Google Ads is an effective way to reach new customers and create web-based revenue streams. The platform generates 97% of Google’s revenue. This means that millions of businesses are already taking advantage of Google Ads and its services.
However, launching a successful Google Ads campaign can be daunting. To launch an effective Google Ads campaign, it’s imperative to target specific audiences, create SEO-friendly Ads and web pages, and frequently analyze and adjust your Ad campaigns via Google Ads and Analytics. In this article, we’ll go through the most effective strategies that can help you develop and implement successful Google Ads campaigns. This can be done yourself or even better by hiring a Google Ads specialist.
1. Approach Your Ads Campaign Like a Customer
To develop a successful Google Ads strategy, you must master the art of creating specific campaign keywords. This will help you draw more prospects to your website and landing pages.
Choosing the right keywords is the key to an effective Google Ads strategy. Start by thinking like a consumer and incorporating SEO strategies into your keyword research. List the keywords your target customer may type into Google when searching for your products or services. Start with general search terms, then get specific to reach the right audience.
For instance, if you’re a corrective exercise and fitness training business owner in Chicago. You can include the following keywords in your arsenal: “fitness consultant in Chicago,” “Chicago personal trainer,” “best fitness program in Chicago,” and “Chicago fitness training program.”
You can leverage Google’s Keyword Planner to find relevant keywords that apply to your business. Also, this tool will show you the number of times people are searching for those keywords and how much web traffic those keywords may drive to your website. Further, this tool allows you to add negative keywords, preventing irrelevant keywords from being associated with your Google Ad campaign.
2. Stay Local
If you own a small business with a physical location or you offer a service, one of the most effective Google Ads strategies is keeping your keywords local. This enables you to create keywords specific to your region, allowing you to reach highly targeted audiences. Also, it helps you save money by preventing your Ad campaign from showing up when searches are general, for instance, when you’re too far away for the client to even visit.
For a clothing store in Malibu, for example, available keywords may include “clothing store Malibu,” “Malibu clothing stores,” “best clothing stores in Malibu,” etc. It’s essential to note that you expand keywords to include seasons, such as “Winter clothing stores,” and “Summer clothes stores.”
To develop and implement a successful Google Ads campaign, set your campaigns to target specific geographical locations. Google Ads features many tools that make this possible, including places of interest targeting, radius targeting, and bulk location targeting. Radius targeting, for instance, makes your Google Ads campaign visible to people within a certain geographic location, such as 20 miles around Malibu. Also, you can target places of interest, such as universities, airports, and specific commercial areas. Bulk targeting allows you to target multiple geographic locations because it lets you set up to 1,000 locations at a time. These tools are available in the Campaign tab on your Google Ads account, below the Settings menu.
3. Optimize Your Website and Landing Pages
Just like selecting the right keywords, optimizing your site for Google Ads can increase your return on Ads investment and with advancing your business goals. One of the most effective ways to optimize your website is to ensure you have landing pages that align with your Ad. For example, if you’re marketing a new product, ensure that prospects who click on the Ad are directed to the product page. If they’re directed to your homepage or another page on your website, this may require an extra step for customers to find the specific product. Here, you’ve paid for the Ad click which might not convert.
You can also optimize your website by making it easy for visitors to navigate. A prospect clicked on your Ad because they’re looking for something you’re offering, so make it easy for them to find what they’re looking for. Deliver an excellent customer experience by thinking like a customer and organizing your web content intuitively, such as product category or keyword.
4. Consider Your Competition
Considering what your competitors are doing on Google Ads can offer insight into what you should improve on. It’s brilliant to follow your competitors’ lead, but it would be better to determine how you can differentiate your Google Ads strategy from theirs.
If you paste a competitor’s website in the keyword panel on your Google Ads account, you’ll see the keywords they’re bidding on. This will give an insight into how similar businesses approach Google Ads.
Check what your competitors are doing. If they’re not using paid Ads, it could mean that you’re the first to use this strategy, or maybe your competitors know that Google Ads don’t yield positive results in your industry.
Final Thoughts
The road to Google Ads strategy expertise is long, and you’ll make many mistakes along the way. A common mistake is setting up your Google Ads campaign and forgetting to look at it again for several months.
To ensure success, you must monitor your Google Ads campaigns constantly, gauge performance, and make adjustments to the settings. Working on your campaign for 30 minutes per week can make a significant impact on your return on Ad investment.
When you’re running your Google Ads campaign on a limited advertising budget, you must get creative so that your budget goes further.
