PPC (“pay per click”), search advertising, is not the darling of the advertising world that it used to be. But for those who can’t afford to buy ad space on an Alexa-powered website or don’t have time to spam Facebook and Twitter users, it’s still one of the cheapest online advertising methods. However, it doesn’t work for every business. Here are some small steps to take to see if PPC could work for you without blowing your budget.
Pick some amazing keywords
No one will see your ad if they don’t search for your keywords first, no matter how clever your ad is. Spend a couple of hours thinking of keywords that describe your product or service. A variety of online keyword screening tools can help you research the popularity of your keywords and provide other suggestions.
Set a budget, er, limit
Most advertisers don’t know how much to bid and how much traffic they will get. I have run campaigns that generated a quarter of all website traffic. I’ve also run those that hauled in 5 visitors over 3 weeks. Proceed with caution. Set to the limit. The beauty of PPC programs is that you can set price limits per keyword, per day, per month. Don’t set a limit of $3,000 a day if you’re not willing to spend that. If you’re lucky enough to hit a nerve in a market and the clicks start rolling in, you don’t want to check your account a week later and find you’ve spent a year’s marketing budget in 1 week. Start small. You can always increase it later.
Manage those metrics
You’d be surprised how many people spend on paid search anyway without knowing what, if anything, they’ve earned from it. Every time someone clicks on your ad, you pay. And those clicks don’t guarantee sales.
An example: $5 per click X 1,000 clicks X 0 conversions = you’re out of $5,000.
Install a metrics program (Google Analytics is free) and set up one or more “conversion paths.” Conversions are anything you want them to be: a sale, a signup, a mail-in signup. Check the conversion rates of your keywords at least once a day. No conversions in a week? Lower your bid or remove the keyword entirely. High conversion rate but low placement? Consider increasing your offer.
Testing, testing, testing
No, you can’t set them and forget them. The market is picky and needs the advice of a Web Expert. Let’s say you’re selling “dust mops” and your ad ranks #1 on Google for $0.50 per click on Monday. On Tuesday, TMZ publishes a photo of Lindsey Lohan hitting her girlfriend’s car with a mop. The next day, she is out of the market and her keyword sells for $5 each. Try a new keyword that will attract people who want to buy mops (marketers call these people “qualified”), not just people who want to see the damage Lindsey did to Samantha Ronson’s car. Try a different keyword. Try a “phrase match” or an “exact match.” Try different sentences against each other. Try different ads to see which works best. Test running campaigns at different times of the day.
Sometimes winning PPC tactics are the last thing you would expect.
