There are numerous Google AdWords tutorials and tip sheets out there. And yet, I often meet with business owners who know a lot about the mechanics of setting up a search advertising campaign, but fail to understand the basics of pay-per-click (PPC) profitability.
As they quickly come to discover, those are entirely different things. You certainly have to know how to choose keywords and put ads online before you can succeed with AdWords, of course, but you’re going to lose money if your knowledge stops there.
To help illustrate why this is the case – and keep you from making all-too-common mistakes with PPC advertising – here are a few things every business owner should know about using Google AdWords profitably…
Google AdWords is Easy to Setup, But Hard to Master
The engineers at Google have made it incredibly easy to set up your first paid search ads. All you have to do is follow some intuitive menus, choose a few search terms you’d like to target, and write some kind of offer. Take those steps, fund your account, and you’re ready to go!
Unfortunately, “ready to go” doesn’t necessarily mean “ready to get new sales.” Despite the ease of setup, it can take a while to truly master PPC advertising on Google. That’s true for the interface itself, and for the particular market you want to dominate.
Creating Profitable Ad Groups is All About Focus
One thing that makes it difficult to set up profitable PPC campaigns is that a business owner’s natural inclination is almost always going to be to bring more visitors to a website. After all, more visits means more chances to make a sale.
You have to remember, though, that each of those visits costs you some small amount of money. Those expenses can add up when you cast a really wide net. That’s why creating profitable and sustainable Google AdWords campaigns is all about focus. You have to be able to narrow in on the visitors you most want to track – and identify the ones who aren’t likely to buy from you – so you can direct your limited time and resources for the biggest sales impact.
Long Term, You Should Focus on Conversions and ROI
Over time, marketers learn that it’s easy to get traffic from Google AdWords. But, generating conversions and maintaining a positive return on investment is a lot more challenging.
In addition to focusing on certain types of buyers or keywords, savvy marketers use AdWords to fine-tune their offers over time. They keep testing various elements of their landing pages until they simply can’t squeeze additional conversions out of the visits they are receiving. Until that happens, a campaign is never as effective as it could be, whether the ads in question are bringing in half a dozen prospects today or a few thousand.
Google AdWords is the perfect PPC advertising tool for capturing search traffic at exactly the right moment. But, if you are content to simply set up your accounts, aim for as much traffic as you can get, and then leave your ads to run on their own, you’re going to be disappointed with the results.
To get experienced help making the most of your Google AdWords campaigns, why not call Biondo Creative today to set up a free consultation and see how we can help?