Archive for the ‘Google AdWords’ Category

Google Moves to Retail with Official Google Stores

Friday, October 7th, 2011

First came the Apple retail stores. A technological Disneyland within your local mall.

Next, Microsoft followed suit. And now, Google is looking to create their own retail experiences with official Google Stores. The first Google Store has opened in London, called the Chromezone – which lets you experience Chromebooks and other Google accessories. No Android mobile devices. Not “all things Google”. Just Chromebooks. And apparently, it’s a short-term idea, meant to mainstream these Chrome notebooks.

Perhaps if successful enough, they’ll keep it around?

It’s hard to bet on retail right now though, isn’t it? Can’t Google just buy some AdWords or something?

The Evolution of Paid Search Advertising

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

Paid search advertising is now bigger than radio advertising. It’s bigger than billboards and movie advertisements combined. It’s almost as big as television advertising, and its numbers are growing way faster.

In fact, by 2016, paid search advertising is projected to be a $60 billion industry.

Currently, Google owns 80% of the search market share, but Microsoft Bing is up to 20% and climbing. Plus, with Bing advertisers experiencing a 12% ROI increase year-over-year compared to Google’s -10%, who knows what the PPC advertising industry is going to look like 5 years from now?

All we know is that it’s going to be huge. So, make sure you’re working with a PPC expert and taking advantage of it.

Google Analytics Adds Multi-Channel Funnel Reporting for Crazy People

Friday, August 26th, 2011

Google has added five new reports to their Google Analytics reporting today, called Multi-Channel Funnels.

I can’t exactly imagine who was asking for this. It’s such crazy deep analysis that only PPC experts are even going to be able to understand it, but for those PPC gurus, I suppose it’s Christmas morning.

Until now, Google Analytics credited the last gateway source with a purchase referral. For example, a visitor clicks on an online ad, which brings you to your site, and he buys a set of golf clubs. You credit the ad with that sale referral. But, that might have been that visitor’s 5th visit to your site. And we’re only giving credit to the referral that resulted in the purchase.

Most people would probably say, that’s ok. Google wouldn’t have it. So now, these multi-channel funnels will tell you exactly how searches, ads and site referrals participated in the conversion.

Facebook Topic Target Makes Hyper-Targeting Even Better

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011

Facebook’s ability to hyper-target individuals based on specific interests has always been their best differentiator over Google AdWords. And this differentiator has just become even easier to manage.

With the brand new feature, Facebook Topic Targeting, you can target individuals who “like” all things “Indie Music” without having to manage an incredibly long laundry list of key phrases. Now, by targeting #Indie Rock, you target people interested in ‘Indie Rock Music’, ‘Indie Rock Bands’, ‘Indie Rock Videos’ and more.

In cases where these highly similar search terms are going to be hyper-related to your ideal audience, this is an amazing timesaver.

Using Life Time Value to Valuate Customer Acquisition Costs

Thursday, August 18th, 2011

What should you pay in terms of PPC advertising in order to acquire a customer? That’s the magic question, and the answer depends on what you’re selling.

Let’s say you’re a musician selling CDs. Your profit per CD sale is $6. If you can advertise using key phrases with a $0.60 cost-per-click, then 1 out of every 10 clickthroughs needs to make a purchase – just to break even.

But, if you sell speedboats and make $6,000 on each sale, if you can advertise using relevant key phrases that cost you $3.00 per click, then if you can convert one of every 100 clickthroughs, that’s a 2,000% ROI ($6,000/$300 clickthrough on your online advertising dollar.

Make sense? Ok, well let’s look further than that. Because what if you’re a Starbucks? What if you’re a customer for 20 years and buy once a week. Then make sure you’re incorporating that lifetime value to your acquisition costs.

5 Tips For Improving Your PPC ROI

Monday, August 15th, 2011

You’re convinced of the ROI benefits of PPC advertising. In fact, you’re doing it. But, you could be doing it better. Here are 5 tips for exactly how to do better.

1) Include pricing within your ad.

If pricing is going to scare your customer away, scare them before you’re charged for the clickthrough.

2) Be conservative with your location radius.

If you’re a local business, you might fantasize that people from hundreds of miles away will make the trip to see you. These “potential customers” really aren’t. So stop wasting your money advertising to them, and narrow your ad campaign to a minimal location radius from your store.

3) Test your ads.

Do you think you’ve crafted the perfect ad? Awesome. Make another one anyway. The deeper we get into the technological era, the sooner we get to leave Prideville. You don’t have to be clever anymore. Just test a few options and go with the best.

4) Send them deep in your site.

Too many companies just default drop click-throughs right onto their home page. But your ad is probably specific, so send them deep into the site. Just before the buying stage. Remind them of your offer, why it’s awesome, and ask for the sell.

5) Make sure you’re targeting the right keywords.

So many companies waste their ad budget targeting completely broad irrelevant keywords when there are so many hyper-targeted keywords just waiting for your bid. Find an affordable PPC management expert, and you’ll increase your PPC ROI overnight.

Do PPC Ads Cannibalize Your Organic Listings?

Thursday, August 11th, 2011

You have probably heard this in your business meetings. An excuse why not to utilize PPC campaigns. “Well, people will click on our ads instead of our organic listings, and we’ll pay for traffic we could have gotten for free.”

This is probably true. Especially if you’re the #1 listing for the search terms you’re competing for (which, for the most part, is very unlikely.)  But even in these remote circumstance, is it the full story?

Google statisticians recently ran more than 400 search traffic studies to find the answer to this question – analyzing organic click volume in the absence of search ads.

It turns out that a site receives 89% more traffic when search ads are active.

Is the Yahoo-Microsoft Alliance Hurting Bing’s Paid Search?

Monday, August 8th, 2011

The whole idea behind the Yahoo-Microsoft alliance was to combine forces, knowledge and funding in order to give Google a run for its money as the industry leader in paid search.

It turns out they’re just giving Google money instead.

Because it turns out that Bing has actually hurt Yahoo’s numbers by powering their search advertising. Before teaming up, Yahoo was better at presenting ads to match particular search queries (moving reportedly from 60% of broad matched traffic down to 40% post merger.)

And this is the secret behind search advertising. Making it match the user request. Offering up a hyper-relevant product or service at the very moment someone is looking for it. And it looks like the alliance that was designed specifically to achieve this – is failing at this.

Google Has Blogs For Everything Except Google+

Tuesday, August 2nd, 2011

Google has blogs for everything, except the one thing they seem to be banking their entire future on.

I personally RSS subscribe to Google’s corporate blogs on search engine optimization, analytics, AdWords, gmail, webmaster and mobile. But, the one I want to subscribe to the most doesn’t even exist. There is no official Google+ blog. And I wonder why that is?

There is an official What’s new in Google+ site. But, this isn’t really  serving the same purpose. It’s not providing too many tips and tricks as to how to best utilize the Google+ social network. Is this an intentional iterative design choice by Google? Are they moving away from the traditional blog/RSS format? Seems surprising for a company that owns Blogger?

Google Will Offer AdWords Credit Card

Thursday, July 21st, 2011

It’s about time Google got into the credit card game. After all, it’s one of the few remaining industries they haven’t yet monopolized…

Reuters has reported that Google plans to offer a low interest rate credit card, exclusively to Google AdWords advertisers. This MasterCard credit line will only be allowed to buy AdWords ads.

Why???

It’s actually really clever. Around the holidays, small- and medium-size businesses make a majority of their money. But, too often, they are too cash-strapped to properly advertise and take advantage of the growth promise of an actively seeking audience.

With this AdWords credit card, advertisers will be able to take an ad advance out to capitalize on holiday rushes. And Google must be pretty confident that AdWords will ensure a healthy ROI on their investment in order to get their money back.