Whether you want to drive traffic to your website, improve your brand's online presence, or increase inquiries about your products or services, Google ads are a powerful tool that can help you achieve all of these goals and more.
Google ads are an effective way to drive relevant and qualified
traffic to your website, right when users are searching for specific types of
products or services offered by your brand.
With paid Google ads driving 65% of clicks and 43% of customers
claiming to have purchased something they saw in a YouTube ad, it's no secret
that this innovative and popular platform presents opportunities.
It can be difficult to know where to start when it comes to
spending money and time implementing digital advertising campaigns. That's why
the experienced team at Bold x Collective has put together a comprehensive
guide to help you align your business strategy with Google Ads.
Read on to learn how you can leverage one of the most popular digital marketing agency tools.
Let's start with the basics... What are Google Ads?
Google Ads uses a search engine approach that allows users to
promote their business by targeting relevant keywords, which can lead to
generating leads and increasing sales, among other KPIs.
Formerly known as Google AdWords, this online paid advertising
model works by combining several aspects that allow marketers to leverage the
search engine results page (SERP) to reach the desired audience.
The platform refers to the Pay-Per-Click marketing channel and has
evolved over the years. In fact, with Google's ever-increasing popularity, many
new features have been added to enhance the opportunities you can implement
(more on that later).
Now that we have a general overview of the benefits of Google Ads
in the advertising world, let's take a look at how you can use this platform to
meet the needs of your business.
First of all, you should better understand how your audience and
all Google traffic see and access ads. First of all, users come across Google
ads when they search for a specific type of product or service.
Among the offers they receive, and depending on the keywords they
search for, several ads are presented as the best options.
For example, if a user searches for "natural sunscreen"
on Google, the list of products that appear first will include ads created as
part of Google Ads Shopping campaigns.
Pay-per-click requires you, as the Google Ads account owner, to
pay a certain amount every time someone clicks on your ad. You also have
control over where your ad directs users, as well as the structure and
placement of each ad.
Now let's take a look at the steps you need to take to create and
place an ad. There are four sections in total, and in each category, there are
several steps you need to take before placing your ad.
How To Use Google Ads - Overview:
1. select the campaign settings.
2. set your ad groups.
3. create your ads
4. billing
Campaign Settings
The first step includes all the tools you need to lay the
foundation for your campaign. In this first section, you should introduce the
basics:
- Goal and purpose
- Type of ad
- General settings
- Name of the campaign
- Networks
- Time
- Targeting and audience segments
- Budget and billing
- Extensions of the ad
Moving on to a more detailed explanation, let's first understand what each section means.
Purpose and Goals
In this first section, several different paths and goals are
presented for you to choose from. Depending on the desired result and your
company's product or service, you should choose the one that best suits your
needs.
Types of Google Ads
The following section is not to be overlooked and shows a wide range of ad types you can choose from. It is important to know the difference between them. So, read on to learn more about the most common and popular ones.
Search
This is the most common type of Google ad and the most used by
businesses. In fact, search ads are the first thing that comes to everyone's
mind when they hear about Google ads in general.
As the name suggests, these types of ads are the ads that you see
on the search results page. These ads appear in the first place and sometimes
at the bottom of the page.
You can distinguish between the organic search results and the paid search results, as in the latter the "Ads" section appears at the top left.
Display of
Since then, Google has added a number of other ad types that can be used by businesses that have different calls to action and can be found on multiple Google platforms. These ad types are different from search ads, as they are displayed in the form of banners on the Google network websites.
Shopping
These ads are used to promote products and can be seen on Google's Shopping tab for online marketing company. They are ideal for advertising specific products and, like search ads, appear in the first place in users' search results for a particular advertised product.
Video
This type of advertising is done through video content and works
on YouTube. Since these ads are placed on the video platform, this advertising
medium requires more effort and time. Unlike the previous types of ads, these
ads do not only work based on a text or the display of a product, but a
personalized video is required to promote the right product or service.
There are other ad types as well, which are explained below.
- Discovering
- Intelligent
- Local
- App
- General settings
Next, it's about the other basic elements when creating your
campaign. You can set the duration of the campaign and specify whom you want to
target.
This also includes specifying the span in which your ads will
appear. You can choose local or global audiences, and even narrow them down by
gender and age, as well as many other demographics and psychographics.
Remember that the more specialized your target segments are, the
higher the cost of placing your ads.
Depending on your business, products, or services, ask yourself if
it's beneficial to target a broader audience or increase spending on audiences
based on specific interests and segments. The final step is to set a budget
limit for your campaign.
You can set a maximum monthly amount you are willing to spend, as
well as a daily amount. Google Ads' pricing process is good because it is very
flexible and provides predictable results that show what results in you can
expect with your budget.
You can also explore add-ons like extensions and try to change the maximum amount of your budget based on the monthly results of your ads.
Create your Ad groups.
Now let's move on to step number 2: creating ad groups. This is
where you decide which keywords you want to use in your campaign. If you want,
you can create multiple ad groups, with different keyword groups for each
relevant topic.
When choosing keywords, make sure you understand exactly who your
consumers are. Think about their search habits and make a connection to your
brand and product or service in this situation.
Also, the keywords you choose should be specific and
relevant.
You can also exclude negative keywords to avoid linking irrelevant
searches to your ad. To place negative keywords in your ad group, simply add a
minus sign in front of the keyword.
We highly recommend using platforms to find and organize the right
keywords for your brand. Here are some free tools you can try as a newbie to
Google Ads:
- Google Trends
- Responses from the public
- Keywords everywhere
Create the ad
You've now completed most of the campaign creation process, and
it's time to set up the actual ad that users will see and interact with. As
mentioned earlier, Google Ads has a preview tab where you can see the final ad
on both desktop and mobile.
Make sure that the ad looks exactly the way you want it to because
once Google Ads approves it, it becomes public.
Invoicing
The last and final step is the invoicing process. This fourth step
is self-explanatory and prompts you to add all the details and information
needed for the invoicing process.
But wait a minute... The Google Ads adventure doesn't end here!
It's important to remember that creating and monitoring successful
campaigns takes time. Most of the time, the very first ad you run will need to
be adjusted and changed periodically to achieve the optimal results you're
aiming for.
In order to get as many conversions as possible, keep the CPC
(cost per click) per ad low, and generally have an effective impact that gets
results, you need to take additional steps.
The two main ways to analyze the progress of your ad are split
testing and a/b testing. Also, keep an eye on keyword search trends and search
your company's ad campaigns for different products and services to see what
works best - this will help you get the best results.
We also recommend installing Google Analytics, a free tool you can
use to measure the success of your platform against other marketing efforts
you're making to reach your business goal.
It's a fantastic way to track results and better understand the
performance of Google ads for your website.
Need help using the Google Ads platform?
Bold x Collective's team of experts has helped many brands from
the Greater Toronto Area, Canada, and around the world run ad campaigns on
Google.
To get started with our team, we offer a free consultation where
we take the time to understand your goals and the needs of your business; book
a consultation to get started.