The Ultimate Guide to PPC Marketing

Mark Twain once said that “many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising”; and in the digital world, where everything is so fast forward, advertising plays a vital role in making your brand memorable. When it comes to advertising, Pay-per-click (PPC) marketing is one of the most effective forms of advertising in the digital world. PPC marketing can help your business become a brand, and gain more leads and conversions when done right.

In this article, we will share everything you need to know about PPC marketing. We will cover:

• What is PPC marketing?
• What are the standard PPC terms and their meaning?
• Why your business needs PPC advertisements
• What are the major PPC platforms?
• How to create effective PPC campaigns
• What does PPC management entail?

What is PPC marketing?

As the name suggests, pay-per-click marketing is an advertising method to target your audience on different digital platforms with your marketing message. For PPC advertising, you have to pay each time a user clicks on your ad. Most people associate PPC with Google, but you can run PPC ads on various platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, and others.

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What are the standard PPC terms and their meaning?

To understand PPC marketing, first, you need to understand various PPC jargon related to PPC advertising. They are:

• SEM (Search engine marketing): Search engine marketing is a form of marketing done on any search engine like Google, Bing, or Yahoo to rank for a specific keyword. Search engine marketing can be both paid and unpaid.
• CPC (Cost-per-click): Cost-per-click is the amount that you have to pay to the platform for every click made on your ad. The cost is determined by the bidding amount you make for the position of your ad on the platform. However, your ad quality also plays a role in your ad placement.
• CPM (Cost-per-mile): Cost per mile refers to the amount you have to pay per 1000 impressions. An impression is when someone takes the cursor on your ad but doesn’t click.
• Ad group: Ad group is defined as the different sets of ads you create within your campaign for a different set of keywords.
• Keywords:  Keywords refer to the queries people put into the search engine. With ads, they refer to the relevant questions to which you want to show these ads.
• CTR (Click-through-rate): Click-through-rate is found by dividing the number of clicks by the number of impressions. CTR is a valuable parameter in determining the relevancy of your ad to your audience.
• CPA (Cost-per-acquisition): Cost per acquisition is the cost incurred when a person goes beyond clicking your ad. The person may fill out a landing page or make an inquiry call.
• Landing page: The landing page refers to the place (a page of your website or a form) where the viewer ends up when they click on your ad. A good landing page is crucial for successful leads and conversions.

Why your business needs PPC advertisements?

Once you understand the basics of PPC, the next question in your mind would be, “Do I need it?”. Here are some reasons why you should use PPC marketing for your business:

The primary reason why PPC is better than traditional advertising is that it is cost-effective. You can determine the amount you want to spend on each ad campaign, and you don’t have to go beyond that. Moreover, the chances of getting conversions are way higher with PPC than traditional advertising methods.

Another prominent factor that makes PPC marketing better is that everything is trackable. You can measure your KPIs every step of the way to know how your ad campaign is performing and make changes along the way. You can also keep track of conversions and the cost.

• Unaffected by search engine algorithms

One advantage of PPC ads is that they are not affected by search engine algorithms, so any changes won’t send your ad plummeting down on the SERP. You can also rank higher even if your website does not have higher domain ratings. So PPC is a good option for those marketers to get higher rankings who have not established their SEO fully.

• Enhanced targeting methods

PPC platforms offer enhanced targeting options to help you choose your perfect target audience. You can filter out whom you want to target based on gender, demographics, interests, and much more.

What are the major PPC marketing platforms?

Once you decide to use PPC marketing, the next crucial decision is where to show your ad. The decision depends on where you think you can find your target audience quickly and whether you want help with your SEO. There are multiple platforms you can choose from. The most prominent ones include:

Google is the most popular search engine across the globe, and it has its advertising platform, which allows you to show search ads and display ads on Google search pages and on YouTube. However, the downside of being so popular is that the keywords are highly competitive.

Bing ads is another search engine platform where you can display your search ads. Bing is less competitive than Google. Therefore, you can get a better position at lower rates quickly. However, the audience reach also minimizes.

Facebook is the most popular social media platform with more than 2.85 billion users globally. It is a highly effective paid ads platform as it has in-depth targeting options to reach your audience. You can also display your ads on Instagram with the Facebook Ad manager.

AdRoll is an excellent platform for your business if you want to display retargeting ads. Retargeting ads are those ads that are shown to people who have already visited your website once.

Revcontent is showing your ads next to relevant content. You need to select the keywords, and your ad would be displayed near the applicable content.

What are various types of ads that you can create?

You can create multiple types of ads for your ad campaigns, depending on your platforms. Some of them are:

• Search ads: Search ads are text-based ads displayed with organic results on a search engine for a relevant keyword.
• Display ads: Display ads are one step ahead of search ads as they allow you to use both text and images in your ads. Display ads are more attractive and hence get better responses.
• Paid socials: By promoting posts on social media to increase your reach, you can use paid socials. Through paid socials, you can boost your posts so that they reach more audiences on social media.
• Retargeting ads: These ads are displayed to a particular visitor who may have visited your website but left without making a purchase. Retargeting ads are shown to them to entice them into making a purchase.

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How to create effective PPC campaigns?

Now that you have all the information you need, you can move on to building your marketing campaigns. Here’s how you can make an effective PPC campaign for your business.

The first step in creating an ad campaign is to identify what you want to achieve. Without clear goals, you cannot succeed. Your goal can be to increase brand awareness, generate leads, or increase sales. Whatever it is, you need to build all your parameters around it.

Once you have a clear goal in mind, you can set the metrics required for your purpose. Your metrics will change significantly according to your goals. For example, if your goal is to create brand awareness, your metrics would focus more on social engagement and the traffic you receive. However, if your goal is lead generation, you would focus more on conversions from your landing pages.

• Determine your campaign type

Once you have the campaign’s goals and metrics, the next step is to finalize the campaign type you need to achieve those parameters. You can opt for search campaigns, display campaigns, social media ads, or remarketing ads, depending on what helps you achieve your goals the best.

The next step is to identify and assign keywords for each ad set you have created for your campaign. Keywords help search engines recognize which ads need to be shown to which audience. You should also add negative keywords to your campaigns to ensure that your ads are not shown to the wrong audience.

Remember to keep updating and changing the keywords as your campaign progresses.

Google Analytics is one of the best tools to track whatever is happening with your website. It is also free, so you should use it. It helps you keep track of all your performance metrics on your website. You can use that data to improve your PPC content.

What does PPC management entail?

PPC management covers everything you do to manage your ad campaigns and PPC marketing. It includes monitoring your campaigns, making changes such as introducing new keywords, removing them, optimizing conversion paths, and much more.

You can use PPC management tools like Hubspot, Optmyzer, and TechWyse to track and manage your PPC campaigns.

Here are some tips to make your PPC campaign a success.

Google allows you to create a tailored target audience for your ad campaigns. It helps you to show more relevant ads to your target audience.

You can also increase the bid for a particular ad group with more of your target audience’s responses. You can use this option to enhance your chances of conversions.

You can change the bid you have placed on your ads depending upon their performance. Use this option to spend more on ads that are getting a better response from your target audience.

A/B testing your campaigns to know what works better with your audience is crucial for the success of your campaigns. The insights you gather from this testing will help you improve your ad campaigns further.

Your target audience may be active during a specific time of the day. You can ensure that you pay for more relevant clicks and impressions through custom ad scheduling rather than randomly spending your money.

• Research your negative keywords 

Negative keywords are as crucial as positive keywords for your ad campaigns. Ignoring them can cost you a lot of money and waste your time and effort. Therefore, you need to determine these keywords for your campaign carefully. You can also keep updating these keywords as your campaign progresses.

Conclusion

Now you are all set to run your PPC campaigns. Whether you are just starting or you are an already established brand. It is never late to start with your PPC ads. You can also outsource your PPC campaigns to another PPC agency. It can help you get on with your online marketing strategies quickly and cost-efficiently. Just ensure that you get it right for the best results.