PPC advertising through utilising Google Ads is one of the most powerful tools you can use when marketing your business across the web.
PPC (Pay-Per-Click) advertising is one of the most established forms of digital marketing there is, and we understand completely if you are confused by the prospect of using it for your business. Make no mistake, PPC is important; but first, we need understand why and if it is something you believe would benefit your online marketing strategy.
Simply put, PPC is where businesses pay for each click that their ads receive. Often marketers bid for key search terms, where their ads will be displayed in search results, or they pay for ads to appear in user feeds, videos, web-pages, and more.
PPC not only provides quick results and reliable returns (dependant on the budget you want to spend), but it is also one of the most ubiquitous styles of advertising. By gaining greater visibility on Google, visitors to your products or service will be much more likely to convert. Having advertisement in place makes you look more professional also, as everyone understands that there is a cost when it comes to advertising your business.
Perhaps the most powerful reason to use PPC advertising is that it contributes to a variety of business and marketing goals. From high-level brand exposure to e-commerce and shopify sales, PPC is a powerful tool for aligning website traffic drivers to end-goals (purchases, contact forms, phone calls…etc). Let’s have a look at some of the other key factors that PPC can provide for your business.
Measurable and Trackable Data/Results
This is arguably the single greatest draw for using PPC. Unlike search engine optimisation that focuses on ‘organic’ traffic growth, PPC advertising can give marketers results as soon as their ads go live.
Once your campaign is set up and put in place, it can take up to a week for Google to learn the algorithm of your keywords and search terms, but you are given results on the go, showing how your campaign performs and grows overtime. This means that Google will identify which of your keywords will perform the best and which have low search volumes, ensuring that you are not spending your budget on keywords that are not common.
By simply using the Google Ads tool in combination with Google Analytics, you can clearly see what was spent and what it drove in terms of your end goals. You’ll see high-level performance details including impressions, clicks, and conversions. So if a certain keyword was driving a lot more conversions in comparison to another, you would know to put more budget in that certain keyword.
Works Alongside SEO
Naturally, PPC and SEO work well together as the impressions and opportunities for traffic are often to the same audience. All of these factors of paid advertising will contribute hugely towards the website traffic and views of your website. Using performance data of impressions, clicks, and conversions from Google Ads can provide great insight and direction for where to prioritise SEO efforts. If a particular landing page was generating huge attraction from the PPC, then you would know to target that page SEO to make it the best landing page possible, ensuring there are calls-to-action and outgoing links.
Target Your Ideal Customer
Especially for local businesses, you may be looking to target a specific area or demographic that you believe are your strongest assets. Unlike traditional paid advertising, PPC gives extreme levels of control that works because businesses can boost ad spend for areas/demographics/queries that work for them, and reduce ad spend in areas that don’t work.
For example, if you are a pet shop based in Stroud, open 9AM to 5PM, who do not offer delivery services; you would set your implications to:
- Only show call-to-action during opening hours
- People aged 21+ only (prioritise women)
- People within Stroud
- People within Gloucestershire
- People who have recently searched for animal food/products
This means your ads won’t be wasted on those who have no interest in your service, or those who do not live in your area where you operate. Research shows that women aged 25-45 are the most common audience for purchasing pet food or products, thus targeting them by putting most of your spending budget will ensure a better return-on-investment. If you aren’t taking advantage of the different ways in which you can use PPC marketing, your business is losing out on valuable traffic and revenue. Make sure you are appearing in front of the right audience who are ready to spend.
Because these platforms have a huge wealth of user data, they can give ad options that are based on things like:
- Age, gender, language, and other demographic data.
- Global, national, and even local locations.
- User interests, hobbies, careers etc.
- Previous shopping habits, brand interests, and web browsing.
- Device, mobile vs. desktop use, and cross-platform browsing habits.
- Education level, income, and employment.
- Life events.
- Political affiliations.
You Are In Total Control
Although Google like to give recommendations of what to do to make your campaigns more effective, you are in complete control of what you spend, conduct keyword research on and what avenues you take in order to attract the best ROI. Pay-per-click advertising is built entirely around budget, for this reason it offers a much greater level of control than traditional paid advertising strategies.
For common paid ads styles like search engine PPC, you only pay for the clicks! There’s no paid barrier to entry, and there is no minimum ad budget. Businesses can choose to spend as much or as little money as they want. For many businesses this might seem daunting, but it’s a big part of why lots choose to hire PPC management experts like ourselves.
If you want to start small and then scale up when you start seeing positive results, you have that option. Keep in mind though, you will have to pay somewhere close to the market rate to play in most cases. Especially if your competitors are already using PPC, you will have to either match or budget higher than them to appear above them. Likewise, if campaigns are not working the way you like them to be, you can simply pause them and complete some maintenance work on them, it really is that simple!
So, if you are interested in learning more about how PPC can benefit your business, make sure you give us a call today on 01452 534 860 or visit our website to view our variety of services and packages.