Understanding Google Ads For Lead Generation

Understanding Google Ads For Lead Generation

 

Google Ads is an advertising service by Google for businesses wanting to display ads on Google.

It’s most commonly associated with the paid search but advertisers can also run their Google Display, Video (YouTube) and Shopping campaigns through the AdWords platform.

 

There are two main types of AdWords account:

  1. A standard Ads account:

This is a single account that can contain numerous campaigns, ad groups, ads and keywords. You can create separate AdWords accounts for each client or manage numerous AdWords accounts through a manager account. When an AdWords account is managed through a manager account, the AdWords account is called a child account.

 

  1. A Google Ads Manager account:

This is used to manage multiple standard AdWords accounts (called child accounts when being run through an AdWords manager account).

NOTE: There is a third type of account called AdWords Express but it has limited functionality and it’s not recommended for digital marketers as it’s too simplistic.

 

Follow the steps to creating an AdWords manager account here:

https://adwords.google.com/home/tools/manager-accounts/

  • When creating a Google account, you can use the same login details for any Google application (Analytics, AdSense, Places etc.). If you already have a Google log in, for Gmail for example, you can use this same one to sign up.
  • You can use an existing Gmail address but it cannot be linked to any other AdWords account.
  • You will also need to enter the website address for the business you want to advertise.

google ads

Features of a Manager Account include:

  • Use a single sign in to access all managed AdWords accounts, including other manager accounts
  • Search, navigate, and manage all of your accounts from a single, easy-to-read dashboard
  • Create and manage campaigns for your managed accounts from within your manager account
  • Easily compare performance across all accounts and run reports for multiple accounts at once
  • Use consolidated billing to get just one, simple monthly invoice for all of your managed accounts
  • Use alerts to efficiently monitor all of your linked accounts
  • Quickly create and link AdWords accounts from within your manager account
  • Its useful for agencies with multiple clients or companies with different product lines or territories that might require separate AdWords accounts for each

 

Create a Child Account in a Manager Account in 6 quick steps:

  1. Press the Management Tab at the top of the screen

2. Press the Blue +Account Button

3. Choose Create New Account

4. Name Your Account (you can change this at a later date if you want)

5.Set the country where you are located, your time zone and the currency you want to pay Google (these can’t be changed afterwards)

6. Press the “Create Account” button.

 

 

Features of a standalone AdWords/Child account:

  • A standard account is a stand-alone AdWords account for managing paid search campaigns
  • Best practice to keep one account per client
  • Create keyword lists and organize these lists into Ad Groups
  • Organize your Ad Groups into campaigns
  • Write ad copy related to your keyword lists (AdGroups)
  • Report on Performance on all account levels, e.g. campaigns reports, ad group reports, keyword reports, ad copy reports etc.

Follow the steps to creating a standalone child account here:

https://adwords.google.com/home/

 

The critical components of account structure include:

A.Campaigns

B.Ad Groups & Ads

C.Keywords

 

When you are looking at campaigns, it’s called campaign level.

This is also applied to Ad Group Level, Ad Level and Keyword Level.

 

This is an example of how you could structure a TV campaign in Google AdWords

  • On a top-level we have the TV category as the campaign
  • We then split this campaign into ad groups for different types of TVs
  • These ad groups contain the keyword lists and ads relating to the different types of TVs available

This type of organisational structure allows for better management of an AdWords account.

 

Other elements of account structure include:

  • Keyword Match Types: parameters that can be set on your keywords to control which searches trigger your ads to appear
  • Negative Keywords: excluding certain search words from your campaign to not trigger ads
  • Max CPC Bids: the maximum you are willing to pay for a click
  • Ad Copy: the ad someone sees when they do a search
  • Ad Extensions: enhanced features to make your ad more appealing and drive higher CTRs

 

Structuring your account helps manage performance and spend. You can use a few different methods to structure your account:

  • Similar Keywords: structure an AdWords account from the ground up, i.e. structure keyword lists into campaigns and ad groups
  • Ad groups and Ad Copy: group keywords by theme into ad groups
  • This allows for more efficient management of keywords
  • Ad copy is set on a keyword level so one ad can service multiple keywords
  • When keywords share a common theme, a shared ad works effectively by delivering a relevant response to multiple search queries
  • As keywords are organized thematically into ad groups, ad groups are organized into similar theme campaigns
  • Split these groupings by search volume:
  • Organize keywords and ad groups by search volume into high and low volume campaigns to control daily budget

 

  • This is your list of keywords. Keywords are the foundation of a search campaign
  • These are what consumers input into a search engine to find your product
  • Choose appropriate keywords relating to your product, it’s benefits and consumer needs

 

Note:

You can have different bids and landing pages for keywords in your account to optimize performance.

 

  • Ad Groups are groupings of your keywords into similar themes (this is how you organize keyword lists)
  • Keywords are stored in Ad Groups and you create ad copy for that keyword list
  • You should group your keywords together by theme and store that list in an Ad Group, e.g. all Sharp TV keywords in one Ad Group and all Sony TV keywords in another Ad Group

 

  • Campaigns are your Ad Groups (which are essentially keyword lists) organized together into larger campaigns
  • You can organize your ad Groups into campaigns and manage how much these Ad Groups spend each day, e.g. all TV Ad Groups in one campaign and all Radio Ad Groups in another campaign
  • This type of organizational structure allows digital marketers to manage thousands of keyword lists easily

 

There are four positive match types: Exact, Phrase, Modified Broad and Broad. Keyword Match Types allow you to widen or narrow the scope of your ad visibility. Choosing the best match types will help save you time and money by optimizing your reach to target audiences.

 

Examples:

[hotel New York] is an exact match keyword as defined by the square brackets. When a user types something into a search engine, this is called a search query. This keyword will serve search ads only if the searcher types hotel New York into Google.

 

“hotel New York” is phrase match, as noted by the quotation marks. This keyword will serve search ads only if the searcher includes words before or after hotel New York, e.g. best hotel New York city. By allowing ads to serve when someone types in best and city, Google has expanded the reach of our keywords. Note: for Phrase match, the core search query has to be input in exactly the order of the keyword.

 

+hotel +New +York is a modified broad match as identified by the + symbol before each word. This is like a flexible phrase match where word order can be mixed up and new words added and some misspells allowed but all of the words in the keyword must be included in the search query, e.g. what are New York’s best hotels is a modified broad match. This has even more reach than phrase match.

 

hotel New York, as noted by no symbols before any of the words, is a broad match. This is the match type that allows for the largest reach. By using searcher history and the meaning of relative words and phrases, Google can match user search queries from a wide range of searches, e.g. accommodation in New York would be a broad match, it does not contain hotel but Google knows that hotel is a type of accommodation and searchers will use these words interchangeably.

 

 

  • Negative keywords is a means of reducing clicks from unwanted searches
  • It is a way to ensure you don’t serve for certain searches as it might drive poor ROI or reflect poorly on the brand
  • Common negative keywords are “free” and “jobs”, e.g. a company selling Sony products would not want to get clicks from people looking for Sony jobs or free Sony products. Unless you are advertising free products or job listings, these are good keywords to add to your negative list. You can then build out your negative keyword list based on what you know about your product and consumers.
  • Well-built negative keyword lists will help reduce costs, increase CTR and conversion rates and make your paid search activity more effective.

 

There are four positive match types: Exact, Phrase, Modified Broad and Broad. Keyword Match Types allow you to widen or narrow the scope of your ad visibility. Choosing the best match types will help save you time and money by optimizing your reach to target audiences.

 

Examples:

[hotel New York] is an exact match keyword as defined by the square brackets. When a user types something into a search engine, this is called a search query. This keyword will serve search ads only if the searcher types hotel New York into Google.

 

 

“hotel New York” is phrase match, as noted by the quotation marks. This keyword will serve search ads only if the searcher includes words before or after hotel New York, e.g. best hotel New York city. By allowing ads to serve when someone types in best and city, Google has expanded the reach of our keywords. Note: for Phrase match, the core search query has to be input in exactly the order of the keyword.

 

+hotel +New +York is a modified broad match as identified by the + symbol before each word. This is like a flexible phrase match where word order can be mixed up and new words added and some misspells allowed but all of the words in the keyword must be included in the search query, e.g. what are New York’s best hotels is a modified broad match. This has even more reach than phrase match.

 

hotel New York, as noted by no symbols before any of the words, is a broad match. This is the match type that allows for the largest reach. By using searcher history and the meaning of relative words and phrases, Google can match user search queries from a wide range of searches, e.g. accommodation in New York would be a broad match, it does not contain hotel but Google knows that hotel is a type of accommodation and searchers will use these words interchangeably.

 

  • A bid is the amount you are willing to pay for a click
  • You can set your bids for individual keywords or for lists of Keywords (Ad Groups)
  • When you set a bid, you tell Google the most you are willing to pay for a click. You can appear higher on the page if you set high bids. If you have a high-quality score, you don’t have to set your bids as high to appear higher up on the page
  • Setting the correct bids for your keywords or keywords lists (Ad Groups) will help optimize the price you pay for traffic and help you get the most out of your media spend.

 

  • A bid is the amount you are willing to pay for a click
  • You can set your bids for individual keywords or for lists of Keywords (Ad Groups)
  • When you set a bid, you tell Google the most you are willing to pay for a click. You can appear higher on the page if you set high bids. If you have a high-quality score, you don’t have to set your bids as high to appear higher up on the page
  • Setting the correct bids for your keywords or keywords lists (Ad Groups) will help optimize the price you pay for traffic and help you get the most out of your media spend.

 

  • This is the ad that will appear when someone searches. When an ad is shown on a search engine, you say an ad has been served.
  • Character limits of a text ad include:
  • Headline 1 – 30 characters
  • Headline 2 – 30 characters
  • Description – 80 characters
  • Ads are linked to Ad Groups, which means that a number of keywords can show in the same ad. This is why it is really important to ensure your ad groups are organized thematically
  • Well written ad copy will improve searcher experience with your brand, drive more clicks and can increase conversions by directing searchers with a CTA, e.g. “Sale ends Sunday, buy today!”

 

Enhance your ads with additional features such as ad extensions:

  • Ad extensions provide context on the nature and variety of your products and services before visitors click through to your site
  • They create more reasons to click your ad leading to improved visibility and improved click-through rate
  • You should look at the types of ad extensions available to you and choose the most appropriate one for your business/client and business objective.

 

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