Have you wanted to optimize your paid search campaigns?
The thing is, managing your paid search campaign is all about data, and data comes faster after you launch a new digital marketing campaign.
Before you optimize your campaign, you should be sure your top goal is from your paid search marketing campaign.
The last thing you want to do is attempt to optimize everything.
If you follow our strategies outlined below, you’ll be on the way to getting more for your digital marketing dollar.
When you advertise in several channels or campaigns in Google Ads, it’s vital to watch which channel produces the best residuals for your primary keyword performance indicator (KPI).
For instance, paid search has a higher conversion rate than YouTube, but that doesn’t mean the latter isn’t involved in the sale that paid search results gets credit for.
You should take time to grasp which search results campaigns and channels perform the best and then direct more of your budget that way.
Another vital factor in optimizing is the budget and search impression share. This is especially important when you are bidding on branded search terms in your niche.
Go over your impression share for locations where you defend the keywords for your brand, as well as any search terms that often convert to sales for you.
If you find yourself falling behind on share as you have a small budget, review how the funding is allocated.
If you don’t know what your competitors are doing in their PPC campaigns, you may flounder when forming your own. They will either dominate you when it comes to getting clicks or you’ll make errors they figured out long ago. You don’t want to be playing catch up with your competitors, right?
There are many ways to leverage what you know about your competitors as you form your paid search campaign strategy.
PPC tools help you to analyze the paid search marketing strategy for each of your competitors.
You can find tools that show the ad keywords for your competition, as well as their current paid search advertisements.
Some even allow you to review their advertisement history, which offers you insight into the google ads/ppc ads that do the best for them.
Outstanding performance in your PPC campaigns depends on a robust account structure.
You should ensure that ad groups clearly defined and that the keywords in each ad group are closely related to each other.
The more organization and relevancy in the account, the easier it is to focus on improving PPC ROI in different parts of your business.
Experts in the industry report that it’s ideal to have several ad campaign for each of your products and locations. Another way to organize your campaigns that work well is to base it on your site structure.
You can make bid adjustments at many levels. If you’re doing traditional, manual bid management, you do this at the keyword level.
But there are various aspects of your paid search campaign where you may consider applying additional bid adjustments.
For instance, you can adjust your bids by the day or hour of the day. Also, consider if you want to exclude certain times of the day or days during the week to ensure you get the best results.
Many recommend accessing Account Settings/Ad Schedule and putting in the dayparting schedule there.
Even if you run google ads 24/7, you have an appealing visual to review to check performance. Otherwise, you need to pull a new report every time.
After you do your competitive analysis, you should know how you can improve your online advertising copy to get more clicks.
Paid search ad copy is short – only 25 characters per headline and 70 characters for the ad – the text you write needs to get the person’s attention and get them to click.
If you see one of your competitors using a certain ad for weeks, there is a reason for it. The ad probably is getting clicks, so it’s a good template to use. Don’t copy what they’re doing, but look at the style and tone, as well as the keywords. After you look at some successful ads for your competitors, you probably can get an idea of what to do.
As well as getting some inspiration from your competitors, you should test your google ads to see which does the best. So, you should have two or more versions of the same ad so you can see the one that gets the most clicks.
Many marketers don’t realize how important performance by location is; some geographic areas perform differently from others. As you review and make adjustments to your top goal, you can increase the efficiency of your paid search campaigns.
If you are running your ad campaign nationwide, it’s also vital to keep track of how much budget the cities eat compared to how well they convert the prospect into a client.
You can look at the reports that reveal your location performance by accessing Campaign/Locations/User Location Report.
You can reduce your bids on locations that don’t perform as well or even think about excluding them.
If you review what users are searching for to get a match with your keywords, it informs about how paid search logic operates. But also helps you pinpoint the parts of queries that you don’t want to show up for.
This is where negative keywords can play a vital role and may help you avoid wasting money.
What the system counts as a conversion plays a vital role in determining the bidding mechanism performance.
Goggle allows you to monitor many user action types, but consider the difference between having the actions checked in conversion and bidding formulas vs. having it only for additional information.
Over months, older conversions may not matter as much. Or you could include a conversion type that was getting double counted because it was part of a current conversion type.
It’s wise to review these every quarter to ensure only counting the proper user actions for a conversion.
Keywords are the basis of paid search and organic paid search marketing, so doing a regular keyword review is a vital step in this process. The keywords you select in your campaign need to be focused on getting clicks from prospects. So, only keywords that have commercial intent can apply to your campaign.
So, you want searchers using those keywords to be as close to purchasing as possible. And remember: Don’t only select the most expensive keywords; there are niche keywords that can perform well that cost much less.
Adjusting bids by keyword is crucial because you need to review how they perform vs. the goal. You should ask yourself: Are there some keywords that don’t perform even though you check search queries, adjust bids, test landing pages, and testing various match types?
If that is the case, it may be time to remove these keywords from your campaign.
The landing page may be overlooked when measuring performance because they aren’t part of the ads account.
Nonetheless, the landing page is crucial to your ad account’s performance.
Why do people overlook landing pages?
First, landing pages are not as easy to adjust as other elements of a campaign.
Also, some brands may not want to spend money on landing pages. But landing pages often are the best way to convert prospects into clients.
Remember: Keywords and ads attract prospects to your website, and landing pages seal the deal.
It’s also important to review your campaign’s performance on various devices. Are your landing pages and pages easy to view on mobile devices?
How are your advertising campaigns doing on mobile vs. tablet vs. pc? And do you need to make adjustments to a particular device or exclude it from your ad campaign?
Don’t forget to check how each remarketing list is doing in a search and any necessary adjustments. If you’re using demographics for your inquiry, how is a particular age range doing vs. others?
Put in as many audiences as you wish at the Observation level, and see how they compare to baseline users.
Well, much depends on your goal.
Also, it depends on how your current campaigns are working.
For example, are your ad campaigns getting many clicks with a high click through rate (CTR) but only a handful of conversions?
Then it may be wise to review search queries to see how relevant they are.
Then, look at the landing pages to ensure they use best practices.
Also, review performance by device to note a big difference in different electronics your users are using.
The bottom line is there are many parts of paid search that you should review, analyze and optimize with regularity.
Let our paid search management services help you shine above your competition and maintain the ROAS you deserve.
Contact us today!
So, your company is paying big bucks for Google Ads, But Google ads not showing.
However, this isn’t always a problem.
But if you don’t see them with the Google Ad Preview tool, something’s wrong.
Fortunately, there is usually a good reason Google Ads don’t appear.
Below, we delve into why Google Ads not showing or don’t show up and what to do about it.
Some of the reasons they don’t show are technical or administrative issues, and others are performance-related issues.
Most Google Ad account holders pay for their ads with automatic credit card or debit payments. Google charges the account when you get to your payment limit or threshold. It also will charge your card at the end of the month’s billing period.
For your transactions to be processed, the payment details on your card need to be correct. When Google can’t charge the card, the ads won’t appear.
This is one of the most common reasons Google Ads not showing or don’t run. So make sure your payment information is accurate when setting up your account.
Many account holders also have their credit card expire and they forget to update the information.
If you see ‘Low search volume’ in your account, you probably target long-tail keyword’s that few searchers are looking for.
Long-tail keywords can potentially bring high traffic. But this won’t happen if they are stopping your Google ads from showing up. When Google sees that you are going after low-volume keywords, it will make the ad inactive in the account.
You can fix the problem by seeing if your keywords are in the low keyword search volume category. Go to the Keyword part of your Google Ads account and review ad Status. If you see ‘low search volume,’ you can see the problem.
If the keyword is rarely searched for because it’s extremely niche, use a broader term to cover more searches.
Google evaluates ads based on how relevant they are to what the person is searching for. But it also judges by how relevant your landing pages is to the ad and keyword. So the ad rank will drop if the landing pages isn’t optimized and meaningful to the user.
Solve the problem by examining the targeted keywords you target and thinking about what the searcher is looking for.
What are the questions the searcher has? What is causing their problem? What are they looking for to solve their issue?
The landing pages should answer these critical questions. The message must match the ad and the landing pages.
Some advertisers simply don’t put enough time, effort, and research into the quality of the landing pages. But this an essential part of successful campaigns.
The more effective you are at establishing relevance between the landing page and the ad, the more often your ads appear.
Using negative keywords in your ad campaigns ensures you don’t spend money on undesired search traffic. But be careful when you set up negative keywords with broad match modified.
Check the negative keyword list and ensure that you don’t have negative keywords that cancel out keywords in any ad groups.
A phrase match keyword that doesn’t perform well may be ineligible to show ads. This may happen if your active keywords are too broad, so use long-tail keywords are different match types.
Sometimes ads don’t appear because they have been paused. Or, the google ads campaign or ad groups level where the ads reside were paused. If that’s happened with your ads, you only need to enable ads again.
Also, Google ads may not show if they were taken out of your account. If that happens, you would need to recreate them.
You can check if you paused or removed the ads by going to Change History to see what has been changed.
If nothing in your account has been paused or removed and you still don’t see ads, Google may have disapproved them. An ad that Google didn’t approve, obviously, won’t show.
You may need to review Google’s ad policies.
If you focus on a geographic location outside your area, you won’t see your Google Ads. But, of course, that also is the case if you have a different language preference option.
Also, if the language selection in the search engine is different than what is in your campaigns, you won’t see your ads.
Sometimes Google will review ad accounts. This is for security, and the search engine will check that your billing information is accurate. But your ads will not appear during the review process.
Good news – the process only takes two or three days, then the ads will show again.
However, account reviews are part of Google’s business, so there isn’t anything you can do but wait.
If, for some reason, the account is reviewed for more than three days, you will need to contact them.
Depending on how you have planned your Google Ad budget, you could run through your ad budget too fast. For instance, some Google advertisers set up their ads to deliver quickly. This can make your campaign limited by budget.
If the ad campaign shows ‘limited by budget,’ it means the ad may not show because of your CPC compared to the allotted budget. Google Ads will try to spread the budget over the day for the best performance. So, your ads will not show each time a person looks for your keywords in Google.
Address this problem by lowering bids or boosting your daily budget.
Ad Schedule: Also, try setting up your ad schedule to certain hours of the day and focus on times when there is more user engagement.
As you see by this list, there are myriad reasons your Google Ads may not appear.
Unfortunately, many users have this problem, but the good news is that it’s not difficult to fix once you pinpoint the issue.
Did you know that Google handles about 5.6 billion search queries per day?
If you want your accounting company to get more exposure, it’s essential to get as many visitors to your site as possible.
It helps a lot to have a high Google page rank for major accounting firm and CPA terms, but a pay-per-click campaign for accountants could be just what you need to set your company apart.
PPC campaigns are helpful for the accounting Firms profession for many reasons:
With Pay per click (PPC) advertising, your company’s name will appear above most results on search engine. This helps more potential clients find your business.
If your company doesn’t rank for a critical accounting keyword, you can design an ad that appears when the user types that word. Your company name and site will always get prominence above your competition with PPC ads.
With A successful PPC campaign, you have a lot of control. It’s possible to make campaign changes immediately.
Just choose the keywords you want to focus on, set how much you are spending, and write the ad.
PPC allows you to track people that click your accounting Firms or CPA website. With that data, you know which Google ads work and which don’t. You also learn which pages get the most visitors and the most effective keywords.
All of this information lets you tweak your ads for the most effectiveness over the long term.
Before setting up a PPC campaign, please review these best practices to get the most bang for your buck.
Your Pay per click (PPC) campaign should be regularly updated to ensure they are focused on the right keywords and prospects. That means you or your PPC manager need to look for the latest keyword opportunities to put into the campaign.
You can rely on many ways to find the latest keywords. One simple way is to review Google search results in your niche and look for keywords that you didn’t include in your digital marketing campaign.
Another way is using the Keyword Planner that is included in your account. This is a free tool loaded with ways to find the best and most competitive keywords. You also can review what the average cost per click is for each word. Then you can forecast what you will probably spend and the marketing budget you need.
This is essential for your accounting PPC campaign. Conversion tracking lets you check how many visitors have come to your site from the campaign. This could be through a website form, chat, or phone call.
You also can use micro-conversion that lets you see smaller types of engagement, such as signing up for the e-newsletter or downloading a white paper.
When you set up conversion tracking, you can watch how many contacts or sales have come from a period of time compared to the costs. You also will know which keywords, ads, and landing pages are the best performers. This allows you to fine-tune your paid search campaigns for the most cost-effective results.
It’s easy to get bogged down in your own company and campaign, but don’t forget to check what your competitors are up to. There are reports and tools within Google Ads that help you keep up with competitors.
Some of these tools are free, but you also can pay third parties to analyze your competition. A popular paid tool is Spyfu which shows the keywords your competitors pay for. Another good one is SERanking. Both offer a good look at what other marketers are paying every month for your keywords.
For every accounting ad group, you have in Google Ads, it’s advised to have two or three advertisements so you can test various promotions and variations. Google/search engines have several ad types you can choose from.
Google defaults to showing the best-performing ads the most. So you should watch your ads and continue running tests. Any ad that isn’t performing well should be analyzed and improved for the best digital marketing spend.
It might seem too obvious, but it’s surprising how many accounting firm target areas that don’t matter to their business. After all, if your office is in Seattle, you may not get a lot of traction running ads in Miami. Sure, some clients can be remote, but many people don’t want to use an accountant that isn’t in their town.
You can easily set up location targeting in your Google Ad account by clicking Settings, Locations, and City/Region/Zip Code.
The recommendations page in your Google account offers many helpful opportunities to improve your campaign. Recommendations are created automatically by Google’s algorithm when it sees chances to make your campaign better.
There are lots of recommendations on this page that can help your accounting PPC campaign. Some include dynamic search as, targeting and keywords, responsive search ads, and more.
You also will notice an optimization score. This is Google’s estimate of how well your account is performing. Applying their recommendations helps the campaign improve.
The list of keywords for accountants is often shorter than for other PPC ads advertisers. This means there are fewer search variations even when your campaign targets several geographic locations.
That said, you still might dig up a few long tail keywords that work well for your accounting business.
It’s often worthwhile to use board match keyword versions of other keywords and match types. Experts say it’s ideal to begin with phrase and exact match keywords. Then, put in broad match after a few weeks or months when you want more clicks.
Don’t neglect negative keywords, either. For accountants, this can include keywords that are related to people searching for jobs, careers, resumes, etc.
PPC is one of the most powerful and cost-efficient ways for accountants to grow their brand and practice. Use these tips and your accounting firm will be well ahead of the competition.
If you manage a pay-per-click (PPC) account, you may always search for ‘the best way’ to increase ad performance.
Many different strategies work for various companies, but one surefire way to get better PPC performance is to bid on your branded keywords.
At first glance, this sounds like a waste.
Why should you run ads on branded keywords that already give you a high organic Google/search engines listing?
We’re glad you asked because the reasons we offer in this article should convince you that spending money on branded keywords offers excellent PPC ROI.
Want the best strategy to control the message of your own brand Or brand keywords? Bid on it! The landing page and advertising copy you want prospects to go to when they look for your brand name can be highly controlled with pay-per-click advertising.
If you don’t use branded clicks and the prospect puts your company name in search, they usually go to the home page/search engine results page. That’s fine but it probably isn’t the page that is most likely to make them take action.
If you can control the message the prospect sees – such as highlighting your most popular product – it’s more likely they will take the action you want.
Say your company sells regulatory webinars and it’s currently offering a discount on an annual pass. When a prospect looks for your company name, you need to be sure they are aware of the discount in the advertisement copy.
When they click the ad, they will be sent to the landing page to learn everything about the yearly discount, which will include a call to action to get them to purchase.
Let’s say you decide to use a branded keyword campaign and it’s doing very well. That’s awesome and it comes with another benefit: It enhances your account’s/social media accounts Quality score.
Having a branded keyword part of your PPC campaigns means the account gets a better Quality Score, and having a higher grade is very important for search placement.
If you own a home or investment properties, you know their location is often more important than anything. Even if the home is really attractive, you could have problems if the neighborhood is so-so.
In a similar vein, using track-branded keywords helps you to own as many of the SERPs as possible. You want to do so with your regular Branded keywords ads, but it’s very difficult to show up in paid search ads and high organically for every Branded keyword.
Spending on branded keywords gives you a bigger boost. Your site will be high in the rankings organically. And, the branded ad also will appear.
A visitor may click either one, but it always helps to occupy more SERP real estate. The more of that space you occupy, the more likely the customer will wind up on your site.
Does it seem like your partners and affiliates present your brand and products well? Great! But don’t take that to mean you should never bid on your brand. The opposite is true, actually.
Working with partners and affiliates is worthwhile; it increases your market reach and potential revenues. But it’s understandable that you probably prefer to sell to your prospects directly.
When you bid on branded keywords, this makes sure the ad shows alongside ads that your partners and affiliates placed.
If you see bidding on your company brand by competitors, then you really need to start doing it.
Using branded keywords means raising your CTR and Quality Score. After all, branded keywords are highly relevant to your landing pages and ads.
Once you lock in that higher Quality Score, you get a lower CPC, too! Branded searches will automatically put branded ads at the top of search results.
No one can guarantee that getting branded clicks to your site is cheaper than others. But many in the industry say this is often true.
Also, the price for non-branded Keyword and branded keywords can be really different. There are some companies that pay up to $20 per click for non-branded keyword but only $2 for branded keywords!
You can track organic searches with a search console, but the functionality is limited. With a paid search/digital marketing campaign and branded keywords, you will gain valuable information about your customers.
You’ll collect branded keyword data from ad licks but you can take advantage of ad extensions to get even more insights and data.
Conversion tracking with a PPC ads campaign also lets you collect information on demographics, and you can find out the days and times you get the most site Organic traffic. With this critical data, you will be able to make improved decisions about your ads and SEO or search engine optimization strategy.
If you try various versions of branded keywords Or Find branded keywords, you could discover search results that give you more insight into your customers.
Some companies say they found new target markets they can target with unique landing pages. And it all comes from just using branded keywords as part of your Digital marketing efforts.
If you aren’t convinced to bid on your branded keywords after reviewing our list, your reluctance is understandable; who wants to spend unnecessary money on ads? However, experience shows that bidding on branded keywords could give you some of the best ROI in your Digital marketing spend.
If your company is operating a pay-per-click or PPC campaigns, you should spend some of your ad budgets on branded keywords. Some experts say you should dedicate about 15% of your ad budget to branded keywords.
This is an effective strategy because it’s some of the least expensive web traffic you can get. Also, by targeting branded search terms:
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