Are you running Google Adwords campaigns? In this blog post, we will review a few simple but very effective tips to boost their performance in 2018. Whether you are looking for tactics that could maximize your existing Adwords campaigns or maybe you are only thinking about launching your first PPC campaign, try these five tips.
1. First of all, get to know the new AdWords dashboard version which now offers interesting and useful features which were not available in the previous version, such as bundling different campaign types, enhanced graphs, new filtering suggestions, and advanced bid adjustment options.
2. Write a text ad copy that mirrors search phrases that people actually use when they search for a product/service relevant to your business.
Instead of writing about your business or a product, spend some time researching for what phrases people tend to use when they are looking for a product/service you offer and use it in your ad copy headline and descriptions.
By focusing on phrases people are more likely to use, you have more chances to get their attention since your ad copy reflects their search intent.
For example, instead of writing a headline “Best Movers Company in Toronto – Call Us Now,” try to include more conversational terms, such as “Long Distance Moving Company Toronto – Book Online Today”.
As another example, the ad copy “We Train Dogs – Call Us Now” is focused more on you, not on a customer. Instead, you could try something like “Trusted Dog Trainers in Toronto – Book Your Appointment Online”.
See the difference? In the first version, the business is talking about itself; in the second version the focus is directed on the customer and incorporates phrases that they tend to use.
3. Take advantage of various ad extensions
While Google Adwords has decided to stop using review extensions, (and it was difficult to follow all the requirements Adwords had in order for your third-party review to be approved anyway), there are a number of highly useful extensions that could help to improve the click-through rate of your ads and earn you better real-estate on the search results page.
One of the interesting new ad extensions is the Promotional Extension. It basically shows special sales and offers with ads. You can also assign a specific “Occasion” to the offer by selecting a holiday or special events such as Christmas, Black Friday, or Boxing Day (or you can use just a standard format).
Here are the main promotion types:
Advertisers need to specify which of these 4 categories best describes their sale or promotion:
- Monetary discount: A static dollar amount that a product will be discounted. The promotion will read “$X off…”
- Percent discount: A set percent that all orders will be discounted. The promotion will read “X% off….”
- Up to monetary discount: A maximum static dollar amount that your orders may be discounted. The promotion will read “Up to $X off…”
- Up to percent discount: A maximum percent that your orders may be discounted. The promotion will read “Up to X% off…”
Another really handy ad extension is the Price extensions.
This is a great new feature for businesses who have various service offerings or products they would like to feature with specific prices, as it allows you to separate out each service, the price, a brief description, and even send each ad to a different landing page.
Test all available ad extensions for your ads and see which work for you best.
4. Don’t forget about conversion tracking
To track your campaign performance and then being able to optimize your keywords, ads and even targeting accordingly based on valid results you will have from conversion tracking.
You can either set up one conversion action, for example, to track purchases on your website, or track multiple conversions to track a sign up on your landing page and another to track calls from your ads or Installs of your Android or iOS mobile apps, and purchases or other activity within those apps.
5. Take advantage of audience targeting
Last but not least, Google Adwords now allows targeting specific audience not only within display campaigns but in search campaigns as well.
You can select the type of audiences you want to reach by their intent, allowing you to target users who are actively researching products or services relevant to your business. You can also try remarketing, reaching people who previously interacted with your business. Demographic targeting is also a very interesting feature that will let you target your search campaigns to specific audiences based on gender, age or even income, including by bidding up your top performing genders, age or average annual income or excluding demographics for which you would prefer you ad not be shown to.
For display campaigns, besides the intent and remarketing targeting you can also take advantage of the affinity targeting, which will let you reach groups of people based on their lifestyles, buying habits, and long-term interests.
Don’t forget to always experiment with ad copy and targeting, and learn from strong and poor performing campaigns.
If you need assistance implementing any of the points that have been covered in this post, shoot us a message at [email protected] and we’ll be happy to help you. And please, don’t forget to share your thoughts in the comments below!
Very well explained marketing tips. Pay per click,Social Media Marketing and in fact all the marketing methods are very creative tricks.
I really appreciate this article. I think, Budgeting for PPC involves careful consideration of two things: time and money.
Hi, I like the way this article is written. It’s easy and fun to read while being rich in information on how to increase the performance of your AdWords campaigns.
I understand better that Google is worried about its advertisers. It has changed its interface and introduced new features such as the promotional extension.
I like it. It is effective and can truly help achieve business goals.
Once again thanks to Aisulu for this article and good luck to Reshift Media