How to make the most of pay per click advertising

Pay per click adverts (i.e.Google Adwords) can be an almost instantaneous and highly profitable way for you to generate enquiries and sales. These are the sponsored adverts you see on the right hand side, or sometimes at the top, of a page of search results. Their name describes exactly how they work. You pay the amount set by the search engine and which you have bid for when a person searching on the Internet clicks on your advert.

When it comes to pay per click adverts, first impressions count. A killer pay per click advert stands out from the crowd and drives the right kind of traffic to your website. Despite the restrictions on the number of characters you can use, it must describe your product or service, but still leave the reader wanting more information. It’s got to entice the right type of customer to sit up, take notice and make that all important click.

The success of your PPC advert lies with your keywords

The success of your pay per click advert depends on your choice of keywords and where they are positioned within the ad text. Before starting a campaign, you need to think about what are the most important terms or words for your product or service. Omitting important terms from the advert wording is a common mistake. If you are using Google AdWords, it also means you’re missing out on vital quality score points.

In simple terms the AdWords quality score demonstrates your ad campaign’s ability to give search engine users exactly what they’ve gone online to find. In pay per click terms, this means ensuring the keywords used to trigger the adverts are strategically placed within the advert itself.

This is also important because it can lead to a lower cost per click and better positioning. More importantly, it means your advert stands out to the search engine user, matching their need to your advert.

PPC ads should be as relevant and specific as possible

If the choice of keywords within the AdWords campaign have been well researched, then arranged into linked groups, the text content of advert will be so much simpler to write and so much more effective. Using the correlation of groups and keywords as a starting point, adverts should also be as relevant and specific as possible.

For example, if you are selling or promoting a particular brand, make sure you include it as early as possible in your ad. It will help ensure you attract the right kinds of traffic to your website.

No matter what industry or sector you operate in, the reality is you will be in competition from other pay per click advertisers for the same audience you’re targeting. So you need to choose your keywords carefully, not just choosing the most competitive (and most expensive!) but searching for words that will attract not just the most clicks, but clicks from the people you want to become your customers. So be creative in your keyword choice and with your ad wording, to convince the search engine user that your business, product or service is superior to other ad listings.

Remember, you can create several ads and run them in rotation in the same campaign, allowing you to quickly test which combination of keywords works the best. Like so many types of marketing, testing will allow you to refine your campaigns, trying new ads against tried and tested formulas.  

As with all online or offline marketing and advertising, pay per click advert text must always, be truthful. Special offers, free postage and packaging or limited edition lines will get high click through rates, but if these are not actually available when visitors arrive at your website, they will soon leave and the cost to you of the click through has been wasted.

Finally, don’t fall into the trap of thinking that once people have clicked on your advert the job is done, it isn’t. One of the biggest mistakes is to just send them to your home page. Instead you must make sure that when they arrive on your website the advert takes them straight to a web page that gives them the information they are looking for and entices them to either buy, or contact you. To do that the content of your website must be compelling and persuasive. If not, they will leave and never return.