Are you trying to reach more customers online this year? Paid advertisements have a 200% ROI. In fact, ads can boost brand awareness by 80%, too.
About 65% of consumers click on pay-per-click (PPC) ads as well.
With a strong PPC strategy, you can appear in front of customers online who already have an interest in your offerings. Then, you can direct them to your website. From there, you can start converting potential customers into happy, paying customers.
Not sure where to start when developing a PPC advertising strategy? Here are seven steps to follow as you get started. With these tips, you can start appearing in front of customers online in no time.
Set your business up for lasting success by developing your first PPC advertising strategy today!
1. Research Your Audience
Before creating your first PPC ads, it's important to gather research. Otherwise, you could make assumptions about your targeting or ad language. You might struggle to appear in front of your ideal customers as well.
Instead, learn as much as you can about your customers. For example, you might want to consider their:
Age
Gender
Location
Household income
Marital status
Buying behaviors
Pain points
Interests
Hobbies
Do your customers fall into more than one group? Consider segmenting your audience into buyer personas. You can create different campaigns with each group in mind.
Personalizing your PPC ads could help you generate more leads and sales. In fact, 50% of consumers would pay more if brands provide personally relevant content. Another 73% expect brands to understand their needs.
Personalization could improve your ROI by eight times, too.
Once you know who your customers are, determine what search terms they use online. You can use tools like:
Answer the Public
Ahrefs
Google Trends
Keyword Planner
SEMRush
Look for longtail keywords, which are more precise. More precise targeting can help you make the most of your PPC advertising budget. A one-word keyword, on the other hand, could lead you to appear for thousands of irrelevant searches.
To avoid appearing for irrelevant searches, make a list of negative keywords you don't want to appear for. As an example, a home window replacement company won't want to appear for "Microsoft Windows" searches.
2. Establish Your Goals
Platforms like Google AdWords allow you to set goals for each PPC advertising campaign you make. As you develop your PPC strategy, consider your goals. For example, maybe you want to:
Generate brand awareness and recognition
Encourage people to call your business
Encourage people to fill out a form on your website
Lead more people to download your app
Generate more website traffic
Improve your cost-per-acquisition
Improve the ROI for your campaigns
Make sure your PPC advertising goals align with your overall business goals.
Establishing your goals ahead of time will help you develop more successful campaigns. Your goals could determine the call to action language you use. It could help you choose images or videos for display ads, too.
You can create a different campaign for each goal to make sure your ads are focused.
3. Create Landing Pages
Before you start creating your PPC ads, take the time to audit your website.
It's important to make sure your site is fast and mobile-optimized. Otherwise, people will leave your site without exploring. A negative landing page experience can hurt your ad quality score.
A low quality score could impact how much you pay per each click on your ads. A higher cost-per-click could impact your ROI.
Instead, take the time to improve the user experience on your website.
First, run your site through Google PageSpeed Insights and Mobile-Friendly Test. If your site isn't fast or optimized, work with a web design and development company.
Make sure you have multiple conversion opportunities on your site, too.
Otherwise, consider creating a dedicated landing page for each campaign you create. Make sure the keywords in your ads align with the landing page. Don't forget to maintain a singular focus for each ad and landing page, too.
Maintaining focus can help you avoid confusing customers. Instead, you can lead them to your call to action with ease.
4. Develop Campaigns and Ads
Once your landing pages are ready, start creating your campaigns.
Each campaign will contain ad groups and individual ads. You can create more than one ad for each ad group. Creating multiple ads will help you A/B test your ad language.
You can create both text and display ads to reach your customers.
When creating your ads, make sure to use clear, concise language. Make sure your target keyword appears within the ad, too. Otherwise, use impactful verbs to lead people to click on the ad.
Consider creating remarketing ads as well. Remarketing ads will appear in front of people who previously visited your website. You could have a second chance to convert those customers into leads.
5. Set a Budget
Make sure to establish a budget when developing your PPC advertising campaigns. You don't want to start overspending before you can evaluate the campaign's performance.
Consider starting small. If you run through your daily budget too quickly, consider your targeting parameters. It's possible your keyword or targeting is too broad.
You can adjust your budget as needed to maximize your results.
6. Add Extensions
Consider adding extensions to your ads to help them stand out on Google search pages. Ad extensions could help improve your clickthrough rate.
These extensions can appear as a list of your products/services, phone numbers, or links to your site.
7. Analyze and Optimize
Once you develop your PPC strategy, continue checking on your campaigns. Review the results to make informed decisions moving forward. For example, you might realize one ad is performing better than another.
Maybe a specific extension is helping you generate more clicks.
Continue optimizing your campaigns to improve your ROI.
Set for Success: 7 Steps for an Effective PPC Strategy
Developing a strong PPC strategy doesn't have to feel stressful. Instead, use these tips to reach your customers online. With effective PPC ads, you can expand your reach and boost business.
Set your business up for success with these PPC advertising strategy tips today.
Want to make the most of your PPC advertising budget? We can help.
Contact us to schedule a demo!