With 96% of brands now spending money on Google Ads, there’s a lot more noise for your ads to cut through these days. Getting the most bang for your buck on Google means making sure your ads are reaching the right people at the right time.
That may sound like Marketing 101, but it’s true on Google, which counts nearly 250 million unique users in the U.S. alone. That’s a lot of potential eyeballs—and a lot of people who have absolutely no interest in your products or services. Knowing where the people who do have interest in your brand is key.
Successful digital ad campaigns also require you to stay ahead of the Google learning curve. Even if you’ve configured your Google Ads campaigns correctly, you still need to know how to how to optimize them for continued success.
If you’re ready to get more out of your next Google Ad campaign, check out the following tips from our digital marketing experts. And don’t hesitate to reach out if you need more help with your ads.
Clearly Define Your Advertising Goals
Define your purpose
Are you wanting to generate more leads or simply help a community become more familiar with your brand? Decide what action you want users to take as a result of your ad, whether that’s filling out a form, donating to your cause, or purchasing your products.
Define your audience
Once you've established a desired action, define who's most likely to take it. Choose who you’d like to show your ad to, whether it’s residents in a specific city, a certain age range, or those with specific interests, just to name a few targeting options.
Understand How Your Audience Searches
Compile search words and phrases
Showing up in Google’s search engine result pages search is highly dependent on using the right language. For example, “best real estate agents near me” and “good real estate agents in my area” are about the same topic, but the former gets typed in the search bar more often. Compile a document of 50-100 questions, words, and phrases that users might put into Google to find your products or services.
Conduct keyword research
After you’ve built a solid list of keywords, use Google Keyword Planner (or another keyword planning tool) to find out which brand-related words and phrases are highly searched in the area you want to target. Within Google Keyword Planner, you’ll also be able to see the competition index, which shows how difficult it is to rank for each keyword.
Set Up Your Google Ads Campaign
Choose a campaign
The type of campaign you choose through Google should depend on which part of the sales funnel you’re targeting. For example, if you run a top-of-funnel brand awareness ad, you’ll reach a wider audience with a display campaign. By contrast, a search campaign would target a narrower group toward the bottom of the funnel that’s closer to a purchase decision.
Define a bidding strategy
Once you’ve created a campaign, you’re able to choose whether you’d like to bid on conversions, impressions, clicks, or views. This ensures you’re only paying for the outcomes you care about, and lets Google know what to optimize for. Note that if you choose to bid on conversions, you’ll need to define what that means (contact form submissions, survey completion, etc.).
Add quality text and imagery
Clicking on an ad is a split-second action, so you need the right content to capture a user’s attention. Make sure that your display, search extension, and other visual ads have high-quality images. Dynamic ads pull images from your website, so update your product images if necessary. While you want to load your ad copy with keywords, you also need it to be descriptive and drive users to act.
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Continue to Monitor & Optimize Your Ads
Measure performance
Don't just set it and forget it until the campaign period’s over. Regularly monitor your ads for clicks, impressions, CTRs, and other important KPIs. Compare your performance to your industry’s benchmarks.
Look for improvements
While you’re checking your ads, look for ways to optimize their performance. For example, costs for certain keywords fluctuate regularly, so see if any are worth adding to or cutting from your campaign. If specific locations are getting more clicks, consider adjusting where your ad is being shown.
Test the waters
Google allows you to A/B test ads, meaning you’re able to try different calls to action, images, and text to see which better achieve your goals. When conducting a test, Google will automatically put more budget toward high-performing assets, so you don’t have to worry about manual adjustments.
If you need some assistance with getting your ads off the ground or just want some optimization tips, reach out to us. Our Marketing team’s Google Ad certified experts will help you reach your lofty ROAS goals.
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