Are you Wasting PPC Budget?

Are You Wasting PPC Budget? THOMAS HAYNES. APR 2015.

The Problem

“ The average smal l bus iness wastes 25% of the i r AdWords PPC budget ”

Wo r d S t r e a m r e s e a r c h 2 0 1 3

How does this happen?Many businesses don’t spend the necessary time optimising their accounts or don’t keep up-to-date with the latest developments.

If any of the below apply to your business then you’re probably wasting at least some of your AdWords spend:

1. You haven’t logged in to your account for over a month.

2. You’ve never heard of “Ad Extensions”.

3. The person in charge of your PPC account hasn’t had the necessary training.

The Checklist:

1. Negative Keywords2. Mobile3. Ad Extensions4. Geographic Targeting5. Ad Schedule6. Landing Pages7. Account Structure8. Conversion Optimiser

1. Negative KeywordsUsing broad match or phrase match Keywords increases the risk that your Ad will show up for unrelated search terms. To prevent this use tighter Keyword targeting such as Exact Match or add negative keywords.

If you tick the box next to a keyword and click on ‘Search Terms’ then ‘Selected’ under ‘Details’ you’ll be able to see which search terms actually triggered your Ad.

2. MobileGoogle AdWords Campaigns are now shown on all devices by default. If you’re sending mobile users to a non mobile friendly page chances are they’ll leave your site pretty quickly.

You can bid down on Mobile devices by up to 100%. If you do have a mobile friendly site look at your stats and see if mobile users convert or not.

3. Ad ExtensionsAd Extensions make your Ads more eye catching and result in a higher Ad Rank in AdWords. This helps you to rank higher for a lower Cost Per Click.

Add as many Ad Extensions as you can. Sitelinks and Call Extensions are particularly useful.

4. Geographic targetingWith AdWords you can easily geographically target areas as large as the UK or as small as a 1 mile radius. If your business operates in a small area then there is probably no reason for you to show Ads outside of that area.

Exclude areas in your Campaign settings or if you’re feeling particularly advanced bid up or down on geographic areas.

5. Ad ScheduleWith AdWords’ Ad Schedule settings you can set when you want your Ads to be shown either by day or by hour. For example, if you operate in a B2B industry you may decide that you’re best of only showing your Ads during the working day.

6. Landing PagesIt’s important that you send users to a relevant Landing Page with a clear call-to-action or next step. If you’re not doing this you’re paying to send people to your site and they might just leave straight away.

A good first step is to review the Bounce Rate of PPC visitors by Landing Page – this shows you what percentage of users land on a page and then leave again without continuing to browse the site.

7. Account StructureThe best AdWords accounts use a careful structure with clearly defined Campaigns and Ad Groups arranged around defined topics. If you throw all of your Ads and Keywords into one Ad Group you won’t be able to properly optimise or achieve a high Quality Score.

Avoid wasted spend by splitting out your account structure with as much granularity as you can and using separate budgets for different Campaigns.

8. Conversion OptimiserConversion Optimiser is a Google setting which will optimise your Cost Per Click in order to try and hit a target Cost Per Acquisition.

For example you may decide that you’re willing to pay £5 per Conversion. AdWords will use historical data to adjust your CPC based on Keyword, device, time of day and location.

LinksThis Slide Show in Blog format (with links to AdWords help documents) http://www.optixsolutions.co.uk/blog/are-you-wasting-ppc-budget/

Follow me on Twitter https://twitter.com/thomashaynes_

Add me on LinkedIn http://uk.linkedin.com/in/haynesthomas

Email me [email protected]

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Are you Wasting PPC Budget?

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