In today’s digital-driven world, business owners adopt different digital marketing tactics to strengthen their organisations’ presence online. These innovative solutions (e.g., content marketing and SEO) provide valuable tools to reach a wider audience. When utilised correctly, these can future-proof a business. However, business owners are often unaware that some digital marketing tactics need support from other solutions.
Simply relying on a single digital marketing tactic puts your business at risk of missing out on valuable opportunities. Most of these solutions are developed to support and strengthen each other, resulting in better results for the organisations that adopt them into their strategies. If you are looking to improve your discoverability and increase website traffic, consider adopting other tactics, such as pay-per-click advertising, to bolster those you already have in motion.
What is Pay-Per-Click Advertising?
Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is a type of paid advertising online. It allows advertisers to place their ads on a platform to reach their target audience. As the name suggests, they only have to pay the host of the platform every time someone clicks on their ad.
Once someone clicks on an ad, they will be redirected to the advertiser’s website or app. Here, they are presented with content that encourages them to complete an action, such as signing up for a newsletter or purchasing a product.
Popular ad platforms for this advertising model include search engines (e.g. Google and Bing) and social media sites (e.g. Facebook). It is the advertiser’s decision which platform to utilise. Many opt to use both as it helps them reach a wider audience, resulting in more clicks.
Why Use PPC Advertising for Your Organisation?
The digital-driven world has made businesses across several industries more competitive. The digital landscape presents a new playing field where small to medium-sized businesses can compete with larger enterprises. Reluctance to adopt and implement the necessary digital marketing tactics will make it harder for your organisation to reach its target audience.
PPC is predictable.
PPC is one of the few digital marketing tactics that provide predictable results. The website traffic you generate from these ads is tied directly to how much you spent on them. This makes it easier to allocate and justify costs.
PPC is faster.
As mentioned, PPC provides instantaneous results. With inbound marketing, you will need to wait a couple of months to see significant traction. But with PPC, you immediately increase traffic to your website every time someone clicks on an ad.
PPC is scalable.
The digital landscape is constantly evolving. Your digital marketing campaign has to be flexible to adapt to changes. A PPC campaign allows you to scale up and down based on your organisation’s needs and your industry’s current climate.
PPC is undemanding.
Although there is a learning curve to setting up a PPC campaign, it becomes easier once you’ve become more familiar and comfortable with it. Once your campaign is running smoothly, you can redirect your attention towards other business tasks.
PPC is compatible.
PPC works well with other digital marketing tactics, especially content marketing and SEO. With the right strategy, your PPC campaign can effectively support and strengthen your overall digital marketing campaign for better leads.
How to Use PPC Advertising Effectively?
A PPC campaign has the potential to increase valuable traffic to your website, increasing conversions and improving retention. To achieve these results, you will have to develop a campaign that is unique to your organisation. Aside from customising it to reach your target audience, it aligns your digital marketing goals with your business goals.
Choose the right platform.
As mentioned, there are two platforms available for PPC advertising, namely search engines and social media sites. Although many business owners choose to utilise both, this isn’t always an effective strategy. When choosing your platform, consider your target audience and their behaviour online.
- Google Ads: This platform allows you to place ads across their wide selection of web properties, including search engine results pages (SERPs). It gives you better discoverability and a wider reach.
- Facebook Ads:This platform allows you to place ads on specific users’ newsfeeds. Customise your ads using the platform’s user data—choose your target users’ age, profession, and interests to make sure the right people click your ads.
- Twitter Ads:This platform works similarly to Facebook. The difference lies in how you can customise ads. This platform offers eight types of advertising objectives to choose from, including reach, video views, app installs and followers.
Choose an ad type.
Once you’ve chosen a platform, you can proceed to optimise your PPC campaign by choosing the right ad type. Everyone is different; while some ad types are effective on a certain portion of the population, they might not be for your target audience. Study your audience to determine which ad types will be more effective on them.
- Google Ads: This platform provides four types of ads, namely display, video, search and app. Display ads are considered the most popular because these use SERPs to reach your target audience. With the right search terms, you can drive more valuable traffic to your website using PPC ads.
- Facebook Ads:This platform provides five types of ads, namely image, video, carousel, instant experience and collection. Instant experience ads are beneficial to your PPC campaign if you are aiming to reach mobile users. When they click on the ad, they will be shown as fullscreen ad that highlights your organisation and what it offers.
- Twitter Ads:This platform provides four types of ads, namely promoted tweet, video, cards and brand. A website card ad allows you to showcase content that will drive people to your site. It has a ‘conversation’ option where you can improve engagement with embedded CTAs underneath the Tweet.
Develop a bidding strategy.
After deciding on a platform and ad type, consider revisiting your PPC campaign budget. It directly impacts your bidding strategy. Google requires a daily budget, while Facebook and Twitter allow you to select payment increments. Adjusting your ad budget will help you optimise your bidding strategy.
- Target CPAs: This strategy has you focusing on CPAs (cost per acquisition) based on your internal business data. Advertisers who have a set cost per conversion often choose this, preventing them from losing money.
- Target ROAS:This strategy is typical with e-commerce businesses. Advertisers set a ROAS (return on ad spend) to meet minimum returns and make a profit on sales.
- Target Impression Shares:This strategy has you setting a target figure that allows you to choose where your ad will appear. It is often pricier because you are competing with more advertisers.
Customise your PPC ads.
The advantage of a PPC campaign is that it allows you to reach your audience better. Ad platforms allow you to customise who will see your ads. Make the most of these settings to increase traffic to your website and generate more valuable conversions.
- After establishing your target audience, narrow them down based on their age, location, profession, interests and other relevant personal information.
- Once you’ve accomplished this, you can move on to identifying search terms that are compatible with the SERPs you want your ads to appear on.
- Use keywords that match the intent of your target audience. Doing so will reduce the chances of your ads being seen by the wrong audience.
Organise your PPC ads.
Most seasoned advertisers create ad groups for their PPC campaigns to create segments that allow you to streamline the bidding and customising processes. With the right ad groups, you may begin with a single search term and branch out from that as you adjust your PPC campaign strategy. By organising your PPC ads, you strengthen your campaign for long-term effectiveness.
Use relevant landing pages.
Business owners who are new to PPC make the mistake of making their homepage the destination of their ads. This only confuses visitors and results in them exiting the page before completing a valuable action. When you create your PPC ads, make sure they redirect visitors to the relevant web pages.
- If your ad is informational, use a landing page that explains a product or service (e.g. on-page blog article).
- If your ad is transactional, use a landing page that encourages visitors to purchase a product or hire a service.
Matching your search terms with the target audience’s intent will in higher conversions. Additionally, ad platforms will take your ads more seriously, improving their quality score.
Track your PPC campaign.
Track your PPC campaign’s performance to determine its effectiveness. The data you gather will help you develop better strategies when you revisit campaigns. Additionally, it shows you how much of your investment you’re earning back through these ads.
A PPC campaign is a practical and effective way to bolster the rest of your digital marketing campaign. Make the most out of this innovative solution when you work with professionals. Media Crew is one of the leading marketing and advertising agencies in Melbourne.
Get in touch with us to find out how to generate the right traffic to your website.
