Five Steps To Get Your AdWords Campaign Off to a Successful Start

Launching AdWords campaigns can be a frustrating, pocket-draining initiative if you’re not careful. However, it can also bring in traffic and conversions that quickly make the whole thing worthwhile. Here are five quick tips if you are just getting started and don’t know where to, well, start.

1. Plan ahead

Work with your internal team and your agency to define what your expectations are and create some realistic goals. A good way to do this is to assess what you are doing now. How much are you spending for leads and conversions using your existing marketing tactics? How much can you allocate to AdWords campaigns? What are your customers or clients really looking for when they turn to a search engine for help?

2. Optimize

Dedicate some time and resources to optimizing your web site’s landing pages to increase the Quality Score of your ads. Google is successful because it thinks about its users (and this focus keeps users coming back for more and more). In regards to AdWords, Google wants to make sure that it is sending its users to the places where they can actually find relevant content.

Google rewards you for sending people to right place. Having better content helps bring you a higher ranking and can lead to a lower cost-per-click. It’s worth the upfront costs and effort to create a great experience for users on your web site and landing pages before bidding on ads.

3. Play Chess, Not Battleship

While there is some guessing when it comes to the auction process, you can make educated bids. With high keyword limits, AdWords allows 20,000 per ad group, it seems like the options are endless. Why not have every variation of the terms related to your business and see what happens? If this is your approach, I’m not surprised if SEM is the bane of your marketing existence.

Instead, do research, be relevant. Imagine what your customer is thinking and searching for, then use terms and phrases they would naturally use or what they will be looking for in the future. You are paying for each visit, make the most of them. Tactically, if your product or service is commonly misspelled, use the broad match keyword approach and let Google’s mechanics take care the rest. You can cast a wide net to improve your ad’s impressions but focus a majority of your resources on high-quality keywords that will bring the right customers with real conversions.

4. Be Patient

While this process can seem laborious and not yield immediate results, stick with it. SEM is an ever-evolving marketing tool. You won’t run perfect campaigns every time (I’m not sure that such a thing even exists). After a month or so of running ads, take a look under the hood and see what’s working and what’s not. This will help you learn more about what Google AdWords and your users are looking for with your ads. Remember, one click could be the conversion that covers the cost of the entire campaign.

5. Have Flexibility

After reviewing what’s working, investigate why. Is it bid amounts, budget, keywords, ads? AdWords is full of analytics, use them. If it’s not working, do something different. This platform is one of the only marketing tools available that can quickly be changed with little or no cost.

AdWords allows you to amend your account as frequently as you want, or if you are a data-lover and want to be able to examine trends, make less frequent, measured changes. Study the board, do your research and be willing to adjust your game plan.

Ads in the Right Place at the Right Time

Unlike some other marketing efforts, AdWords allows customers to see your information when they expect to see it, at the time when they are actively searching for what you offer. It’s a worthwhile program to boost your business, but it requires attention and upkeep for success. Stay focused and watch the clicks turn to conversions.