11 Tips for Startups Who Want to Start Using Google Adwords

At least once in your professional life you have tried to use Google Adwords as part of your marketing activities. It may have been a success and it may have been a failure. Here are some tips to help you do it right

One day, a few months after we froze the use of the account due to high costs, the phone with the Maryland area code rang and a nice customer manager from Google was on the other end of the line. Over the course of several weeks, once a week we discussed changes that should be made in the campaigns to achieve the best results. Despite the scepticism that characterized me at first - the results were good. I will share them here with you, in the hope that they will help you, as they helped me, to properly manage a limited PPC budget and bring immediate results to a startup at the beginning of its journey.

1. Stay focused

In order to reach your target audience using Google Adwords, you have two options:

a. Google Search - publish next to the search results. This option is very focused on the concrete interest of the potential customer (who right now is looking for something that you believe is related to you).

b. Display Network - which allows you to target (from the word target) people using different parameters on any site that works in partnership with Google (using Google Adsense).

It is most likely that at the beginning of the work you will not know which of them will yield better results, but it is important to stay focused and concentrate on one option and avoid spreading the budget. Try to concentrate and conquer one goal. For example, you can choose a certain country (and even go down to the resolution of certain cities) which you will define as a target country. This way you will optimize the campaign in the best way.

2. Here too, everything depends on the first impression

Google rates your new campaign mainly according to the first impression of their algorithms, that is, Google measures certain parameters, if you do not succeed in them your campaign may be judged and receive a "fine", and from there it will be very difficult to improve and maximize it. So create campaigns wisely.

For example : Let's say you want to create a campaign whose target audience are people who are looking for the brand that competes with you. In that case, expect a low click-through rate (CTR), no matter what you do (especially in light of Google's strict restrictions on the matter). Hence, create a separate campaign with keywords related to your competitors. In the same vein refer to concepts related to your core business, for example: your competitors' CTR can drop below 0.20% while your core campaign's CTR should be at least 1.30%, as it should be highly relevant to your target audience. Obviously, if you combine both into one campaign, the CTR of the campaign will be significantly affected. Also try to locate users on different devices. Adwords defaults to unify desktop, tablet and mobile. My recommendation is to start with the device that is most relevant to you (the one that gives you the highest conversion rates, at the lowest cost).

3. Don't settle for little - big ideas for finding small (and relevant) words

After you have created the list of words relevant to the campaign, try to expand the list. Don't break your head, just type the words from the list in the AdWords Keyword Planner tool, it will automatically suggest more words that may be relevant. Additionally, you can use the URL of your competitor's website when using the tool, so you'll get word ideas based on the competitor's website. And of course, with Spyfu and SimilarWeb you can find out what words your competitors are targeting.

4. Start wide, but not too wide

If you really want to succeed, try to understand what your audience is looking for. This can be understood through targeting words in a broad way, and then analyzing (with the tools of AdWords) which phrases the searchers used when your ad was displayed and clicked by them. Suppose your business is in the world of conversion optimization. If you choose a very general word (for example "Conversion ") Anyone who searches for something that contains this combination of words will reach your ad. So far so good, but remember that those who are looking for a close term will probably reach your ad, for example, someone searching for "converting to Judaism" will also reach the ad, and not necessarily will be your target audience. So how do we solve the matter? Part of the solution will appear by adding negative words (in the next section) and another part by adding a + sign before the chosen general word. This action will instruct Google to bounce the ad only when the word exactly matches the word that you chose and not when the word typed by.

5. Negation is not always a bad thing

In section 3, when you used the Keywords Planner, Google probably offered you words that it finds relevant to your campaign, but in fact they are not relevant at all. If you don't exclude these words, your ad will be available to a broad and irrelevant audience. For example, a search for "Dollar Euro Conversion rate" Another way to define negative keywords is through the data report you received from Google AdWords after your campaign is live. Search for the exact term, then sort the results by cost/impression (which word came up to you a lot and made little impression), and select the words you want to exclude. If it's a general word that repeats itself, don't forget to add the + before you exclude it (you don't want to alienate too much audience). To exclude the other exact terms (entertain as conjunctions) you can exclude using square brackets, for example [Dollar Euro Conversion Rate].

6. Increase with your hands and be the first

As we saw earlier, your campaign needs to make a good first impression on Google. This is through a high CTR for your ads, high relevance to the target audience, the messages in the ad itself, the messages on the landing page and more. The fact that your ad is amazing is not enough by itself to get a high CTR percentage. It is desirable that it be displayed as high as possible (so that it is not only searched "on paper" but also stands out to searchers). A good ambition is to be in the first three places. And how do you increase the chance of this happening? Just raise the bids on your words precisely at the beginning of the campaign.

7. Not all hands in one basket

Be sure to differentiate between the Broad, Phrases and Exact Match hands. It doesn't matter if you chose to separate them between different campaigns or not. A certain strategy holds that in the beginning, general words should receive the highest hands. 20% less for Phrases and 20% less for Exacts. The logic behind this is that the more general the words you target, the greater the competition for them and since you want to get more exposure (to actually learn from this which words and sentences are more accurate to target later) you should invest more in them first. In the future, it may be worthwhile to reverse the rule, since the most precise sentences will be worth the most to you, and precisely the broad ones will become less relevant, etc.

8. Give Display Network a chance

In some industries there is great competition, and the stakes can be very high. It's okay to try to find other alternatives and not go head to head with competitors who are richer than you. Try using the Display Network and creating text or banner ads using the Adwords automation tool or your favorite design tool. Maintain concreteness and of course emphasize the call-to-action button. You can search for large and relevant content sites in your field where your target audience is found a lot, by detecting keywords or interests, by using demographic data, preferences and more. If you chose to target only desktop users, you may be surprised to find that traffic is still flowing from mobile apps.

9. The secret of Google Display

It's very frustrating to find out that part of your budget was "wasted" on irrelevant clicks from mobile devices, even though you chose not to show the ads to such surfers. In order to avoid this phenomenon, simply prevent this link: adsenseformobileapps.com from the list of sites where Display Network ads can be displayed. Furthermore, search for keywords such as "game" or "mobile" and block all sites containing these words. Mostly these will be apps or games for mobile devices.

10. Don't be rude, be consistent

Part of the quality score that Google gives to your campaign is the relevance of the ad. Google compares keywords on your site with keywords you marked as target keywords in the ad, and also possible keywords of your competitors. In order to locate the most prominent keywords on your site, use tools such as Quicksprout and make sure that these words (the relevant ones of course) appear in your H1 and H2, and possibly also in the HTML address and description. You can also add links to your blog, which contains the relevant words.

Make sure that the ad you created contains the keywords you are targeting in that group. This is important because as soon as a word entered in the search appears in the ad - this word is highlighted, thus attracting more attention. That means a higher CTR and a better Google score. If you think psychologically, people will click more on an ad that matches the concept they were looking for. At least in the beginning, it is highly recommended to avoid all kinds of "tricks" and "inventions" that you think will catch your eye (for example, adding different signs such as $, ★ or multiple exclamation marks!). Google doesn't like all kinds of stars, likes, etc. and they may cause your ad to be disqualified and not displayed at all.

11. Finally, are your conversion rates high enough?

After all the hard work you've invested, don't forget to make sure that your website or the landing page the surfers reach really invites them to make the long-awaited conversion (in maximum percentages) and bring the marketing campaign to a positive ROI. In order to check this, you can test (using A/B Testing) the design of the site, the messages, the calls to action and more.

But in order not to fall into the traps of A/B testing , you need, among other things, a sufficient number of visitors, proper planning, patience and time. To improve the performance of your website in a shorter time, how about contacting the users you have located through PPC campaigns with personalized messages that are suitable for each of them? Who among us does not like personal attention? For example: offer a 10% discount to users whose word "discount" was located as part of their search, or even contact them with personal content, for example, did you locate a user from New York City? Emphasize to him that you offer free shipping to New York, an action that will attract his attention much more than the standard wording that you ship to US states for free.

And as a last report by a paid search management agency, if at last the surfer is about to leave the landing page or the website without leaving details or registering - offer the visitor something valuable for him in exchange for his email address, such as valuable content, an immediate or even future discount.