Manual CPC Bidding – The Advantages and Disadvantages

With the improvements that have been seen to the efficacy of the smart bidding strategies on offer by Google, Manual CPC bidding is becoming less and less relevant.

Advertisers are seeing more and more, that campaigns that are using automated bidding strategies such as Target CPA are able to outperform those that are using manually optimised bids.

However, despite this, there are still instances where the use Manual CPC bidding is not only more effective, but essential.

Within this article we’ll review the advantages and disadvantages of using Manual CPC bidding, and the situations where it should, and should not be used.

Disadvantages of Manual CPC Bidding

Potentially Poorer Performance

Google’s smart bidding strategies are able to tap into a wealth of data on the behaviour of users in order to help drive calculations for bids.

With this in mind, it is no surprise that many advertisers are seeing improved performance when transitioning from manual CPC to a smart bidding strategy such as target CPA.

Requires Experience and Expertise

Knowing how to effectively optimise bids based on the individual performance of keywords requires a certain level of experience and expertise.

This can make setting manual bids difficult for those who have not yet developed a high level of proficiency with Google Ads.

It’s Manual…

An obvious downside to using Manual CPC bidding is that… well, it’s manual. Account managers will be required to log in on a regular basis in order to review performance and make adjustments to the bids accordingly.

This doesn’t just include keyword bids, but also bid adjustments for device, schedule, locations, and demographics.

Time Consuming

The time required for continually optimising keyword bids adds up over time. If using an automated bidding strategy, this time could instead be invested in further analysis and development of the campaign’s strategy.

Advantages of Manual CPC Bidding

New Campaigns With Little or No Conversion Data

Newly setup campaigns that do not yet have any performance or conversion data cannot take advantage of smart bidding strategies.

Automated bidding strategies such as Target CPA require campaigns to have at least 30 conversions within the last 30 days in order for them to work effectively.

In this circumstance Manual CPC bidding gives the advertiser the ability to optimise their bids without having to wait for a certain volume of conversions.

When Automated Strategies Can’t Cut It

There are instances where automated/smart bid strategies are just not able to meet the campaign’s targets or objectives.

This is why it is important to test the effectiveness of smart bidding strategies versus manual bids.

When smart bidding strategies are failing to meet targets, the remedy is to optimise bids the old-fashioned way.

Full Control

Manual CPC is the only bidding strategy that gives advertisers full control over their bidding. This is as long as the option for Enhanced CPC is unchecked, of course.

This gives the advantage of not having to rely on the efficacy and reliability of Google’s automated bidding strategies, and gives the ability to fully control costs, and ensure that bids are being optimised in-line with the campaign’s objectives.

Conclusion

Manual CPC is not better, or worse, than any of the other bidding strategies available. Its comparable efficacy will depend on the individual circumstances of the campaign in question.

For this reason, Manual CPC should be tested along with the other bidding strategies which are applicable to the objectives and targets of the campaign.

There will however, at least for the time being, always be circumstances where the Manual CPC bidding strategy will be relied upon.

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philip January 14, 2020 0 Comments

Search Term Report AdWords (Google Ads): Learn to Save Money With Negative Keywords

The success or failure of a Google Ads search campaign hinges on the effectiveness of the search terms being targeted.

Despite this, when reviewing new Google Ads accounts for clients, one of the main contributors we find for low levels of profitability for campaigns, is non-relevant search terms being targeted.

These are terms being used by people who have no interest in the products or services being marketed by the campaign, and are therefore a waste of the campaign’s budget.

Within this article you’ll learn how to quickly identify these terms, and remove them from the targeting of your campaign, in order to save money and increase your campaign’s profitability.

Finding Your Search Term Report

The first step is to navigate to the search term report for your campaign by selecting ‘Keywords’ tab from the left menu, and then selecting ‘Search Terms’ in the top menu.

Ensure that you have set the date range in the top right hand corner to the time frame you would like to review.

Filters to Use Within The Search Term Report

Before starting to review the terms, you can save time by using a number of filters:

  1. Added/Excluded: None – This ensures you’re not reviewing terms you’ve already taken an action for)
  2. Conversions: <1 – This way you’re only reviewing the terms which are potentially wasting ad spend.
  3. Match Type: Select all except ‘Exact match’ – This way you’re not reviewing terms which you are already targeting as keywords.

Identifying Non-Relevant Search Terms

Within the search term report, you should review each of the terms and try to gauge the intent.

The key to identifying non-relevant search terms, is putting yourself in the shoes of the person using the search query.

Ask yourself ‘what would I be looking for if I used this search term’?

Would you be looking to purchase the product or service being marketed by the campaign in question? If the answer is no, then it is very likely that you have found a non-relevant search term.

For example, if the campaign in question is marketing solicitors services, and the search term in question is “solicitors average salary”; it is clear that the person using this term is not looking to hire a solicitor, but rather is doing research on the salaries of solicitors.

Blocking Non-Relevant Search Terms

Once you have identified a non-relevant search term, it is time to add a negative keyword to the campaign in order to block that search term.

This can be done very simply and quickly within the search term report by selecting the checkbox next to the search term in question, and then clicking the ‘Add as negative keyword’ option at the top of the report.

However, there are several ways we can be far more effective with our negative keywords:

  1. Instead of adding the full term as a negative keyword, e.g. “solicitors average salary”, we can isolate the salient non-relevant part of the term “salary” and add this as a negative keyword.
  2. Use the Phrase Match type, which is indicated by the use of quotes. So our negative keyword in the example would be “salary”, rather than [salary]. This ensures that we will be blocking any search term which contains the word ‘salary’, which is a wider spectrum of terms.
  3. We can also add other related terms as negative keywords, to preemptively block these from ever being targeted. Words like “salaries”, “wages”, “hourly rate” etc. These can be added within a negative keyword list.

Using Negative Keyword Lists

The search term report can also give you ideas about other terms which you may want to add as negative keywords, to block them from ever being targeted by your campaign in the first place.

These new negative keywords can be applied directly to the campaign, but they can also be added to a negative keyword list. This can be quicker to do and will mean that these negative keywords can conveniently be applied to any campaign within your account.

You can create negative keyword lists by selecting “Tools & Settings” in the top right hand corner of your account, and then “Negative keyword lists” from the menu.

We’ve created a list of over 13,500 common negative keywords that we would like to share with you.

Using these bulk negative keyword lists can help to avoid ad spend being wasted on non-relevant terms and improve the profitability of your campaigns.

Need Help With Your Google Ads Account?

If you feel your campaigns are not working as effectively as they could, and would like an expert to review your account, then feel free to get in contact with us and we’ll have one of our specialists get in contact with you.

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philip November 27, 2019 0 Comments

Best Bidding Strategy Google Ads (AdWords) – How to Choose The Right Bidding Strategy to Meet Your Business Objectives

Within Google Ads there are a number of different bidding strategies to choose from, and it can sometimes be quite unclear which is the best bidding strategy to choose for your individual campaign.

You may have been wondering the following:

  1. Which is the best bidding strategy for meeting my business objectives?
  2. When should I start using the bidding strategy?
  3. How do I set up the bidding strategy?

This article and accompanying videos will answer each of these questions.

Looking for the Short Answer?

Now if you want the short answer as to what the best bidding strategies in Google Ads are, in this section I’ll quickly explain which bid strategies are the best to use in the majority of cases, and when and how to set them up.

For a more comprehensive answer, continue reading below this section.

The majority of clients we work with are looking to maximise the number of leads, or product sales that are generated within their monthly budget, and continue to grow their campaigns at a profitable rate.

In order to accomplish this we do the following:

  1. At the time the newly set up campaign begins running, we use either the Manual CPC, or Maximise Clicks bidding strategies.
  2. As performance data begins to accumulate we begin to see which forms of targeting are working most effectively, and using Manual CPC, we are able to adjust the bids to focus ad spend on the areas of the campaign which are generating the most value.
  3. Once the account has a sufficient level of conversion data (30 or more conversions within a 30 day period) we then select either the Target CPA bidding strategy, or the Target ROAS bidding strategy (ideal for conversions that have revenue data pertaining to them).

Selecting a Bidding Strategy for Your Objectives

Target CPA

Your Objective

Generate conversions at a specific pricer per conversion.

How it Works

With the Target CPA bidding strategy, you specify the price or CPA (cost-per-acquisition) that you would like to pay on average for a conversion. For example, if a conversion on your website is a prospective client fill out the contact form, and you would like to pay £25 on average for each lead, then this is what you would set as your target CPA.

Google’s system will then automatically manage your bids, using the user behaviour data within your campaign, in order to try to achieve this average price per conversion.

The more conversion data your campaign has, the more accurate the system will be in selecting the optimal bid. It is recommended that your campaign have at least 30 conversions within the last 30 days before opting to use this bid strategy.

Any manual bids you had previously set will be removed.

When To Use It

Target CPA should ideally be used when all of your conversions have the same or a similar value for your business. This is because the system will treat all conversions with equal weighting, including both macro (high value) and micro (low value) conversions.

If you have multiple conversion types, all with very different values, e.g. different product types, then you’re better off using a Target ROAS strategy.

Target ROAS

Your Objective

Generate conversion value, for a specific % return on your ad spend.

How it Works

The target ROAS bidding strategy works in much the same way as the Target CPA strategy, except instead of optimising your bids to achieve a particular CPA price for conversions, the bids are optmised to achieve a particular Return-On-Ad-Spend.

For example, if you’d like your campaign to generate £40,000 in revenue from £10,000 in ad spend, then your target ROAS would be 400%.

The system will then automatically adjust your bids in order to try to achieve this ROAS throughout the course of the month.

When To Use It

Target ROAS is the ideal bidding strategy when you have multiple conversion types with different conversion values. This is typically the case with e-commerce/online stores with multiple product skews.

To make use of the bidding strategy, the value of each conversion must be tracked within Google Ads.

Maximise Conversions

Your Objective

Generate as many conversions as possible within your chosen budget.

How it Works

With the Maximise Conversions bidding strategy, there is no need to set a target. Instead Google’s system will adjust your bids in order to try to generate as many conversions, or as much conversion value, as possible within your daily/monthly budget.

When To Use It

The Maximise Conversions strategy can be useful if you are not sure how much you would like to pay for conversions, or what you would like your return to be (and therefore can’t specify a target CPA or ROAS), but you are sure about how much you would like to spend on clicks each month.

However, if possible we would recommend using the Target CPA/ROAS bidding strategies instead of the Maximise Conversions strategy. This is because we have consistently seen the Target CPA and Target ROAS bidding strategies outperform the Maximise Conversions strategy.

If you are unsure about what target to set, you can periodically tweak your target CPA or ROAS in order to test which target generates you the highest volume of conversions or conversion value within your monthly budget.

Maximise Conversion Value

Your Objective

Generate the highest amount of conversion value as possible, within your chosen budget.

How it Works

With the Maximise Conversion Value bidding strategy, there is no need to set a target ROAS. Instead Google’s system will adjust your bids in order to try to generate the highest conversion value possible within your daily/monthly budget.

When To Use It

This bidding strategy is ideal when you are tracking conversion value within your campaigns, and would like to maximise the amount of revenue generated within your budget.

You’re not sure what Target ROAS you would like to set, but you know how much you would like to spend within Google Ads, and would like to aim for the best possible return.

Maximise Clicks

Your Objective

Generate as much traffic as possible, within your chosen budget.

How it Works

With the Maximise Clicks bidding strategy, Google’s system will adjust your bids in order to help generate as many clicks as possible within your daily/monthly budget.

Clicks from all keywords will be weighted the same, and you therefore may see a greater number of clicks from less competitive keywords with a lower average cost-per-click.

Make sure to place a cap on the max CPC/bid when setting up this strategy, as this will ensure that the system will not exceed a bid amount that you are comfortable with.

When To Use It

The Maximise Clicks bidding strategy is ideal when your main objective is to generate traffic.

The strategy can be useful for generating an optimal volume of traffic within your budget, so that you can then generate conversion data to be used for one of the conversion based bidding strategies.

Manual CPC With Enhanced CPC

Your Objective

Maximise the volume of conversions / conversion value, within your budget.

How it Works

When using the Manual CPC bidding strategy, with Enhanced CPC activated, Google’s system will adjust your chosen keyword bids, either higher or lower, for each auction.

Google makes use of user data to determine which auctions are most likely to result in a conversion, and will then focus your ad spend on these auctions.

For auctions that have a higher probability of resulting in a conversion, Google will raise your bid above the maximum CPC you’ve set.

And for auctions that have a lower probability of resulting in a conversion, Google will decrease your bid to an amount lower than the maximum CPC you’ve set.

When To Use It

This bid strategy is ideal when your campaign has not yet had time to build up a substantial volume of conversion data.

For those auctions where Google’s system lacks enough information to make an effective bidding decision, the Max CPC that you’ve set can stand. But for those auctions where Google has adequate information, the bidding strategy can step in and adjust the bid higher or lower to help increase your campaign’s overall performance.

Important Considerations

Setting Realistic Targets

It’s important to note that in order for your chosen target to be achievable, for either the Target CPA or ROAS bidding strategies, it needs to be a realistic target. If the target CPA or ROAS you set is substantially lower than what your campaign has achieved using manual bids, the system may set your bids too low, and your campaign may not generate any impressions or clicks at all.

Monitor the Performance

Although automated bidding strategies take over the management of your bids, they are not ‘fire and forget’ processes. It is still your responsibility to monitor the performance of your campaigns and ensure that you are on track to meet your targets.

There can be unintended effects from the use of bidding strategies. The Maximise Clicks bidding strategy for example, can have a habit of consistently reaching the daily budget cap of your campaign (currently 2x the daily budget you have set). So it’s important to review the impact of using any bidding strategy, and adjust accordingly.

Test Different Strategies

Every Google Ads campaign is different, and while one bidding strategy may be the most effective for one campaign, another bidding strategy may be more effective for another campaign.

For this reason it is essential that you test the different bidding strategies that are appropriate to your business objectives, to identify the one that garners the best performance.

Setting Up Bid Strategies

Individual Campaign Bidding Strategies

In order to update your campaign’s bidding strategy, navigate to the Settings tab, and Select Bidding. You will then have a selection of all of the available bidding strategies within the drop down menu.

Portfolio Bidding Strategy

Using a Portfolio Bidding Strategy allows you to use a single strategy for multiple campaigns and combine the data for those campaigns.

More data there is available, the effective bidding strategies can be, so using a Portfolio Bidding Strategy is a great option if you have multiple campaigns which share the same business objectives.

To create a Portfolio Bidding Strategy, click on Tools & Settings in the top right hand corner of your Google Ads account, and under Shared Library, select Bid Strategies.

From here you can click the blue plus symbol, selecting the bidding strategy you would like to use, and also apply it to the appropriate campaigns.

Need Help With Your Google Ads Account?

If you feel your campaigns are not working as effectively as they could, and would like an expert to review your account, then feel free to get in contact with us and we’ll have one of our specialists get in contact with you.

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philip November 25, 2019 0 Comments

Responsive Search Ads in Google Ads: Why You Need to Be Using Them in 2020!

Since their introduction in early 2018, Responsive Search Ads have received a mixed reception.

Being the new kid on the ad format block, many advertisers were wary of incorporating RSA into their ad groups.

However, heading into 2020, it is clear that Responsive Search Ads are not going anywhere; and if anything, they’re taking over.

So here’s why you need to be using RSA in 2020, along with some considerations for attaining the best performance with this ad format.

Click-Through-Rates Are Generally Higher with Responsive Search Ads

Google has stated that Responsive Search Ads on average have a 5 to 15% proportionally better click-through-rate (CTR) when compared to their Expanded Text Ad counterpart.

Initially when RSA were used, many advertisers complained that they were seeing a lower CTR with RSA versus ETA.

However as time has gone on, the algorithm being used for the RSA seems to have improved drastically, and CTR’s seem to have improved dramatically for RSA.

You Can Test A Lot More!

With Responsive Search Ads, you can test up to 15 different headlines and up to four different descriptions within a single ad.

These headlines and descriptions will be combined to form a multitude of unique variants which would have otherwise required dozens and dozens of Expanded Text Ads in order to test.

This underpins the power of Responsive Search Ads, and why they’re an improvement on Expanded Text Ads.

Responsive Search Ads May Replace Expanded Text Ads

Google often phase out the old features of their platform, such as the old Standard Text Ads that were phased out by Expanded Text Ads.

It’s not inconceivable, and is actually quite probable, that ETA’s will be phased out by RSA’s.

For this reason it is essential to begin testing RSA’s now, and ensuring that all of your ad groups are utilising RSA’s, in anticipation for the moment when they are removed from the platform.

You Cannot Review All of The Performance Data for Your Responsive Search Ads

One downside of using Responsive Search Ads at the moment, is that we don’t have access to all of the performance data for each of the different combinations of headlines and descriptions being used.

Without this data we cannot ascertain which variants of each ad are helping us to generate more clicks and conversions.

Google is keeping this valuable data hidden, almost like a secret recipe.

RSA Do Not Always Perform Better Than ETA

Responsive Search Ads will not always perform better than Expanded Text Ads.

Testing both ad types is essential to discover which format will deliver the highest click-through-rate, and the highest conversion-per-impression within each of your ad groups.

Tips for Testing Responsive Search Ads and Expanded Text Ads

  • When Testing RSA and ETA:
    Ensure that there are no duplicate headlines or descriptions within your RSA ad copy.
  • Pin headlines to the headline 1, and description line 1. This helps to ensure that your ad will make sense.
  • Use one RSA per ad group.
  • Use three ETA per ad group.

Free Responsive Search Ads builder

Gain access to our free Responsive Search Ads builder, which will allow you to quickly and easily create new ads to be imported into your Google Ads campaigns.

Need Help With Your Google Ads Account?

If you need help with setting up and getting the best performance from your Responsive Search Ads, and would like an expert to review your account, then feel free to get in contact with us and we’ll have one of our specialists get in contact with you.

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philip November 20, 2019 0 Comments

Landing Pages That Convert In Google Ads – 10 Top Tips

One of the most important variables which determines the success of a Google Ads campaign, is the landing page.

The campaign settings, targeting and ads generate the traffic; but ultimately that traffic must be converted into a lead or sale by the landing page.

You can have an extremely well set up Google’s Ad campaign that attracts customers who are dying for your product or service, but if you don’t engage those visitors once they’re on your website, and entice them into a sale, then they’ll simply leave and buy from another website.

Through our experience reviewing Google Ads campaigns, we’ve seen which landing pages convert, and which do not, and based on this we’ve compiled a list of 10 Top Tips that you need for a high landing page conversion rate.

1. Fast Page Speed

The speed at which your landing page loads is one of the most important factors for determining its conversion rate.

People these days want everything to load instantly and will have very little patience for a page that’s taking more than two or three seconds to load.

If your page is taking more than three seconds to load for either desktop or mobile, then this is certainly an area you should be committing attention to.

Any time you can shave off of your page load speed is going to translate directly into a higher conversion rate, and ultimately more money in yours or your client’s bank account.

Luckily there are some great tools for assessing your landing page’s load speed and identifying areas where improvements can be made:

GTMetrix
Google Page Speed Insights

2. Strong Call to Action

There needs to be a clear indication of what visitors need to do once they land on your page.

Visitors don’t want to spend time digging around and hunting for the next step they need to take in order to buy your product or service.

If the visitor needs to be fill out a form in order to place their order, this needs to be clearly stated, and this is achieved with a call-to-action. For example a big “Order Now” button on the form, gives a clear indication.

A call-to-action needs to be bold, and stand out by contrasting with the colour scheme of the page so that the visitor’s eyes lock onto it straight away.

3. Responsiveness

Is your page responsive and easy to navigate on mobile and tablet devices? As more and more people are choosing to browse the web on their smartphones, it’s becoming increasingly important for your website to perform well and look good on mobile.

4. Limit Linking to Other Pages

Having links to other pages on your own or other websites can pull visitors away from your landing page, and the specific action you would like them to take.

Limiting the number of links you have on your landing page can help channel visitors towards the action that will ultimately generate revenue for your business.

5. Great Content Above the Fold

Is there valuable information above the fold of your page? Many visitors won’t scroll past the top of your landing page. Again, visitors are impatient, and want quick answers to their queries.

It helps to place information about your product or service’s main features and benefits in bullet-point format above the fold, along with a clear call-to-action to give you the best chance of converting visitors within the first few seconds of them landing on the page.

6. Excellent Brand Messaging

Do you have a strong brand that exudes authority, and integrity within your sector? Visitors pay a lot of attention to the feeling and vibe they get from your website’s branding.

This includes your domain name!

We’ve performed tests with landing pages, where the only change we have made is to the domain name, and we’ve seen a proportional difference of conversion rate of 25%.

7. Credibility & Transparency

It’s important to come across as legitimate, credible, and trustworthy. People want to do business and buy from people that they can trust.

Make sure it’s easy for visitors to access your terms, privacy policy, contact information, and details of how you will secure their information.

8. Unique Product or Service

Is the product or service that you’re offering unique or differentiated from your competitors in any way? And if not, are you presenting service in a different way from your competitors?

If you’re offering the same thing as all of the other advertisers, then why what will make prospective customers choose you?

Without a competitive edge, any marketing campaign being run may struggle to produce results.

9. No Spammy Content and Features

Does your site have any annoying pop-ups? Is it full of ads? Are there multiple email optin forms. These types of features can reduce your page’s overall conversion rate.

10. A/B Testing

No landing page is perfect, and you can always find ways of squeezing more conversions out of your visitors.

Split or A/B testing, gives you experiment with new ideas and to identify new layouts, content, and call-to-actions which generate higher conversion rates.

Need Help With Your Google Ads Account?

If you think your landing page conversion rates are not as high as they should be, and would like an expert to review your page, then feel free to get in contact with us and we’ll have one of our specialists get in contact with you.

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philip November 19, 2019 0 Comments

Google Ads Landing Page Experience: How to Get an Above Average Rating and Maximise Your Quality Score

The Google Ads landing page experience is an important component of each of your keyword’s Quality Scores.

Why Does Google Place an Importance On Your Landing Page Experience?

One of Google’s main objectives is to ensure that their users are served with the best possible results for their search query.

If people were consistently linked with content that they do not find useful, or a website that gave them a bad experience, then they would eventually stop using Google search.

For this reason, use a ranking system to compare the websites of the various advertisers bidding on a given keyword.

How Is Landing Page Experience Assessed

Your landing page will be assessed by both bots that automatically crawl your site, and staff who will carry out a manual review.

Together these assessments will be used to categorise your landing page as either

  • Above Average: The experience on your landing page is excellent compared to other advertisers for the keyword in question.
  • Average: The experience on your landing page is OK, but it has room for improvement.
  • Below Average: The experience on your landing page doesn’t meet the standard, and needs improvement.

How to Review Your Keyword’s Landing Page Experience

To view the Landing Page Experience for your keywords:

  1. Navigate to the Keywords section of your account
  2. Select ‘Columns’ and ensure that the ‘Landing Page Experience’ column has been added
  3. Review the rating, which will be either “Below Average”, “Average”, “Above Average”, or “-” if there is not yet sufficient data
  4. If your rating is “Average” or “Below Average” – then there’s room for improvement

How to Improve Your ‘Landing Page Experience’

When it comes to ‘Landing Page Experience, there is a set criteria Google users to categorise pages as either above or below average.

The more of these criteria you meet, compared to your competitors, the better your rating will be.

It’s important to understand however, that some of these criteria are quite vague, or subjective.

Whether you meet the criteria or not will be down to the opinion of the individual manul reviewer reviewing your page.

Here is a full break-down of the criteria offered by Google.

Well-Defined Criteria
  • Speed: Does it load quickly, or does it keep the user waiting around for 3 or more seconds? Test your site’s mobile speed here.
  • Information: Does your page offer an adequate level of information for visitors to make a decision? We’ve found that having at least 500-1000 words is a good amount to aim for.
  • Responsive: Is your page responsive and easy to navigate on mobile and tablet devices? Google places heavy emphasis on how well your website performs on mobile.
  • Above the fold: Is there valuable information above the fold? We’ve found that pages that have limited content, or just a form or an image above the fold, tend to find it harder to get a good rating.
Intuitive Criteria
  • Brand Meets Expectations: Do you have a strong brand that exudes authority, and integrity within your sector? Of course this is very subjective, and this will mean something different for each industry. A tattoo parlour’s website is going to require a completely different colour scheme and brand in order to appear authentic, compared to a law firm.
  • Transparency: It’s important to come across as legitimate, credible, and trustworthy. Make sure it’s easy for visitors to access your terms, privacy policy, contact information, and details of how you will secure their information.
  • Unique Content: Are you offering something new that allows you to differentiate yourself from your competitors, or are you offering the same thing as all of the other advertisers?
  • Spammy Content and Features: Does your site have any annoying pop-ups? Is it full of ads? Are there multiple email optin forms. These can be viewed as detrimental to the overall user experience.

An Above Average ‘Landing Page Experience’ Can Be Elusive, But Keep Trying!

Achieving an ‘Above Average’ rating can at times, seem to be very elusive.

But the important thing is to ensure that you meet as many of the criteria possible, to give your page the best chance of getting an above average rating.

A side effect of doing this is that the experience for your visitors should improve by doing this, which should improve your retention of those visitors, and possibly increase the percentage of visitors who become customers.

So there is no down-side to improving your landing page. Even if you don’t see an above average rating, it’s still worth making the adjustments.

Need Help With Your Google Ads Account?

If you’re struggling to achieve an Above Average rating for your keyword’s Landing Page Experience, and would like an expert to review your account, then feel free to get in contact with us and we’ll have one of our specialists get in contact with you.

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philip November 19, 2019 0 Comments

The Ultimate Google Ads Negative Keyword List: 13,535 Negative Keywords and Counting

Why Are Negative Keywords so Important?

As opposed to the keywords that you bid on, with negative keywords, you select which words you want to prevent your ads from showing for.

Your list of negative keywords should be made up of commonly terms which are not relevant to the purchasing of the product or service that you offer.

For example if you’re advertising your services as a solicitor, you don’t want to be bidding on a term such as “solicitors salary”, as this keyword is being used by someone doing research about solicitor salaries not a customer.

Adding “salary” as a negative keyword would therefore help to prevent wasted ad spend on non-relevant keywords.

Simply put, using a long list of negative keywords will help put more money in yours or your client’s bank account.

Despite this, negative keyword lists are typically under-utilised within the accounts that we review.

For this reason we’ve created a comprehensive list of common negative keywords that you can use to save ad spend, along with a guide to help you get the most from your negative keyword lists:

Discount

bargain
cheap
clearance
close out
close outs
closeout
closeouts
discount
discounted
free
inexpensive
liquidation
odd lots
overstock
remainder
remainders

class
classes
college
colleges
course work
course
courses
curriculum
education
essay
essays
learn
manual
material
materials
module
modules
pdf
program
programs
pupil
qualification
qualifications
qualified
report
reports
resource
resources
ringtones
school
schools
seminar
seminars
textbook
textbooks
thesis
training
universities
university
workbook

agencies
agency
association
associations
career
careers
consultants
consulting
curriculum vitae
cv
direct hire
direct placement
employ
employer
employer
employers
employment
employment
firm
firms
freelance
freelancer
freelancers
freelancing
frys
full time
full-time
head hunter
hire
hiring
house
household
independent contractors
intern
interns
internship
internships
job
job
jobs
jobs
occupation
occupations
part time
part-time
pay
personal
recruiter
recruiters
recruiting
recruitment
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How to Get The Most from Your Negative Keywords Lists

Doing Your Own Research

Using Google’s free Keyword Research Tool can be a great way to find non-relevant terms to negative match for your specific product or service.

You can start by entering words related to your service and then browsing through the results.

Try to think about what the intent of the searcher using each of the queries, are they looking to buy your product or service? If not, then you’ve likely found a good candidate for a negative keyword.

Negative Keyword Match Types

The same match types that can be used for normal keywords can also be used for negative keywords.

All of the negative keywords within the lists provided on this page, by default are using the Phrase Match Type (indicated by the quotes), as opposed to Exact, or Broad Match.

This is because we recommend using Phrase Match almost exclusively for your negative keywords, and is to save you time when copying and pasting these negative keywords into your account.

Phrase Match is recommended because it gives you the best of both worlds: it allows you to block all of the search terms that could possibly contain that negative keyword; while also allowing you to retain control over how wide the spectrum of terms you’ll be blocking will be.

Take Care When Adding Negative Keywords

When adding in negative keyword lists, you should always take care to ensure that the keywords you are negative matching are not keywords that you would want to target for your product or service.

Google Ads will automatically detect when keywords that are targeted directly within your campaigns are unable to serve due to a negative keyword, however this issue will often only be flagged after a number of hours or days.

For this reason it is important to eye-ball every negative keyword that you add within your account.

Be sure to manually check every negative keyword that you add within yours or a client’s account. It is your responsibility to ensure that the negative keywords that you add will not be blocking any of your targeted keywords, or have an adverse effect on the performance of your campaigns.

Negative Keyword Limits

  • 20 shared negative keyword lists per account
  • 5,000 keywords per negative keyword list
  • 10,000 negative keywords per campaign

So the maximum number of negative keywords you can assign within a given campaign is 110,000

https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/6372658?hl=en-GB

Account Level Negative Keyword Lists

This is a bit of a hack, allowing to create list within your MCC account once and apply it to campaigns in multiple accounts.

To do this, when logged into your Google Ads MCC account (not a client’s child account) click on ‘Tools & Settings’ in the top right hand corner and select “Negative Keyword Lists”.

Any lists that you create within this section can be used across all the client accounts managed within your MCC.

Need Help With Your Google Ads Account?

If you feel your campaigns are not working as effectively as they could, and would like an expert to review your account, then feel free to get in contact with us and we’ll have one of our specialists get in contact with you.

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philip November 11, 2019 0 Comments

White Label PPC For Agencies: 5 Reasons to Consider Using White Label PPC Management

White labelling is a method for hiring another agency to act as part of your agency, in order to seamlessly manage your PPC clients.

This is ideal if you do not have the internal staff to handle high level PPC management and would like to deliver this service within your agency, and without needing to hire additional full-time employees.

Although you’re outsourcing all of the work, you retain the client. The white label agency simply acts and behaves as part of your company.

Pay for What You Need

If your agency has a relatively small number of clients that require PPC management, it might not make sense to hire a full-time in-house PPC specialist.

Using a white label PPC service instead will give you the ability to keep your costs low, and ensure that you only pay for the amount of work required for your current clients.

White Label PPC Offers Flexibility

A white label PPC service will have the resources match the level of demand you have from your clients.

You can access a reliable team of PPC specialists to meet a sudden influx in demand.

Likewise, when you have a temporary lull in demand for PPC services, you can simply cut back.

High Level of Expertise

In-house staff, especially those that are close to entry-level, take time to build on their experience and expertise.

Using a white label PPC service, you can instantly tap into a high level of expertise from specialists who have many years of experience building and managing successful campaigns.

Lower Your Overall Costs

White label PPC specialists have very efficient and streamlined processes for managing accounts. For this reason they’re services are extremely cost effective while delivering optimal results for clients.

The cost for a good white label PPC service should be significantly lower than the cost for hiring an in-house specialist, even when managing the same number of accounts.

This is also while delivering a higher level of performance for client campaigns that you would expect from a specialist with a track-record of success managing numerous accounts over the course of their career.

Permanent Relationship

In-house account managers can move on to other companies, taking all of the knowledge, experience and expertise that they’ve built up with them.

With a white label PPC company, you can remain in contact and maintain a long-term relationship with specialists who will always be ready to work on your client’s accounts when you need them.

Need Help With Your Clients’ PPC Accounts?

If you feel your clients’ campaigns are not working as effectively as they could, or you believe you could benefit from a white label PPC service, then feel free to get in contact with us and we’ll have one of our specialists get in contact with you.

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philip November 6, 2019 0 Comments

Should I Use Google Ads For My Business?

A question I’m asked very often is “should I use Google Ads for my business?

When I am advising a new client on whether or not Google Ads (AdWords) is going to be a good option for their website or business, there are five considerations that I will go through with them to help decide if Google Ads will be a good option for their business.

1. Are people actively searching on Google for the product or service that you offer?

Google allows you to be in the right place at the right time when someone knows what they’re looking for and are searching for it.

But if your type of service is very new and people aren’t searching for it on a daily basis yet, then Google Ads might not be the best way for you to reach your customers.

2. What is your advertising budget?

How much are you willing to risk/invest to make this work? This is an important consideration because a successful Google Ads campaign is built on data.

Data on which keywords, settings, and ads are effective for your target market. And this data takes time and money to accumulate.

For this reason it’s worth planning out what you’re expecting to invest and over what time-frame to make this work.

3. What are your objectives?

What are you expecting in return for your investment? Here it’s useful to define some KPI’s (key performance indicators), and alongside this, project what the likely performance metrics for your campaign will be.

How well do these match up? How realistic are your objectives? Are you likely to generate the volume of sales or clients that you need for your campaign to be profitable? If not, then it may not be a good investment.

4. Have you explored other forms of marketing?

Have you considered other forms of marketing, especially those that can be more cost effective, or give you a better ‘bang for your buck’?

Reaching your target customer through other channels such as social media, email, or networking face-to-face could be highly effective and work out much cheaper.

If you’ve tested other marketing channels, were these successful? Was there a lot of demand for your product and service? Did your landing page get a good conversion rate?

Why are you looking to set up a Google Ads campaign?

The best reason to turn to Google Ads, is because you’re seeing high demand for your product/service, and you’re looking to scale things up.

The power of Google Ads is that it allows you to build on this success by delivering a predictable volume of new prospective clients, at a predictable cost.

Imagine your company is a fire that you’re building; as it heats up, Google Ads would be the petrol you can pour on that fire to make it roar.

If you’re service; product; website; offer; are untested however, Google Ads may not be the most cost-effective place to test these.

Need Help With Your Google Ads Account?

If you need help in deciding whether or not Google Ads is a good option for your business, then feel free to get in contact with us and we’ll have one of our specialists get in contact with you.

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philip November 5, 2019 0 Comments

How to Improve Google Ads Quality Score – The Simple No-Nonsense Guide

Do your keywords have low Quality Scores?

If so, then this is likely to be negatively affecting the performance of you campaign, and having a negative impact on your bottom line.

But what is Quality Score? What effect does it have on campaigns? And how do we change it?

Within this article each of these questions is answered, and a 4 simple steps are given, which if followed can help to improve your keyword’s Quality Score.

What is Quality Score?

Quality Score is a grading system from 1 through to 10, that Google uses to assess how relevant and useful your ads and landing pages are.

Google ‘s aim is to serve web users with content that matches their query as accurately as possible, and therefore your Quality Score will help to determine where your ad will show for each search query, based on its relevance.

A keyword Quality Score of 10 is the most desirable, as this will help your ad to rank high in the search results; while a Quality Score of 1 will decrease the likelihood of your ad achieving a high rank.

How Does Quality Score Affect Your Ad Rank

Google calculates the position of your ad, or it’s ‘Ad Rank’ by multiplying your CPC bid by your Quality Score.

Ad Rank

Note: In cases where two advertisers have an equal Ad Rank, another factor is used as a tie-breaker: their use of Ad Extensions.

Confused? Well Let’s Simplify Things

With Quality Score, there’s really only a couple of things you need to understand:

  1. You want to have a Quality Score of 6 or above, because this entitles you to a discount
  2. You want to avoid a Quality Score of 4 or below, because this will result in you paying an increased CPC

Here’s an image that illustrates the percentage change in CPC price that you can expect compared to a neutral Quality Score of 5.

CPC Discount

So you can see here that Quality Score has a huge impact on the amount you pay, and ultimately the profitability of your campaign.

For this reason, your Quality Scores for the keywords you are targeting will to a large extent determine the success or failure of your campaign.

How is Quality Score Determined?

Google determines the Quality Score of each of the keywords within your account based on three main attributes:

 

Expected CTR

Google generates its revenue primarily from clicks made on ads within its ad network.

The higher your ad’s click-through-rate (CTR) is, the more clicks it will generate, and the more revenue it will generate for Google.

Additionally a high CTR is an indicator that users find your ad to be highly relevant to their search query.

For these reasons, Google favors the ads that have the highest CTR, and CTR is the most important factor in determining Quality Score.

 

Ad Relevance

As mentioned above, Google’s aim is to deliver the most relevant results to users based on their query/the keyword they have used.

In order to accomplish this, Google reviews ads in order to gauge how well the content matches each keyword that the ad appears for.

 

Landing Page Experience

Google also wants to deliver the best possible user experience, helping to ensure that each person that makes a search is matched with the information or service that they are looking for.

For this reason, both bots and manual reviewers will assess your landing page/website to ensure it is delivering a positive experience to users.

 

Use of Ad Extensions

Ad Extensions, such as ‘Callouts’ and ‘Sitelinks’ offer additional information that web users may find useful. These Extensions increases the overall size of ads, and larger ads generally garner a higher CTR.

For this reason Google wants to incentivise you to use the different Ad Extensions available, and doing so can help to increase your Quality Score.

How to Check Your Keyword’s Quality Score

To view the Quality Score for your keywords and how Google has assessed each of the attributes that contribute toward your Quality Score:

  1. Navigate to the Keywords section of your account
  2. Ensure that the ‘Quality Score’, ‘Exp. CTR’, ‘Ad Relevance, and ‘Landing Page Exp.’ columns have been added
  3. Review the rating, which will be either “Below Average”, “Average”, “Above Average”, or “-” if there is not yet sufficient data
  4. If your rating is “Average” or “Below Average” – then there’s room for improvement

Keyword Quality Score

How Can I Improve My Quality Score? 4 Simple Steps:

The Quality Score for a given keyword can potentially be improved by following the four steps below.

Each step relates to one of the four factors that contribute towards a keyword’s Quality Score, listed in order of importance.

Step 1: Improve Your Ads ‘Expected Click Through Rate’

To improve your ‘Expected CTR’ it’s important to split-test different ads within each of your ad groups, with varying headlines and descriptions to find out what is really enticing users to click.

Understanding the psychology and intent of your target market will give you an advantage here, helping you to predict what will resonate with potential client, and grab their attention.

However the key here is to test, test, test.

We recommend testing three Expanded Text Ads, along with one Responsive Search Ad within each ad group..

ad test

Step 2: Improve Your ‘Ad Relevance’

Including the keyword within the first headline if possible, and also in the first description, can help to improve the relevance of your ad. As a knock-on effect, it can also help to improve the engagement and CTR of your ad.

Additionally. organising your keywords into small well-defined ad groups based on their relevance, can help ensure that the most appropriate ad is served for each search term.

If you’re targeting Phrase, Broad, or Broad Match Modified keywords, then can also improve the relevance by using a comprehensive list of negative keywords. By preventing your ads from showing for potential non-relevant search terms that may be targeted by a given keyword, you can increase that keyword’s rating for relevance.

Step 3: Improve Your ‘Landing Page Experience’

When it comes to the ‘Landing Page Experience, there are some areas which are extremely clear cut, and there are other areas which are highly subjective.
The rating for your page may well hinge on the opinion of the person who has manually reviewed your page.

For this reason, attaining an ‘Above Average’ rating can at times appear very elusive, and other times very easy.

But that’s part of the challenge!

Here are some of the most important considerations for achieving an ‘Above Average’ rating for ‘Landing Page Experience’:

 

Clear Cut

 

  • Speed: Does it load quickly, or does it keep the user waiting around for 3 or more seconds? Test your site’s mobile speed here.
  • Information: Does your page offer an adequate level of information for visitors to make a decision? We’ve found that having at least 500-1000 words is a good amount to aim for.
  • Responsive: Is your page responsive and easy to navigate on mobile and tablet devices? Google places heavy emphasis on how well your website performs on mobile.
  • Above the fold: Is there valuable information above the fold? We’ve found that pages that have limited content, or just a form or an image above the fold, tend to find it harder to get a good rating.

 

Subjective

 

  • Branding: Do you have a strong brand that exudes authority, and integrity within your sector? Of course this is very subjective, and this will mean something different for each industry. A tattoo parlour’s website is going to require a completely different colour scheme and brand in order to appear authentic, compared to a law firm.
  • Transparent: It’s important to come across as legitimate, credible, and trustworthy. Make sure it’s easy for visitors to access your terms, privacy policy, contact information, and details of how you will secure their information.
  • Unique: Are you offering something unique that allows you to differentiate yourself from your competitors, or are you offering the same thing as all of the other advertisers?
  • Spammy: Does your site have this annoying pop-ups? Is it full of ads? Are there multiple email optin forms. These can be viewed as detrimental to the overall user experience.

Step 4: Improve Your Use of Ad Extensions

Fortunately this area is very easy to conquer, you simply need to use the available ad extensions which are relevant to your business and your potential customers.

The following Ad Extensions will be applicable to the majority of businesses and therefore we recommend using these as a minimum in order to remain competitive:

 

Sitelink Extensions

These link visitors to other useful pages of your website, besides the primary landing page of your ad.

We recommend creating 4-6 Sitelink Extensions.

If you have a single stand-alone landing page you’re using, and would prefer not to direct visitors to your main website; we have seen examples of advertisers using a single page for all of their Sitelink Extensions; however this is not the way in which they are intended to be used.

 

Callout Extensions

Callouts offer additional bite-size features and benefits of your product or service.

We recommend creating 8-10 Callouts for testing.

 

Call Extensions

Displaying your phone number, these allow users to instantly call your business without even needing to visit your website.

If generating phone calls from prospective customers is not one of your objectives however, you can miss this one out.

 

Structured Snippet Extensions

These snippets allow you to display lists of things such as product or service ‘types’, ‘brands’, etc.

If none of the options are applicable to your business however, you can leave these out.

 

Location Extensions

Location extensions requires a Google My Business page that displays your company’s venue/s, and are certainly worth including if this is an option for you.

Conclusion

Improving your keyword’s Quality Score can be a lengthy and at times challenging endeavor. However with the potential savings in max CPC’s that are available when higher Quality Scores are achieved, it is clear that it is an endeavor that is well-worth taking.

And by using the simple no-nonsense guide above, we hope we can help make the process of achieving those high Quality Scores a little easier.

Need Help With Your Google Ads Account?

If you feel your campaigns are not working as effectively as they could, and would like an expert to review your account, then feel free to get in contact with us and we’ll have one of our specialists get in contact with you.

Read More
philip October 21, 2019 0 Comments