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PPC Agency Blog

How to Build Better PPC Campaigns for Your Law Firm
The Electrician’s Guide to Running PPC Ads That Actually Bring In Paying Customers
High-Performance PPC for Roofing Contractors: A Tactical Guide to Lead Generation
PPC Tips to Help Plumbers Get Real Leads Without Wasting Money on Clicks
Strategies for Maximizing ROI with PPC Management
How to Use Google Ads in a Restricted or Sensitive Category
Google Ads vs. Linkedin Ads: Which is Better for Commercial Targeting?
9 Reasons To Fire Your PPC Agency
How To Start A PPC Agency?
What are the Right PPC KPIs to Track?
How to Write Great PPC Landing Page Headlines
Basic Guide to Retargeting in Google Ads PPC
Display URLs: Optimizing Display URLs for Google Ads & PPC
What Marketers Should Know About Automated Bid Algorithms in PPC
Ultimate Guide to PPC Remarketing: Bring Users Back When They Don’t Convert
Should You Avoid Automated Bidding With Google Ads?
How To Dial In Your Cost-Per-Lead Using PPC?
How to Find the Best Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) Services
PPC Management Pricing: What Should I Pay My PPC Agency?
How Much Does it Cost to Sell On Amazon?
10 Most Important PPC Metrics to Track
What Makes a Good Click-Through-Rate in Google Ads PPC?
Implementing Flexible Bid Strategies in PPC
How to Set Up Facebook Retargeting
How to Increase Landing Page Conversions
Understanding Google’s Ad Rank Formula in PPC
How to Improve Facebook Ads Conversions
How to Implement a Successful Video Ad Campaign
Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads: Which is the Better Advertising Medium for Your Business?
Negative Keywords: The How & Why of Negative Keywords List Building in Google Ads
How to Use “Not Provided Keywords” to Maximize Google Ad’s Impact
How to Avoid Choosing the Wrong Ad Rotation Setting
Chiropractor PPC: Google Ads Guide for Chiropractors
PPC Keyword Match Types & Why They Matter
PPC Marketing Management for Law Firms: A Comprehensive Guide
Broad Match: Best Practices for Targeting Broad Match Keywords in PPC
How to Use Shared Campaign Budget in Google Ads
How to Adjust for Seasonality in PPC Advertising
7 Alternative PPC Ad Networks
Improve Your PPC with Conversion Funnels
How to Use Google Keyword Planner
How to Avoid Keyword Cannibalization in PPC
12 Best Tips for PPC Calls to Action
Dynamic Search Ads for Beginners
How to Take Over Management of an Existing Google Ads Account
How & Why To Leverage Amazon Sponsored Brand Video Ads
Dayparting: Setting Up Time Of Day Bid Adjustments In PPC
How to Use Video Ads to Build Trust
How To Warm Up Your Instagram Audience
8 Tools for Analyzing Your Competitors in PPC
How To Create Better Ad Groups In PPC
How to Target Competitors On Facebook With Interest-Based Audiences
Most Common PPC Questions & a Few Answers
8 Best Link Building Tools for SEO
How To Calculate The ROI For PPC & Improve It
Strategies for Increasing Click-Through Rate in PPC
Exact Match Keywords: How to Target Exact Match Keywords in PPC
How to Perform B2B Lead Generation on Linkedin
Google Ads Suspension: ‘How-to’ Guide for Fixing a Suspended Google Ads Account
The Ultimate Guide to Google Ads Quality Score
How Often Should You Update Your Google Ads Campaigns?
How To Estimate Conversions In Google Ads
eCommerce PPC Strategies for Maximum Sales Growth
What Is ROAS? Complete Guide To Return-On-Ad-Spend For PPC
How to Scale Your PPC Campaigns
9 Pointers For Increasing The CTR For Google Ads
13 Tips for Optimizing Paid Search Campaigns
Why Aren’t My Google Ads Showing & What to Do About it
PPC for Accountants & CPAs: A Beginner’s Guide
8 Reasons to Bid on Branded Keywords in PPC
PPC Automation Tools for Scaling Campaigns
SEO vs. PPC: 21 Best Practices for Organic & Paid Marketing
When to Increase Your Bid in PPC (Pay Per Click)
Branded Search: Why Branded Searches Give the Best Conversions
How to Create Your Own PPC Project Checklist for Optimizing Time Management
5 Reasons to Use Dynamic Keyword Insertions in Google Ads
11 Effective Pop Up Ad Strategies in Paid Marketing
5 Local Lead Generation Tactics Using PPC
Complete Guide to Local PPC: How to Target for Local Paid Search
A Guide To PPC Competitor Analysis in Paid Search
Why You Should Use Dynamic Landing Pages in PPC
How to Improve Google Ads Conversions
How Much Do Instagram Ads Cost
What is Cost Per Click in PPC?
Google Ad Extensions Explained
Understanding Ineligible Clicks in Google Ads
Optimizing “People Also Search For” in PPC
Landing Page Conversion Rate Optimization for SEM/PPC Campaigns
How to Perform Keyword Research with Google Ads Keyword Tool
Optimizing PPC Campaigns for SaaS Businesses
8 Landing Page Test Ideas for PPC
9 Excel & Spreadsheet Tips for PPC Managers
How to Beat PPC Seasonality Issues
How to Do Cross Channel Lead Generation With PPC
How to Use Micro Conversions for Lead Generation with PPC
The Eventual Deprecation of Third Party Cookies
A/B Testing for PPC Lead Generation Success
12 Must Have PPC Certifications
Optimizing for Profit (Instead of CPA, CPL, or even ROI) in PPC
How to Get a Lower Cost Per Click for Your Google Ads

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Samuel Edwards
|
January 3, 2025
10 Most Important PPC Metrics to Track

When it comes to Pay-Per-Click marketing, advertisers are inundated with an endless list of metrics to track and measure. That’s because, unlike other traditional methods of advertising, PPC offers some fantastic ways to keep tabs on every aspect of a campaign. There is no denying the fact that PPC ad campaigns are data-driven to the max.

This also makes it easy for marketers to lose themselves in all the clicks, impressions, and other rates that may or may not make a real difference to the bottom line. After all, not all metrics are equal.

This begs the question: which figures are the most important to monitor?

There isn’t a one-size-fits-all answer because the most critical metrics vary according to the goals of a PPC campaign. Still, there are a few KPIs that are fundamental for the success of every campaign.

Here are the top metrics and KPIs to monitor:

1. Conversion Rate (CVR)

The number of conversions resulting from a campaign is almost always the first priority of an advertiser unless their objective is only brand awareness. Ultimately, profits start with conversion, so it’s the number one priority of any business.

To measure the conversion rate, divide a campaign’s conversions by its total clicks.

For instance, a campaign with fifty clicks and five conversions will give a conversion rate of 10% when expressed as a percentage. Even though conversions are significant for campaign managers, they sometimes create campaigns optimized for clicks instead.

2. Clicks

A click is the starting point of any conversion, making it a preliminary success indicator of a PPC campaign. It takes into account the number of people who clicked on your ad.

These clicks help campaign managers tweak their approach from time to time, even during a campaign’s running time. They can check on ads’ clicks throughout to see which are performing well to put more bids on them and pause those ads completely that are not faring well.

For mid-month performance measurements, clicks are a handy KPI, but of course, you cannot rely on just clicks to determine a campaign’s success.

3. Click-Through Rate (CTR)

Click-Through Rate (CTR)

Similar to how your clicks generated in a campaign measure its performance, CTR plays a vital role in determining the success of a campaign’s performance.

It is measured by the division of the total number of clicks generated by your campaign in a particular period from the total impressions. So, for instance, if your ad got 150 clicks and the total impressions were 1,000, then your CTR is 15% in that case.

It is essential to understand that a perfect CTR does not exist because industry types and other variables affect the PPC performance.

According to 2018 research, the differences in the average CTR of the auto industry and the dating and personals industry were 4% and 6.05%, respectively. So, suppose campaign managers rely entirely on these numbers as a benchmark for their CTR success. In that case, they will overlook the analysis of other variables that affect their campaigns differently.

When you compare CTR from other similar campaigns, they provide a good benchmark for improving upon.

4. Quality Score

One of the most difficult KPIs to measure is the Quality Score. Created by Google, this metric aims to point out your ad content’s relevancy with the help of CTR metric and more performance variables such as landing page experience.

However, it is difficult for advertisers to understand this metric because it is not as straightforward to measure as other KPIs such as clicks.

Google can evaluate an ad’s quality score with the help of expected CTR, ad format, ad relevance, and landing page experience.

When it comes to measuring the Quality Score, Google is upfront about its process and importance. In 2017, Google improved on how it reported Quality Score in Google ads, though the following aspects need to be kept in mind:

If you pay less money to Google Ads for campaigns, you will get a good Quality Score ranging between 7 and 10. However, if you pay more for ads, you will get a bad score of 6 or lower.

With a change in the Quality Score reports, advertisers found it easier to use it in Google Ads along with the provision of KPI’s historical data. Such insights are precious for advertisers to come up with better campaign decisions.

Advertisers are always highly interested in how they can improve the Quality Score as a means to determine the cost they pay for every click.

Additionally, Quality Score can influence KPIs like CPA and CPC.

5. Cost Per Click (CPC)

PPC advertisers usually have a set budget that guides them on how to spend on an ad campaign. However, the bid and budget they specify for a PPC campaign are not guaranteed amounts that they will end up paying.

Advertisers place a higher bid than their competitors to get ad positions but pay a bid price second to it. As a result, your competitors in a PPC auction determine the cost of the ad you put up and the clicks it generates.

If you want to know the exact amount an advertiser pays for a campaign, calculate the CPC. Divide a campaign’s total cost by the number of clicks that ad generated.

To manually calculate your campaign’s cost, multiply a campaign’s clicks with the CPC.

In addition, you should think about methods for reducing your cost per click.

6. Cost Per Acquisition (CPA)

For advertising campaigns, you can come up with a cost per acquisition (CPA) which is the cost of acquiring a new customer. You can determine the CPA when you divide the total conversion costs by the total conversions.

Sometimes advertisers also opt for a bidding technique for a campaign to use a targeted CPA. This helps them use a CPA according to their budget with an automatic bid setting to get maximum conversions.

It is essential to have conversion tracking, know various bidding strategies and have a minimum of thirty to fifty conversions within the past 30 days of using a targeted CPA.

7. Impression Share (CPM)

We all know impressions matter a lot where ads are concerned, and it doesn’t include them clicking on it. So the number of impressions for a campaign won’t indicate its success because there is no way to tell your ad’s effectiveness on your audience.

However, with the help of impression share, you can determine the number of impressions your campaigns generate. It is calculated when you divide your campaign’s total impressions by the impressions it was eligible to have.

If you want indirect yet competitive insight, impression share is a key metric you should have an eye on. For instance, if your impression share is 50% for some keyword, you can determine that the rest of the 50% is with your competitors.

You can reduce your competitors’ ad display by increasing your impression share. On the other hand, you’ll have to improve your bids to improve their impression share.

8. Average Position

Whether search results for a query are paid or organic, Google has a way to balance them both. Google and Bing ads are displayed on top of the results page. The first one is at the highest position, the next one underneath that, and so on.

Advertisers determine the usual position of their ads with its average position. It is important to understand that Google doesn’t always place the highest bidders’ ads in the first place, for which they use the ad rank to figure out the average position.

You can find out the ad rank when you multiply Quality Score with the maximum CPM of an advertiser. However, this is an average, so even after calculations, you can’t tell your ad’s exact position.

It is natural to aim for the first position, but this is just to satisfy numbers because it doesn’t guarantee results.

It is also possible for some advertisers to get more conversions while in the fourth position than the first one. Hence, the average position should only be used as a point of reference but not as a target indicator as it doesn’t necessarily give the information you want.

In addition, it will also benefit to look at how Google Ads extensions perform relative to the normal listings in your campaign.

9. Budget Attainment

More often than not, paid marketers have a monthly budget they need to follow for an ad campaign. To what extent they achieve the budget they were given is determined by the budget attainment.

However, many PPC marketers don’t measure their PPC performance based on budget attainment, even if it provides a lot of information regarding their campaign’s management.

It is not easy to bid regularly and optimize results when PPC auction variations require continuous oversight. This is why marketers end up overspending or underspending on their budget frequently.

Nonetheless, PPC marketers should consider budget attainment as a valuable KPI.

10. Lifetime Value

A highly significant indicator of a PPC marketers’ skills and account health is the Lifetime Value (LTV). However, it is slightly complex to calculate a paid searches’ CLV.

When companies acquire customers through paid search and retain them for a longer time, they make more revenue.

LTV can be measured in several ways, even though it evaluates a customer’s lifetime with a business’s product. For instance, a large company such as Target will have a complicated LTV due to several aspects to it like customer retention rate, applied discounts, customer lifespan, etc.

PPC marketers generally avoid such calculations, but this KPI’s measurement could be precious for other departments.

Conclusion

There are many KPIs that you can use, and you might be tempted to use all of them. It is essential to understand your campaign and carefully choose metrics that suit it best so you can optimize them and get better results.

Chances are that your goal is to bring more traffic to your website, increase sales and enhance brand awareness through various campaigns. Understand what works for your campaign and what doesn’t, based on the KPIs you track.

Samuel Edwards
|
January 3, 2025
What Makes a Good Click-Through-Rate in Google Ads PPC?

One of the great things about online marketing is that you can measure click-through rate. You can quickly review many types of statistics after you run your marketing campaign. Whether you’re doing pay-per-click (PPC), email marketing, or social media ads, you can review your click through rate daily or even hourly to see your progress.

But what should you expect your click through rate to be, after all your SEO work and online ad efforts? Sources say that the industry average is about 1.9%. However, the rate varies by industry. And for best results, your team should shoot for a higher quality scores click-through rate.

Below, we discuss click through rate overall, industry averages, plus ways you can up your click through rate and achieve better marketing success.

What’s The CTR To Aim For?

What’s The CTR To Aim For

Below are the click-through-rates for some of the biggest online industries (Search Network CTR):

  • Consumer services: 2.4%
  • Business-to-business: 2.4%
  • Ecommerce: 2.7%
  • Automotive: 4%
  • Advocacy/politics: 4.4%
  • Education: 3.8%
  • Health and medical: 3.8%
  • Technology: 2.0%
  • Travel: 4.7%

For 16 industries monitored by Google for its ad business, the average click through rate is 3.17%. For the Google Display Network, the 16-industry average is .46%.

What makes an excellent click through rate, then? There is no precise number that we can state for every business. But you want it to be as high as possible! A higher click through rate means more people viewing your product and services, which is always good.

Some marketing experts recommend having a click through rate that is at least as high as your industry average. Aim for a bit higher for best search results page.

How To Boost Your Business CTR

Now you understand more about what a good click through rate is for your industry, but how to get there? Keep reading!

Keyword Choice and Match Types

If you want to have a massive influence on your click-through rates, focus on keywords and match-type.

Ad copy matters, too, but that doesn’t matter unless the ad appears on a search engine result page (SERP).

If you have advertisements that have many broad match keywords, the odds are high that your copy could appear for irrelevant queries. One of the biggest culprits for broad ad groups is the keyword suggestion tool offered by Google or other search engines.

It can help you see your options, but it’s not recommended to go with their recommended match-types automatically. If you go with their recommendations, make sure to use their key at the bottom so you pick the right match type.

Signals for every match-type are:

  • Modified broad: +
  • Phrase: “
  • Exact: [

Keyword Selection And Their Variants

It’s essential to practice vigilance if you can describe your product or service in ways that can net trigger queries in other industries.

Let’s say you’re a patent attorney and you love wearing patent leather shoes. But you’re probably not gunning for people viewing shoes to click on your legal ad, right?

You don’t want the word “patent” to be for any match-type – except exact.

Remember to use negative keywords to avoid queries that could come from other match-types and other keyword meanings.

For instance, cat rehabilitation can be interpreted as cat training or taking kitty to the veterinarian. The prices for each of those search results are much different. Depending on your ad budget, you may not want to use those terms that could trigger unrelated results and money down the drain.

Note that keywords that are in your advertisement groups need to be very likely to produce good queries.

If you have a shot that a long-tail keyword of 3 or more words is better, use it. However, if your specific niche has a lower search volume, you may want to choose a broad concept, as long as you have a long negative list.

Language of Ad Copy

Advertisement copy isn’t just a tired formulaic blurb anymore. Now we have three headlines, a couple of descriptions, and a growing list of extensions to entice our prospects to contact us.

But it’s easy to fall back into old habits and use copy backed by ‘data,’ and not take full advantage of the tools at our digital fingertips.

When humans craft your ads, you have a higher click through ratewhen the ad includes an H3 and D2 – about 8%. When there is no H3 and no D2, the click through rate falls to about 5%.

Mobile devices usually only give two headlines but usually do list both descriptions. Also, using the description provides the ad with more beef. The larger ad usually produces a better click through rate.

Also, note that ads that have all descriptions in headlines get a high CTR, studies show. So, please use them.

Remember Call-To-Action

You’d be surprised to learn how many suitable ads lack a strong CTA or call-to-action. If your advertisement doesn’t have a strong CTA, you’re tossing your money away. Remember to use one of these:

  • Try
  • Speak
  • Learn more
  • Call
  • Apply
  • Subscribe

The purpose of paying for paid search ad is to get prospects to act – go to your website. Some experienced hands say CTAs work great in H2. Others like to lead the ad with the CTA. You can test both in your industry and see which produces.

Note that having repetitive language in your ad will ding your Click through rate. For example, using a single word three times or more in an ad generally lowers engagement.

Targeting And Selection of Audience

Who is seeing your online advertising, where and on which device are big deals for a high Click through rate. If you’re going after more than one region, remember that people around the country think and search differently.

Putting every region in your country makes the ppc account easy to manage, but it could hurt/effect click through rate(CTR).

Google lets you make the target location a choice in an ad campaign, so you could need to limit the first campaign to one or two markets. When you have hard data on which ad works best, you may expand to more markets, change up the ads and keywords per the local search methods.

All it can take is to alter your ad’s copy to ‘request a call back’ after hours. It shows you’re a human thinking about the person reading the ad.

Now you should know more about the ideal/good CTR and how to boost yours. We can help you with our PPC management services, including help with your suspended Google Ads account.  Contact us today!

‍

Samuel Edwards
|
January 1, 2025
Implementing Flexible Bid Strategies in PPC

Advertising on the web is an ever-evolving space filled with the potential for billions of people to see your ads and literally thousands of metrics to determine who to target, when, and where. That’s why it’s important to have the right Flexible bid strategies in place when you go to try and win that all-important ad space on Google.

PPC ads have the potential to generate many high-quality and high converting leads to your site or business, but only if you do it right. Trying to pick the right strategy can be a mind-numbing process. Beyond just the headache-inducing number of metrics that are available, there is a whole realm of other considerations to make to figure out how, when, and where to run your PPC ads.

Google itself can do a lot to help you figure out who to target and when. The trouble is, unless you have experience and know exactly what you’re doing, you may find yourself wasting ad dollars on typical “set it and forget it” ad campaigns.

You’ll often find that these campaigns aren’t doing much other than throwing your money away. If you want to make the most of them, you have to stay on top of your ad campaigns and the strategies you’re using.

This first section deals with how ad campaigns should operate and how to tell if yours are in a good position for new flexible bid strategies.

Understand the State of Your Ad Campaigns

State of Your Ad Campaigns

Before we dive into the different strategies and how to implement them, we want to set you up for success. To do that, we’re going to break down what you should be doing to put yourself in a prime position to make use of the different flexible bid strategies that are available.

The very first thing we recommend doing if you aren’t already is getting in touch with a PPC management company. If you already have one, and they’re not using flexible bid strategies, then you may want to take a look at what you’re paying for and how much you’re paying. Oftentimes, agency fees and returns may not align with your goals or the level of service may not meet up to the needs of your particular ad campaigns. You may want to consider firing your PPC agency if you notice that they’re wasting ad dollars, you’re not seeing growth or other signs that you’re throwing money away.

Once you have that settled and you’ve gotten with an agency that knows what they’re doing, the first thing you really want them to do is to perform a PPC audit. The purpose of having an agency do a PPC audit is to get a sense of where your ad campaigns are at and what is potentially going wrong. Google Ads gives you loads of valuable data, but that doesn’t necessarily tell you what to do with it.

By getting an audit done, you can find out where your ad dollars are going, how much of a return on investment (ROI) you’re getting, and what the problems are. Not only that, but you’ll actually get actionable steps you can take to make improvements on your ad campaigns to see them grow your return on ad spend (ROAS).

They say “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” but if it is broke, you might want to actually know how to fix it or take it to someone who can. That’s why getting with a PPC management company and getting an audit done should be your first step.

Next, we’ll discuss how to analyze your marketing objectives to make sure they line up with your business goals.

Analyze Your Marketing Objectives

Part of knowing what’s wrong and how to fix it means understanding your goals and what you’re really trying to do with your ad campaigns. It may be that depending on the type of campaign you’re running, you may find that while you think a search campaign is best, you want a local PPC campaign, because you’re trying to drive traffic to a brick-and-mortar store.

Through Google’s advanced resources for ad campaigns, you can help to identify your goals and the type of campaigns you should be running. Then, with the help of your ad agency, you can pick the best practices for the types of goals that you have and your advertising budget.

Google’s metrics can help you figure out what campaign to run and a PPC agency can help you execute the process, including managing your bids, increasing your bids, making changes to existing campaigns starting new campaigns, and monitoring performance.

If you find that the objectives you had set aren’t right for your business, then it may be time to pull out of any existing campaigns, reevaluate, and then relaunch.

One flaw that some agencies and businesses often make is to continue to run with an existing campaign that isn’t working. Part of analyzing your marketing objectives is determining if a campaign that’s failing can be salvaged or not. There’s no point in going down with the ship if you can make it back to shore and try again later with a better boat.

Now that we’ve covered how to align your goals with your marketing strategy, it’s time to talk about how you measure success via key metrics.

Reevaluate Key Metrics

Sometimes the problem isn’t even the ad campaign itself; it’s the data you’re using to drive the ad campaign. Realistically, if you’re using an ad agency, they should be helping you do this. If you don’t really know what you want out of your ad campaigns, it can be tricky to manage.

If for instance, you’re in the eCommerce space, but when running ads, you’re not looking at the time of day when consumers are more likely to shop and complete a purchase (we’re not talking about those 2 AM window shoppers who click ad to cart and never buy anything) then you’re likely running ads at the wrong time and not targeting the proper audience.

Additionally, the type of ad and the platform you run them on can make a major difference, too. Demographics change based on the platform the ads are seen on and the likelihood of conversion is tied to that as well.

For example, managing Facebook ads is entirely different from managing your Google search ads.  Your audience changes based on the types of ads you run and not knowing who is doing what will lead to wasted ad dollars. From your Google Ads account, you can see all the data you could ever need to figure out who’s logging on, where they’re seeing your ads, when they’re most likely to click them, and when they actually follow through and convert.

If your ad timing or methods aren’t meshing with the majority of your traffic, then it’s a safe bet that you’re wasting your money.

It’s also important to note that these metrics aren’t static values that you can keep running with forever once you know them. Marketing is ever-moving, ever-changing and you have to put in the work to keep up. That’s why we recommend having a marketing agency do the work, but making sure that it’s one that has your goals in mind and is willing to stay on top of the key metrics and the space you’re in to keep your ads performing their best.

That’s why we’ve written this guide to flexible bid strategy in the first place. There are some experts and businesses that still believe that once you’ve locked in a bid strategy that works, you’re good to go. That’s not how ad campaigns or marketing in general operate. What works today may stop working tomorrow. Flexible bid strategy are designed to be just that, flexible.

The next section covers what automated or Manual  bidding actually is and how it works. We know some readers have a good grasp of the concept, but for those that don’t, this is key information before implementing a flexible bid strategy Aims.

Understand Automated Bidding

Just because flexible bid strategies have the word flexible in their name doesn’t mean that you can just set them and change them any way you choose at any time. The better you understand automated bidding, the better you can make use of the powerful tool that it is.

All automated bidding strategies work off of parameters that you set. This means that if it doesn’t work, it’s likely tied back to something you told the program to do. With enough input and the right configurations, automated or different Flexible bidding strategies can work like magic for your ad campaign, routinely scoring you the optimal converting ad space you need to drive loads of high converting traffic to your site.

That’s why we said that it’s not about a “set it and forget it mentality.” You have to constantly monitor your Flexible bid strategies and adjust them to meet your needs as they change. As your business grows, your audience grows and changes with it. To think of it logically, think about ads that are run for products, consider what happens if new products are added to an existing line, the target audience may change and grow with the product line. That means your existing ad campaigns need to adjust too.

Flexible bid strategies allow you to move and adjust parameters on the fly. The different strategies also allow you to account for different metrics and adjust your return expectations if your audience and traffic volume change. If you have more traffic but few conversions, you can adjust your ad strategy to maximize conversions for the increased traffic flow.

The upcoming section deals with flexible bid strategies in practice and how to properly implement them based on your needs. We included some key pointers that apply to each strategy and how best to use them.

Flexible Bidding Strategies and How to Implement Them

All your bidding strategies can be managed through your Google Ads account dashboard. From the dashboard, you can see all of the different ad strategies that you have available and can create and modify them as you see fit.

Among your choices, there are 6 flexible bid strategies that allow Google to automate your bidding process while giving you the control you need to adjust your bids if something isn’t working or your market changes.

1. Maximize Clicks

This is one of the standard Google ad campaign strategies and is used when you want your bids to drive traffic over all else. You can control spending by setting a maximum bid amount and a maximum daily ad spend amount. This does not factor in conversion rates or other factors. It will target based on your set keywords, and the bidding will moderate within your set/target spend amount so that you don’t go over budget.

This strategy is best implemented when your main goal is just to get more people to see your site over all else. As we said, this focuses on clicks and not conversions, but sometimes click volume can relate to conversion and brand recognition. The ability to set and monitor spending lets you have more control over ad spend if you’re on a tight budget, or if you’re experimenting with a new ad campaign and want to see what type of results you can get without breaking the bank.

You can, of course, implement this strategy without setting daily spending limits/target spend amount, but this can burn through your ad spend budget. Our best implementation advice is to use this strategy when you need maximum site traffic without blowing your ad budget.

2. Target Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)

Calculate Your ROAS and automatically raise digital marketing.

Targeted automated flexible bid strategies are great for when you want to win auctions that offer a certain value for the ad dollars you spend. In the case of this strategy, you can set a percentage value for what type of return you want on every ad dollar that is spent, and Google will automatically adjust bid amounts and auction preferences based on available data.

There are a few caveats to this strategy. Target ROAS strategies are built to get you the most return they can; this means that they will only target auctions based on the available data and are likely to generate the set return based on the available data. This also means that in most cases, they will spend whatever is calculated to be necessary to win auctions. This can be a problem if you don’t set the values for your maximum daily ad spend and the maximum cost per click.

Even with high returns, you can find yourself spending more per click than you end up actually converting. For example, say you pay $15 to get 3 new customers, sounds great right? But then those customers come into your store and only spend $3 each. You’ve effectively spent more for customers than you gain by acquiring them. ROAS strategies aren’t perfect, so you’re working partly on data and partly on guesswork.

The second issue is that if your ROAS is set too high, you may find that the bidding is too selective and you don’t wind up winning very many auctions as a result, meaning fewer ads overall.

If you have great metrics and lots of data built up to facilitate a solid understanding of the types of auctions to bid on, then a targeted ROAS strategy is the perfect option to ensure that your ad dollars aren’t wasted. Just make sure you set a spending maximum bid limit so you don’t outpace your budget.

3. Cost Per Acquisition Targeting

This is another targeted strategy that bids based on a set value. In this case, it’s the cost per customer or cost per acquisition. This is not to be confused with a cost-per-action model that calculates costs based on clicks or other actions. A cost per acquisition targeting strategy bids on ads based on an average set by the campaign owner.

Google will adjust bids higher or lower, within a range of the target Cost Per acquisition in order to win auctions. Target cost per acquisition, You must have at least 15 conversions in the past 30 days and an average conversion rate over the last 7 days in order to implement this strategy. Beyond the base requirements, like other targeting strategies, the more data you have about past conversions and customer data you can feed into it, the better it will perform.

This strategy is ideally implemented when you’re interested in achieving valuable conversions while controlling the cost. This type of targeting strategy has more control than a ROAS strategy as the bidding can fluctuate within a set range without spending too high or bidding on too few auctions.

4. Enhanced Cost Per Click (eCPC)

This strategy is an evolved form of the standard cost per click model. It takes the standard cost per click structure and automatically adjusts the bidding up or down within a set range to win auctions that maximize conversions.

A standard CPC campaign bids on auctions at or under a certain cost per click without regard for other factors. This is done to control spending. Enhanced CPC gives the same measure of control while accounting for conversion rates. This means that you can control cost per click spending while still getting the benefits of higher conversion rates.

If you’re trying to control spending and need to reign in CPC, but still want ads that convert, this is a valuable strategy.

5. Target Outranking Share

This strategy is used when you want your ads to rank higher than competitors in the same space. The automated bidding algorithm will adjust or increase your bid to beat out a competitor to either appear higher up on the SERP or to appear more frequently than a competitor.

The strategy is based on estimates and attempts to win auctions over competitors so that when ads are displayed yours show up first or more frequently. The issue with this strategy is that it does not actually raise your ad rank, the spending is not as easy to monitor, and there are no guarantees that you will always outrank your competitors as the results are estimates based on available data.

This is a useful strategy when you have a competitive market and are trying to gain some market share over others. Be mindful of your spending and you can make some ground in the market by manipulating ad placement to your advantage.

6. Target Search Page Location

The goal of the target search Page Location strategy is to get your ad either on the top of the page or somewhere on page one of the SERP. Marketers know how valuable SERP placement is, especially on page one.

A target search Page Location strategy cannot guarantee that you will end up on the top of a page or that you will land on page one of the SERP. Each individual auction is different and based on the number of competitors and your quality score, your placement will change with these factors and the result of the auction.

While the Target search Page Location strategy isn’t bulletproof, Target search Page Location are the best option when you’re trying to maximize visibility over all else. It can help you appear on page one or on the top of pages and at the very least ensures that people will see your ads some of the time.

Final Thoughts

So, there we are, the 6 flexible bid strategies and how best to use them to improve your business. Hopefully, we’ve given you the advice and strategies you need to use each of these strategies to the best of their potential. Whether you’re trying to control spending, improve exposure, beat your competitors, or maximize conversions, one of these flexible bid strategies will work for you.

As long as you remember to set your parameters and monitor your bids, these options offer more control and more choice than typical bid strategies and will improve your odds of success. Remember, PPC isn’t something you can set on autopilot. Do your research, keep tabs, and get help from a PPC agency to maximize your marketing effectiveness.

Samuel Edwards
|
January 1, 2025
How to Set Up Facebook Retargeting

From its origins as a digital yearbook for Ivy League students in 2004, Facebook has indeed come a long way.

For instance, nobody could have envisioned that nearly 20 years later, it would supplant TV as an advertising platform for a fraction of a cost.

From the exclusive enclaves of Harvard–and later Yale and Stanford–today’s Facebook users are estimated to be nearly three billion from all corners of the globe.

Now, businesses may think that the primary purpose of creating a Facebook pages is to get as many likes or follows as possible. So, their marketing strategy is designed to achieving this goal.

After that, they no longer have any idea of how to get their followers to take the next step toward dipping into their pockets for their wallets.

The fact is that more than 9 in 10 of your visitors have no intention of buying. It is now up to you to convince them otherwise.

Sure, it is nice to see the number of followers tick up, and you may enjoy bragging rights over their competitors. But your social standing will not impact your profits in the long run unless you do something.

And that is where Facebook Retargeting ads comes in.

What is Facebook Retargeting?

When you are personally managing your Facebook advertising/Facebook retargeting ad, you may have an idea of who your customers are based on their profiles. But do you know the reason why they visited your website or Facebook page?

You might say because they are paying customers.

How much are you betting that your assumption is correct? Are you willing to wager your company’s fate? Scratch that. You do not need to make that bet because it is essentially what you are doing anyway.

Make sure that the data supports your assumption if you are going to mortgage your future.

How can you convert them into loyal customers rather than one-time customers?

Facebook retargeting ads is an invaluable tool that will help identify the people who visited your website and then study their data to spot patterns and intent.

You can then use this data to create compelling ads to make them revisit your site and make a purchase.

Facebook Retargeting ads can help your company in a myriad of ways.

  1. You can reach out to your audiences who are already familiar with you. It means you cut straight to the chase because you skip the awkward introduction stage.
  2. You can target your ad to users who have already visited your Facebook page, your website visitors, or installed your e-Commerce app.
  3. You can customize and personalize the Facebook ad to your audience, which makes them more likely to engage.
  4. Reach out to your loyal customers again, even as you continue to implement your marketing ad campaign to lure in prospects. Businesses typically take for granted their long-time patrons for because they think these customers will always be there. If you do it correctly, your loyal customers could serve as your brand ambassadors without having to spend a single dollar on marketing.

Where Do You Start?

The first step is preparing a list of the prospects you want to target.

Creating the list is quite easy because there are multiple tools you can use, such as analytics, visitor profiles on your website, or your brick-and-mortar store. You can also gather data through your customer relationship management software.

You can prepare your customer list in the following formats before you can upload them on Facebook:

  1. Email — Facebook only records the list when you write the email addresses in three different columns. Each cell can only accommodate one email, but it accepts both the US and universal formats.
  2. Phone numbers — When you write the number, you need to include the country code. Facebook will only accept three phone numbers. You can also write the numbers with or without punctuation. Even if you are audience in your country, do not forget to include the country code before each phone number.
  3. Facebook User ID — You can also use the customer ID in preparing your retargeting list. It can be a name or a numerical value as long as it is included in Facebook’s database.
  4. First name or last name — Facebook will also accept your list even if you only list the first name or last name of your audience. In fact, if you are too lazy to write the full name, an initial will do.

Your custom audience may also be identified by the country/city/state/provide where they are based. The Zip Code may also be entered as an identifier, along with the birth date and gender.

Install Facebook Pixels

You can launch your Facebook ad campaign using the Facebook Ads Manager tool.

Facebook Ads Manager tool

But first, you need to install the Facebook pixel. It is a small modification to your code, which is a powerful tool to track users and their online behavior after interacting with your brand.

Once they click on your ad, added an item to their cart, or visited your website, you ensnare the customer in your web of omnipresence.

Even if they leave, you can follow the cookie crumbs to easily track them across the Internet.

Everywhere they go, they will be reminded of you, like the one that got away, or perhaps an itch on their back that they could not reach to scratch.

Installing the Facebook pixel is quite straightforward. Before anything else, you need the following elements:

  1. You have a business website
  2. You have access to your website’s source code

A. Creating a Facebook pixel

  1. Go to your page’s Events Manager
  2. Select Connect Data Sources, then click on Web
  3. Pick Facebook Pixel code, then Connect
  4. You can then add your name
  5. Enter your site’s URL to simplify the setup, then click Continue

B. Add the Pixel

The next step is to add the pixel code into your website’s source code. You can choose to do it manually, use a partner integration, or email the instructions to your website administrator or engineer.

Generally, you only need one pixel across multiple business sites.

But there are times when you need to add multiple pixels, like when there are two separate ads on your website. The marketing agencies may decide to run separate pixels for their dynamic ads.

Facebook Retargeting Using Dynamic Ads

1. Head on to Ad Creation to create your dynamic ad. Make sure to select the audience who already interacted with your services and products on Facebook or other platforms. You can then retarget them first.

2. Next is to select your retargeting option. There are multiple ways to do this.

  • Those who viewed your products but did not make the final push to purchase. You can then promote your products to these users.
  • Those who added to cart but did not make a purchase. Promote related products from your catalog to retarget these types of users.
  • Custom combination. By using this option, you can further filter the type of custom audience you want to target. For instance, you can choose to promote your products to the users who viewed your products for the last 20 days and exclude those who have clicked on your item for the past two months.
  • Upselling your products. In marketing parlance, upselling is offering them a more expensive item in your catalog to make even more profits.
  • Cross-selling your products. Unlike with upselling, you are trying to push similar items in your product lineup, which you think the audience will be interested in. You can determine interest by their browsing history.

3. There is an option to identify the number of days where the last audience activity was recorded. Enter your answer.

4. Show Advanced Options if you want to include Lookalike Audiences in your Custom Audience targeting. Lookalike Audience refers to that underserved segment of potential buyers who share similar intent and goals with your existing customers.

Create a Catalog

The catalog is necessary to create your Dynamic Ads.

The catalog is a repository of all your products that you want to advertise on the platform. Facebook retargeting ads recommends creating a single catalog rather than different inventories to minimize confusion.

If you already have an eCommerce website from Shopify, you can integrate it seamlessly into your ad campaign. If not, you will have to create your business Catalog.

You click on Commerce Manager to get started.

With retargeting campaigns, you can tailor your ad according to the specifications of the customer.

For instance, you can target prospects who visited your website or competitor sites as they browse for products that interested them.

The question is, why did they not convert?

Why People Click on Search Ads

You can then tweak your ad to address the pain points of the customer, making them more likely to buy.

Using Facebook Retargeting ads, you can increase site visits by over 700%!

The first stage is to get them to click on your ad because the same data revealed that the customers are 26% more likely to make a purchase when they do.

Launching Your Facebook Retargeting Campaign

After defining the parameters of your Custom Audience, you can then begin to launch your facebook retargeting campaign.

Go back to your main business profile page, and move your cursor to the top-right of your screen to select “Create an Ad.”

Simply follow Facebook’s instructions on how to start your campaign, including your budget, your audience, the frequency of your ad, and the schedule to display your ad.

You also need to outline your marketing objective to give Facebook an idea of your business goals. In this way, it can further hone on the types of customers you want to target.

What is your marketing objective

For instance, eCommerce sites are for-profit organizations. Facebook will target the audience not only for their buying capacity but whether or not they are likely to engage with your business.

As you can see from the options, some websites are not interested solely in profits. They may want to expand their brand reach, generate leads, increase engagement, and website traffic.

How Much is Your Budget?

Facebook is an affordable platform for marketers to display their dynamic ads.

You can already advertise for as little as $1.00 a day. In fact, it is recommended that you first low-ball Facebook, especially during the early stages.

The idea is to run analytics to determine which among your ads yield the most ROI. You can then rationalize your future budgets.

For instance, you can optimize your poorly performing ads or abandoning them together to focus on your more successful facebook campaigns.

You need to remember the three primary factors for how Facebook will present your ads to your target/custom audiences:

  1. The size of the bid
  2. The level of engagement
  3. The projected action rates

There is a reason why Facebook created the Lowest Cost option, and it is ideal for:

  • Businesses that are trying to keep their ad spending low
  • Businesses that want to eke out the most returns for their budget
  • Those who do not have specific goalposts for ROI

The Lowest Cost It is not the best determinant of the cost per action (CPA) rate, although Facebook claims that it will try to bring you the cheapest cost results.

The final cost will hinge on the bidding activity. The stiffer the competition, the higher the rates.

Collect Data and Analyze

When launching your Facebook retargeting campaigns, make sure to create different types of content.

The idea is to test your ad using trial and error.

Different ads may have different outcomes depending on conditions, target/custom audiences, and frequency.

You can even take the shotgun approach. Launch simultaneous ads at once and see which one sticks. Analytics will give you a good glimpse of where you are successful and which areas you went wrong.

It is better to target your top prospects and customers first rather than deploy your ad to all your customers. You can get better results this way as your data will have less noise.

Conclusion

Facebook Retargeting ads is a novel way to advertise to your prospects without being too creepy about it. It is also a more affordable way to get the word out about your brand and direct your prospects to your sales funnel.

More importantly, do not forget A/B testing on all your Facebook ads to reduce guesswork in your future marketing campaigns.

‍

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