Smart marketers know that all marketing strategies have their own pros and cons. While PPC is inherently regarded negatively, ask any online marketing agency, and it will tell you that there are many positive outcomes that may get from a PPC campaign.
PPC, while it has many benefits, is NOT the only and ultimate way of driving traffic and increasing sales. However, PPC must be tied up to SEO (search engine optimization, SMM, (social media marketing) and SEM (search engine marketing). All of these are needed in having a highly sustainable digital marketing strategy.
Choosing PPC keywords
Advertisers cannot just choose keywords that they think they should be targeting. It’s not the way PPC works. A campaign requires an ad group which, in turn, requires a keyword or keywords (or key phrase). Simply, the keyword(s) is bound to a group of ads. Choosing the right keywords is thus critical.
General or specific keywords
There are two major kinds of keywords: general and specific. General keywords are keywords about the industry and product or service category while specific keywords are about the brand and location. Specific keywords are also known as long-tail keywords, which make the campaign more targeted to what is being offered. Long-tail keywords contain more than three words. They often have lower search volumes and cost per clicks.
There are instances that general keywords are more appropriate to use than specific keywords. For instance, if a business offers digital marketing services, it may simply use ‘digital marketing company’ as their main keyword. This will allow users to find the business despite searching broadly.
Geo-targeted keywords
For local businesses, it is critical to include the geographical terms in the keywords. So, if the business operates in the Philippines specifically in Manila or Cebu, the keywords should be ‘PPC packages Manila’ or ‘PPC packages Cebu.’
Know and do keywords
In creating a campaign, it can be also designed to include know and do searches. An example of ‘know search’ is ‘which is the best PPC company in Cebu’ while an example of ‘do search is‘outsource PPC services in Manila.’ Know searches are informational queries while do searches are transactional queries.
Nonetheless, PPC campaigns usually target do searchers than know searchers. It is always great to discover that people are actually looking for information about the services. However, these people may not really be looking for your product. Do searchers make transactional inquiries which mean that they are more ready to buy the product or acquire the service.
Negative keywords
In October 2012, Google introduced near match wherein the ad will be shown if the user searches for the targeted keyword despite misspellings, accents, abbreviations or even plural and singular forms.
Google also launched putting ‘negative keywords’ so the ad will be more targeted. For example, if the keyword is ‘PPC services Philippines,’ adding –competitor1, -competitor2, -competitor3, etc. Optimind’s PPC ads, for instance, will not be triggered by these negative keywords. Thereby, through these matching options, the choice of keywords can be controlled when it comes to queries that trigger the ads.
The overall process results in preserving the advertising budget and improving the click-through-rate (CTR).
No individual website can rely on a single channel, that is, if it wants to succeed in the ever-competitive Internet industry. Different channels must be implemented for proper diversification of risks.
So, saying that PPC is not complicated is an understatement. In fact, as mentioned above, PPC is not as complicated as other online marketing strategies, but it can get complex and confusing at times. And in times like these, perhaps one should start comprehending making the process easier.
The secret is doing it right. Remember that while you may have the perfect campaign, it is not the only factor that can make such a campaign a success. If struggling is the only option, this brings us to the next area which is PPC outsourcing.
Image credit: evereffect.com
