10 Things You Need to Know About PPC Marketing

A common misconception about Pay Per Click or PPC marketing is you have to spend a lot of money so you can generate leads faster. It’s especially disheartening for small business owners who want to try PPC, as well as other forms of digital marketing because they feel they might go broke in the process.

If you can relate to this, don’t worry. As we’ve said, it’s a misconception.

There are ways to do PPC marketing even if you don’t have a big budget. To do that though, you need a thorough understanding of what PPC is all about, as well as the strategies you can implement to ensure your campaigns will be a success.

1. Don’t Confuse SEO with PPC

SEO or search engine optimization has to do with getting your website to rank high in Google, Bing, and other search engines results. It’s a strategy that has to be done organically. You can’t just pay Google, for example, to keep your website on the first page every time someone searches for keywords related to your business.

When done right, however, SEO can generate a good ROI. Just don’t expect immediate results. SEO is a long-term strategy that could take months or even years especially if your business is in a competitive market.

PPC, on the other hand, is paid advertising. You launch a campaign and your ads will appear on search engines. For fast, reliable, and measurable results, definitely, consider running PPC ads.

2. PPC Marketing Gives Immediate Results

Another marketing strategy you may have encountered is content marketing. In a nutshell, it means offering valuable content to drive visitors to your site.

It’s a solid strategy like SEO. And like SEO, it also takes time before you can enjoy the results.

The beauty of PPC is you don’t have to wait as long. Run a campaign right and you’ll see an increase in leads and traffic almost right away. A

And there’s no guessing too about the results or how much you’re spending. You’ll know exactly how much every click is worth, how many leads you got, and what your ROI is.

3. You Have Control over Your Budget

With PPC marketing, you don’t pay for impressions. You pay when those impressions convert (i.e. when someone clicks on your link/s).

You also have the option to pause your campaign or tweak your budget or keyword targeting if your ads are not converting. The better your targeting, the less money you’ll spend on people who aren’t interested in what products you have to sell or services you have to offer.

4. It’s as Flexible as You Want It

When it comes to targeting audiences, PPC platforms allow you to go as broad or as granular as you want. If you don’t have a clear picture yet of your ideal customer, setting your ads to reach a wide range of audiences can help.

If you have a niche product and you already know your target customers, you can customize your ads so that they only show to the right people. You can even have your ads show at specific times in a day. Your ads can also be location-based, showing only when people are within a particular mile radius limit.

5. You Can Experiment with Various PPC Channels

PPC marketing isn’t limited to search engines. If you’ve tried advertising on Facebook before, that’s also PPC.

What you want to do is test different PPC channels and see which ones will give you the best results. Start with a few and see how they perform. When you find a platform that works, move on to the next one.

Ideally, the more diverse your traffic sources, the better. But if you have limited funds, you can proceed cautiously or ask help from experts who can make the most of your set budget.

6. Conversion Is More Important Than CTR

If a lot of people are clicking on your ads, that means your campaign is a success, right?

Well, not exactly. Though a high CTR or click through rate is good, you want to aim for a high conversion. That means people aren’t just clicking on your links but also buying your products or using your services.

Remember, even if your CTR or click-through rate is lower than what you were hoping for, if your conversion is above average, you’ll still come out as a winner.

7. Don’t Forget Mobile PPC

You can’t have a solid PPC strategy without taking into account users who prefer to search on their mobile devices rather than their desktop computers. And there are a lot of them.

So if you have an ongoing campaign, make sure it’s optimized for mobile searchers. If the PPC platform you’re on allows “click-to-call” feature, make sure it’s enabled. Your landing pages should also load properly on smartphones and tablets, otherwise, you’ll risk losing target customers to your competitors.

8. Take Advantage of Remarketing

PPC platforms such as Google offers a way to advertise to people who visited your site but left without doing anything. By anything, we mean buying a product from your site or signing up for your newsletter or downloading an app.

It’s called remarketing, which is essentially reconnecting with those people by showing them relevant ads regardless of the device they are using. For example, someone who clicks on your Google ad on their phone could later see a remarketing ad while they are checking out the latest post from their favorite blogger.

9. You Can Learn from Your Competitors

If your first campaigns aren’t immediately successful, don’t take it to heart and stop doing PPC marketing altogether. You just need to re-evaluate your strategy and figure out what aspects you should improve on.

A quick way to get better is to check how your competitors are doing with their PPC game. Study what they are doing differently and also keep up to date with industry trends. Like PPC channels, this is something you’ll have to spend some time on so you can figure out what works for you.

10. Track Everything

No matter how small or big your budget is, your PPC marketing strategy will be a bust if you don’t track your results. Make every dollar count by setting up conversion tracking. This way you have a clear direction on how to tweak your ads and your true ROI.

Don’t just launch campaigns based on your gut. PPC gives you access to so much data so use that to influence your marketing decisions.

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