7 Powerful PPC Advertising Secrets to Maximize Your ROI for Your Small Businesses

Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertising is the quickest method of driving targeted traffic to your website. PPC has been proven to be effective if you do it right. If not, you could end up wasting lots of money really fast.

If you are doing online marketing for your small business you should know that every single of your advertising dollar must produce results for you. That’s why it’s critical to setup and manage your PPC campaign correctly and strategically! Follow these tips to ensure you run a successful PPC campaign.

PPC Secret #1 – Create Dedicated Adgroup for Each Group of Related Keywords

Perhaps the biggest mistake that most beginning PPC advertisers make is grouping a bunch of unrelated keywords in the same adgroup with the same ad copy. Doing so will guarantee that you get very low response rates.

Instead, you should create as many ad groups as necessary for the different theme of keywords that you have.  You should not have more than 10 keywords in each adgroup. Next, write relevant ad copy that target those group of related keywords.

For example, if you are running ads for your dental business, you should create separate adgroup and separate ad copy for the keywords “dental cleaning in San Jose” and “cosmetic dentists in San Jose.”

By having dedicated adgroup and ad copy for each related group of  keywords, your ad will attract more targeted and relevant searchers. This results in a lower cost per click and better response rates for you in the long run.

PPC Secret #2 – Use Match Types & Negative keywords

Google PPC allows you to bid for 3 different match types for your keywords – broad, phrase and exact match. Exact match produces the most relevant traffic. Broad match, on the other hand,  usually results in your ads being shown for lots of  irrelevant searches. Exact match usually gives you the best chance for sales and conversions.

Therefore, you should use exact match for all your keywords. You may also add phrase match and broad match for the same keyword to get more ad impressions. But you should bid lower for phrase match and broad match. In other words, for the same keyword, phrase match should have lower bid than exact match and broad match should have lower bid than phrase match. For example, if the keyword is “brown shoes”, a possible bid scenario is as follow:

• [brown shoes] – $2.00
• “brown shoes” – $1.80
• brown shoes – $1.50

In addition, to prevent your ads from being shown for irrelevant searches, you must add these keywords as a negative match. Negative match can be done at both the campaign level and the adgroup level.

PPC Secret #3 – Split Test Your Ads

For each ad group, you should write at least 2 competing ads and let them run at the same time. Be sure to enable the ad rotation feature so that each ad get shown an equal amount of time.

The idea is to test different ad copies and continously optimize the click through rates and/or the conversion rates. Once you get enough data (usually around 50-100 clicks), keep the winning ad and write a new ad to compete against the winning ad.

You may use the ad split tester tool at www.splittester.com to help you select the winning ad. This tool will tell you whether you have enough data point to get a statistically valid result.

Here are some tips to follow to write winning ads:

• Use clear and concise words that match what the searchers are looking for.
• Convey compelling benefits about your business or services.
• Use words and languages that appeal to people’s emotions.
• Include a strong call to action, i.e. “Get this Now!” or “Download Free Trial Now!”
• Test with different punctuation marks such as “!” vs “?”.

PPC Secret #4 – Send Ad Traffic to Dedicated Landing Pages

Another big mistake that I see lots of people make is sending all the PPC traffic to a homepage instead of dedicated landing pages. The home page is intended for a wide audience and has all kind of messages on there. By using landing pages, you’re able to customize the messages to match the copies on your ads. As a result, you’ll get much better responses.

Additionally, by using landing pages, you can do A/B tests as well as multivariate tests to optimize the responses. When doing A/B tests or multivariate tests, you can test different variations of headlines, layouts, images and their different combinations in order to find a version that produces the highest response rate.

Here are some tips for creating landing pages that yield the high response rates:

• Your headline should contain the keywords that the searchers are searching for. Your headline should also offer a compelling promise.
• Use relevant images to enhance your message.
• Your message must be clear, concise, and highlight the key benefits of your products or services.
• Your layout should be clean and simple with enough white spaces to avoid clutter.
• Use lots of bullet points to summarize the benefits and features of your products or services.
• Establish trust and credibility by showing off customer testimonials, customers’ logos, awards, or press mentions.
• Have a Call to Action. Tell the visitors what exactly you want them to do after reading through message. Common “Call to Actions” include “contact us”, “call us”, “add to cart”, or “sign up for free trial.”

PPC Secret #5 – Track Conversions

In order to maximize your ROI, you must track everything. Conversion tracking helps you to find out which campaigns, ad copies, keywords, etc give you the best sales, signups, or responses.

PPC Secret #6 – Pause or Get Rid of non performing keywords

You should continuously monitor your keywords performance in order to ensure you get the best return for your PPC investment.

If a keyword has a low conversion rate or high bounce rate, then it usally indicates that the particular keyword is attracting the wrong audience to your website. You should either get rid of the keyword or put it on pause. Now, if a keyword has a low ad click through rate, then you should check to see if the ad copy is relevant to they keyword or not.

For example, if your keyword is “cat food” and your ad copy says “dog food….”, then it’s likely that you’re not going to see a high ad click through rate for that keyword. Perhaps, you should put that keyword in a separate adgroup and write a dedicated ad for it.

Additionally, if a keyword has a low quality score, you should put it on pause immediately. When you have time later, you can go back and find out why it has a low quality score. It’s most likely related to a low click through rate and a landing page that has no relevance to the keyword.

PPC Secret #7 – Separate Search and Content

One of the common mistake I see beginning adword players make is to activate both the content and search network for the same campaign. This is a BIG no no.

The behavior of the search audience and the content network audience is very different. The search audience are a lot more motivated and perhaps further along the buy cycle. They have a need and are actively looking for a solution. Hence, they use the search engines to search for solutions to their needs or problems.

The audience on the content network, on the other hand,  are there to read an article or to browse around a certain webpage. If your ad is showing up in the content network, you’re basically interupting them and distracting them. If your ad does a good job of attracting their attention, they may be curious enough to click on your ad and check out what your site has to offer.

At any rate, it is best to separate the two and optimize them individually.

PPC can quickly help you promote your business to new customers, but it could be a big waste of money if not managed properly. If you follow the above 5 tips, you will increase your chance of success significantly. Now, go and start optimizing your ppc campaigns!

Share Your PPC Tips By Commenting Below

If you have good experience with PPC and want to share additional tips, please comment below. You may also ask me any questions related to PPC by commenting below.