza jobs” as a negative keyword to prevent your ad from showing for searches for the keyword.
A real world example we have found is that of a company offering cold therapy to reduce “saddlebags” on the hips and thighs. Before launching your PPC campaign, we entered “Harley Davidson” or “bike saddlebags” as negative keywords. This tactic prevents the customer from showing up for those search results or paying for inadvertent clicks.
Just scroll down to the section where you can add negative keywords to your campaign, click the + sign and add a negative keyword phrase to ensure that Google doesn’t show your ad to users who enter an unwanted keyword phrase. in your search query.
Pixel remarketing
With the dawn of user data collection, retargeting programmatic advertising has become one of the top strategies to be a priority for someone preparing to buy your product or service. Remarketing pixels allow you to show targeted ads to specific people who have already interacted with your digital properties (for example, the website). You can embed these pixels on your website, in emails, and when setting up your pay-per-click ad on a search engine or social media platform.
The HTML code that is invisible to the user tracks the behavior of your email subscriber, website visitor or social media follower from the moment they interact with the digital media that you have embedded with the tracking pixel. The data collected by these tracking devices provides information about user behavior that could help you formulate your content strategy, including personalized email marketing sequences. If you use them in Google AdWords PPC ads, your ads could follow the user, appearing on other websites or social media platforms they visit after interacting with your remarketing pixel.
Video remarketing
Video remarketing, also known as retargeting, is a form of PPC advertising that uses a tracking pixel to collect identifying information about users who have previously visited your website, watched a video, or interacted with your digital content. Video remarketing then serves video ads to that contact list. For example, if you are using YouTube, you can set up video ad campaigns that show specific YouTube videos to users who have viewed a specific video. They watch that video, then YouTube will show them the video you want them to see next (for example, a video you created to advertise your product or service).
Taking care of your pay-per-click marketing strategy
Pay per click is not a marketing strategy that you can set once and forget about it. To get the most bang for your buck, you need to take care of it on a daily basis. From budgeting to analytics to bid adjustments, everything you do to stay on top of your PPC campaign will improve your bottom line. Click here for an easy-to-follow PPC checklist.
Social media advertising and outreach ads
As an advertiser, you may also want to consider social media advertising as another way to reach more potential customers. Social media advertising is about putting some money behind an already performing social post, then deciding your demographic (gender, age, location radius, even interests) and setting a budget and time frame for your promotion. Facebook is one of the leading social media platforms for advertising, but there is a difference between social advertising and pay-per-click. On social media, the advertiser’s country for impressions, not clicks.
- Facebook: push a post or post an ad
- Instagram: sponsor a post
- Twitter: promote a tweet
- LinkedIn: Promote a LinkedIn post
- More pay per click tips
- Design multiple ads in batches and update ads quickly to avoid ad fatigue and banner blindness.
- Look at your campaign numbers on a daily basis and tweak negative keywords, bids, and creatives as needed to improve results.
- Use remarketing pixels to trigger your ad to show on other sites your potential customers visit.
- Make a remarketing video that explains what it would be like to be a customer of your business and include a testimonial.
- Use opposing messages (for example, if your funnel is emotional, your video should be logical, and vice versa).
- Remarketing with a video ad that shows what it’s like to buy your product or be one of your customers.
- Use multiple title variations and test your ads in a split A / B way.
Pay-per-click advertising can play an important role in your marketing plan if you know how to maximize your results.