What is PPC @ Google Ads? [The Basics]
Ever heard of PPC marketing?
Whether you have little knowledge or don’t know anything about PPC, you’ve landed on the right article.
First, you need to know the definition of PPC and how you can use it to advertise your business effectively on the Internet.
In this article, you will get answers to the following questions:
What is PPC (Pay-Per-Click)?
PPC is the short-form of pay-per-click, and it is the online advertising model where advertisers pay a certain amount when internet users click on their ads. It’s basically a paid method used to drive people to your site without relying on organic search.
Imagine if you need to pay only a few dollars to gain customers who purchase your products or services that cost them hundreds of dollars. You’ll be making a good return on investment (ROI). This is what most business wants to achieve.
Advertising on search engines is one of the most used forms of PPC marketing. Advertisers can bid for keywords and ad placements in a search engine. When the search engine users perform a search using keywords or phrases related to their business offerings, their ads will show up on top of organic search results. For example, if you choose to bid for the “accounting firm” keyword your ad might show up as the following screenshot. But, it depends on your competition.
As I’ve mentioned earlier, every time your ad is clicked and visitors reach your website or landing page, you will have to pay search engines a few cents or dollars. Some businesses gain huge traction with PPC campaigns. For example, you’re paying $2 for one click to your ad, but the click leads to sales worth $200, then you’ve made an amazing profit.
PPC might look easy but it requires a lot of work. I’ve been using the following steps in handling pay-per-click campaigns for my clients.
- Identify marketing goals. What do you want to achieve from this marketing campaign? Are you looking to increase sales, inquiries, or event signups? You need to be certain about your goal to avoid wasting money that does not produce the expected ROI.
- Develop your buyer persona. Who is your ideal customer? You need to determine the target market to make sure the ads are shown to the right people.
- Set a realistic budget. There is no minimum or maximum amount to spend on PPC campaigns. But, having a number in mind will allow you to test the market with small campaigns to see the effectiveness. You can add more money if you can see results from the campaigns.
- Research and make a keyword/phrase list. Search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo position their ads based on keywords/phrases. Choosing the right keywords/phrases is vital for your marketing success. Tools like SEMRush and Ahrefs can help you identify and list the right keywords and phrases.
- Create groups of keywords. Rather than listing all the keywords under one group, you need to mix and match the keywords. It will help you separate keywords into different groups and target them with the right products and services.
- Write persuasive ad copies. Your ad copy should have 3 important elements which are your keywords, the benefits of the products or services you’re offering, and a mind-blowing call to action.
- Develop specific landing pages. The biggest mistake is sending people to your homepage. Please don’t do this. You will be wasting your money and potential customers will quickly exit your site. If you’re selling products, send them to product pages related to the ads. If you’re offering services, send them to your service pages with a relevant call to action like email signup, free report and etc
The best PPC marketers will use similar guidelines to develop effective PPC campaigns.
Why PPC (Pay-Per-Click)?
I want to convince you to do PPC campaigns if you’re starting off. There are hundreds of benefits of PPC advertising.
Learn why you should consider including PPC advertising in your overall marketing strategy.
PPC offers immediate results
Businesses look for immediate results for the money they invest. This is the common thing I came across many business owners. PPC is one of the fastest ways to get immediate results when done right. Please note** DONE RIGHT!
If you already have a website, you can sign up for a Google Ads account, create your ads and run them immediately. You will get instant traffic this way. This is a simple way to get started with PPC. There is more to PPC like landing pages and conversion rate optimization.
I just wanted you to know that PPC is one of the very efficient paid advertising methods if you want to reach your target audience immediately.
PPC results are measurable
When you spend your money and advertise online, it should be easily measured to determine whether the advertising campaigns producing the expected results.
You can measure various important metrics related to your business with PPC campaigns like clicks, conversions, ad copy quality score, and many more.
Once your PPC campaign is launched, you can measure the performance from the start and easily identify whether the marketing campaign is generating profit or loss.
Don’t have to depend on SEO or Search Engine Algorithmic changes
I’m an advocate of SEO and I always suggest my clients implement SEO strategies for long-term results. It’s good to run PPC campaigns along with SEO. Let your site grow organically with SEO best practices while building momentum through paid traffic.
Take Advantage of Opportunities
If your competitor is not spending on paid ads, that’s a great opportunity for you to attract potential customers with targeted PPC campaigns. You can go for quick domination over your competitors before they realize the potential.
You shouldn’t go wrong with your offers here. You gotta quickly attract and convert your audience before your competitors jump on to what you’re doing.
Get Your Brand Recognized
Sometimes you need to think apart from sales. Your potential customer might not need your products and services today, but the need might arise in the future. Constantly appearing in front of your potential audience, will get your brand recognized.
When your potential customers looking for products and services related to your niche, your brand will be the first one to pop up in their minds. Increasing brand awareness through PPC will not only establish your business as an authority in your industry but also be recognized easily by potential customers.
Attract Local Customers
If you’re going for a quick kill with your local customers, PPC is the most effective method.
With the rise of smartphone usage, people are searching for information about products and services in their area before making their purchase decision.
When they see your ads in their search and click on them, you can easily provide instruction on how they can reach your store.
According to recent research on local search, 75% of search engine users are more likely to visit a store if they find it in the search results.
If your competitor is actively spending on PPC, your potential customers might go to their store instead of yours. You don’t want to lose a customer just like that.
You can set your own budget
When it comes to PPC, there is no restriction on the budget. If you’re advertising on offline media like newspapers, billboards, and television, you can’t set your own budget.
The ability to set your own budget for PPC campaigns allows you to analyze and spend the right amount of money. With PPC tools you can easily analyze and measure which ad is performing well and determine where you should increase and minimize your PPC expenditure.
If you’re able to identify the right cost of acquiring a customer relative to the pricing of your products and services, you can safely maximize in spend until you reach maximum ROI per customer.
These are some of the top benefits you will get when you choose to invest in PPC marketing.
But, you can easily lose money if you don’t strategically plan and implement PPC campaigns. These are some of the important points you should keep in mind:
- Never spend more than your ROI in PPC campaigns
- Optimize your campaigns to lower cost per click and increase adpositions
- Experiment with the right budget to determine what works for your business. Don’t blindly spend without a proper plan.
- Use PPC spy tools like SpyFu to check what your competitors are doing with their PPC campaigns. Leverage their ideas and come up with better ads.
PPC marketing offers great benefits only when it’s done right. With the right strategy, you’ll be able to generate fast results by reaching the right audience.
However, I always suggest businesses simultaneously work on SEO and PPC. The main reason is to grab all the opportunities you have. As SEO and PPC are the most important elements of digital marketing, you will gain great benefits from both.
Don’t try to do everything by yourself. Just focus on what you’re good at and hire professionals to handle your PPC campaigns.
