Formerly known as Google AdWords, Google Ads is an online advertising platform by Google that provides various advertising options such as Search, Display and Video Ads.
In this post, we cover the following topics –
“Google Ads” is most famously known for its Search Ads – Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising where advertisers bid on certain keywords in order to display their ads on Google’s Search results.
Google generates advertising revenue from its search engine by charging advertisers when a user clicks on the advertiser’s ads.
Where is Google Ads displayed?
Depending on the campaign type, who you want to show your ads and the ad creative type – your Google Ads can be displayed in various places such as –
Google Search Results – Ads can appear above or below search results on Google Search. They can appear beside, above, or below search results on Google Play, Google Shopping, and Google Maps, including the Maps app.
Google Search Partners – Google search partners are sites in the Search Network that partner with Google to show ads on their search results.
On Websites that your customers visit – The Google Display Network is a collection of more than 2 million websites, videos, and apps.
Types of Google Ads Goals
The Google Ads campaign can be optimized for specific goals you want to achieve for your website. This also sets a foundations to run specific campaign types meant to achieve those goals.
Campaign Goals that advertisers are allowed to focus on in their advertiser campaign is as follows –
Sales – Drive sales online, in app, by phone, or in store.
Campaign Types – Search, Display, Shopping, Video, Smart, Discovery
Leads – Get leads and other conversions by encouraging customers to take action.
Campaign Types – Search, Display, Shopping, Video, Smart, Discovery
Website Traffic – Get the right people to visit your website
Campaign Types – Search, Display, Shopping, Video, Discovery
Product and Brand Consideration – Encourage people to explore your products or services
Campaign Types – Display, Video
Brand Awareness and Reach – Reach a broad audience and build awareness
Campaign Types – Display, Video
App Promotion – Get more installs and interactions for your app
Campaign Types – App
Create a campaign without a goal’s guidance – Use any available campaign type and construct a campaign step-by-step without a goal’s recommendations
Campaign Types – All
Once you select the primary goal of your advertising campaign, you are then guided to the campaign type that best suits your selected goal.
Types of Google Ads Campaign
Advertising with Google Ads starts with creating a campaign. The type of campaign you choose to create should be based on your advertising goals.
For example, if you’d like to show ads on the google search engine – Google.com to get more visitors to your website, you should choose a Search Network campaign. Each advertising network has different types of campaigns to suit your goals.
Following are the Campaign types –
Search – Reach customers interested in your product or services with text ads
Display – Run different kind of ads across the web
Shopping – Promote your products with shopping ads
Video – Reach and engage viewers on YouTube and across the web
App – Drive app promotion across Google’s networks
Smart – Reach your business goals with automated ads on Google and across the web
Discovery – Run ads on YouTube, Gmail, Discover and more
How much does Google Ads cost?
The cost of Google Ads primarily depends on competitiveness, the geographic location and quality of the advertising campaign.
The Google Ads advertising platform is a realtime auction and bidding platform. Since it is a real-time bidding platform the cost varies depending on many variables such as –
- Keyword Bid amount
- Campaign Quality
- Landing Page Experience
- Target Audience demographics
- Geographic Location
- others
A notable factor that determines the cost is – Ad Rank, which is calculated using the above metrics. With Ad Rank – your cost per click is determined on the overall score of your Ad Campaign compared to the competing bidders. The bidder with the best Ad Rank typically pays the lowest cost per click.
Is Google Ads for your business?
Just because someone recommends Google Ads to you does not mean it will work for your business.
There are few essential things to check prior to launching a Google Ads campaign for your business –
- Are your competitors advertising?
- Is there enough searches online?
- Is it ROI positive?
- Does your product/services require Visual Elements?
- Is your website Optimized for Conversions?
- Is your offer good?
Are your competitors advertising?
If your competitors are investing in Google Ads – it is a good indication that it might work for you as well.
If you analyze your competitors ads in Google, you can check their ad copy and landing pages to get an idea of their digital strategy. Moreover, if you dive deeper – you can also find out their offer and sales funnel.
Is there enough searches online?
Google Search Ads is more of an intent based – pull advertising.
This means Google Ads can only be shown if there are people searching for specific queries. There needs to be a minimum threshold of searches per month for you to be able to advertise on keywords.
You can utilize tools like Ahrefs, SerpStat, Keyword Revealer, KWFinder, UberSuggest, SEMRush etc to find the monthly search volume of keywords. If you find a range of keywords with regular search volumes, then Google Ads can be used.
Is it ROI positive?
Is the Return on Investment from Google Ads is more than your Marketing Expense on paper?
What if the Cost Per Click and the overall cost of the Google Ads campaign is higher than the revenue you can generate?
This usually happens when 1)High Search Ads Competition that drives up the Cost Per Click or 2) The product/services prices are low.
Moreover, there are other costs to factor in such as fixed cost hosting your website, content on your site etc.
If your Return On Investment is more than the Advertising Cost + Fixed Cost, then you can be profitable with Google Ads.
Does your product/services require Visual Elements?
Whenever we think of Google Ads, it is mostly Google Search Ads. Yes there are Display Advertising options – but Google is best for “Intent” based advertising.
Intent based advertising is marketing to potential customers who are searching for queries and intending to take an action. Queries such as coffee shop near me, best hotels in Bangkok etc. These type of customers are ready to take an action now.
However, some of the product or services are best suited for “Interest” based marketing and requires visual element to entice the buyer. For these type of product or services, platforms like Facebook and Instagram Ads might be a better option.
Interest based advertising is marketing to people who are potentially interested in your product or services but are not actively seeking it.
Take a moment to brainstorm if your product or services is more of an “Intent” based or “Interest” based. Then you can decide is Google Ads is for you or not.
Is your website Optimized for Conversions?
Everyone makes this common mistake more often than not.
Typical scenario – We create awesome content, we drive either paid or organic traffic to our website. Awesome! But then, we completely forget to tell our visitors what to do next!
Your website visitors need help, assistance and guided cues on what actions to take next. Otherwise they do not know what to do next and will eventually drop off.
Before running paid traffic to your website – make sure you have these actions planned and laid out.
Guide your visitors to take the next action. A conversion might be filling up a contact form or subscribing to your newsletter or taking a certain action on your website.
Do you have an enticing offer?
The internet is one of the best examples of a free market economy. Everything is based on supply and demand, where the price is transparent.
Most importantly, your consumers have enough information and a price range in mind for your product and service.
People will convert if the Perceived Value > The cost of the product or services.
Therefore, you have to make sure your offer provides higher value. Moreover, it differentiates your product or services to convert your paid traffic.
If you are all in the clear with the above conditions then Google Ads is for you and your business.
The ROI multiple of your Google Ads Campaign depends on the above variables. The more optimized they are – the higher your ROI multiple.
Google Ads vs Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
There are mixed information available online about Google Ads and Search Engine Optimization. At Pixelio, we believe that one is not an alternative to the other. Instead Google Ads and Search Engine Optimization are meant to work together and implemented together.
If you are still deciding between Google Ads and Search Engine Optimization, the following variables should help you decide which is a better idea for you –
Free (SEO) vs Paid (Google Ads)
If you believe that Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is free – then you should rethink the amount of time and resources required to come up with a quality content.
Google has this knack for knowing quality, through, well-written and well-illustrated content. Ranking your content anywhere in the 1st page of Google takes a lot of effort and requires good content. Hiring copywriters, taking the time to write, creating graphics and illustrations – all take time and money.
Google Ads has its own Cost Per Click associated with it and you might require additional support to run/maintain the campaigns.
Instant vs Long Term Visibility in the SERPS
The top 3 Google search results get 75.1% of all clicks. Moreover, there is a 50-50 split between people who intentionally click Google Ads results vs Organic search results.
What does this mean for you as a business?
It is wiser to dominate both Paid and Organic Search Engine Results Page (SERP).
Google Ads delivers instant results. It is perfectly geared for businesses that want instant visibility, awareness and traffic to their website. Moreover, Google Ads campaigns can be launched within minutes. This is the typical example of a pay-to-play model.
On the other hand, Search Engine Optimization is more of a longer term strategy. Ranking websites with Search Engine Optimization approach takes time. The ranking depends on your website domain’s authority, content relevance, expertise, trust, citations and many other factors.
A good digital marketing campaign takes the above into consideration and utilizes both Google Ads as well as Search Engine Optimization.
Rank for One vs Rank for Many Keywords
Do you know why SEOs do not recommend a single page website layout?
Because a webpage can realistically focus and rank for only one keyword. Although a page might rank for many keywords, theoretically, it can only be optimized for one or few keywords.
A single page website cannot rank for multiple service type for multiple locations. Using the same logic, you would need lots of contents to rank for all the different services you offer.
This means, if you want to rank for a range of keywords – you would need a page optimized only for that keyword for it to rank in Google.
On the other hand, with Google Ads, you can immediately display your website for multiple keywords. With a pay-to-play approach, you can bid on keywords and which pages you want to drive the traffic to.
Easily Measurable ROI
The online advertising platforms are designed for advertisers to be able to track advertising spending vs revenue. From Impressions, Clicks to Conversions – each step of the digital sales funnel can be tracked with Google Ads platform.
You can pretty much accurately calculate how much money went into the advertising spending and how much you made in return. The ROI is pretty much transparent.
On the other hand, tracking spending and its direct return in not as easy with Search Engine Optimization campaigns. There are many variables involved such as the cost of content, the time element and specific details of the conversion.
Does Google Ads Work?
If your business has enough search volume, your website is optimized for conversions, proper keyword research and targeting is done – then Google Ads work exceptionally well to drive new leads and conversions.
Please note that you still need to make sure all the previously mentioned Google Ads conditions in the “Is Google for your Business” are checked.
