Demystifying Google Ads: 5 Pro Tips to Maximize your ROI
When you need to drive leads and sales quickly, Google Ads can provide faster results than organic digital marketing. To maximize your return on investment and avoid wasting your budget on ads that don’t perform, you need to understand your audience in great detail, have a comprehensive digital advertising strategy, and understand the complexities and details of Google Ads.
In this article, we’ll help you better understand the world of digital advertising on Google. We’ll define some standard terms you’ll come across and share our top five actionable tips to maximize your ROI.
Understanding Google Ads jargon
The world of online advertising may seem overwhelming at first because it’s full of jargon and acronyms.
When using Google Ads (or other online advertising), here are some common words you should know:
- CPC (Cost per click) – The price you pay each time someone clicks on your ads.
- CPI (Cost per impression) – The price you pay per 1000 views of your ad.
- CTR (Click-through rate) – The percentage of customers who click on your ad.
- Conversion rate – The percentage of customers who take your goal action (usually to buy, sign up, or download something) after clicking on your ad.
- Impressions – How many times your ad is shown.
- ROAS (Return on Ad Spend) – Revenue generated per dollar of ad spend.
The goal of Google Ad campaigns is to have the highest conversion rate or ROAS. The best-performing campaigns generate more direct revenue for your organization than you’ve spent on ads.
Bonus tip: Don’t forget to consider other advertising costs (like ad design, campaign management and copywriting) for the most accurate ROI.
Types of Google Ads
There are several types of Google Ads and your choice will be based on your content and digital advertising goal. Here are 5 common Google Ad types you may consider:
- Search Ads display in search results pages and are best for links related to search queries.
- Display Ads appear on other Google websites and are best for building brand awareness.
- Shopping ads appear in search results and shopping pages and are used to sell a physical product.
- Video Ads appear on YouTube and video results pages and are best for promoting products or existing videos.
- Local Services Ads show search results page and Google Maps, and are good for geo-targeting local users.
5 Pro tips for Google Ads success
Some businesses pour their budgets into Ads without seeing the desired results.. To succeed at Google Ads, here are our expert tips:
Tip #1: Define goals
Your goals are critically important for online ads because they inform the ad type and parameters. Goals aligned with your ad type and settings are more likely to get you the measurable results you need to gauge success.
For example:
- If you’re undergoing a rebrand, perhaps your goal is to increase awareness of your new brand. If so, you may find success with a CPI ad campaign using display ads to get as many eyes as possible on your new branding.
- If you want to increase sign-ups to your new healthcare industry e-newsletter, you can better track your success through a PPC (pay-per-click) ad model.
It will also inform the ad type. For example, a call ad with your phone number won’t likely get many clicks if your ad is intended to raise brand awareness. However, a Shopping ad will typically work well to drive online store sales.
Tip #2: Focus on high-intent keywords
You’re probably already using “keywords” as part of your Search Everywhere Optimization (SEO). They apply to Google Ads, too!
When you create your Google Ad, you assign it a set of SEO keywords and phrases. The goal is for your ad to appear when someone uses these keywords (or close variations of them) in a Google search. When your online advertising goal is sales, we suggest focusing on high-intent keywords.
Searchers who use high-intent keywords are close to taking action (such as buying or seeking detailed information). This is why choosing phrases like “Where to hire a home nurse” will likely bring in very warm leads for your business. An SEO phrase like “What does a home nurse do” won’t likely attract people ready to hire you, but it would be a good phrase to optimize a blog post for in organic (“free”) search results.
Focus on keywords that indicate a person is close to a sale and not just browsing or in the early research phases.
Bonus tip: Don’t forget about “Negative Keywords.” These are words and phrases you want to exclude from searches. For example, a window cleaning company may choose “windows software” as a negative keyword as they don’t want to appear in search results for the software company.
Tip #3: A/B Test and optimize
It will take several iterations of your ads to find the best combination of creative and campaign targeting. Before investing your entire budget in a single ad, run two or more ad variations with smaller budgets to see which brings in more leads. Then, invest more money in the better-performing ad.
You can A/B test different graphics, headlines and body copy to find the best combination that highlights your USP and attracts the hot leads you seek.
Tip# 4: Optimize bidding strategies and audiences
Google uses a bidding system to determine which ads will display for each Google search query:
“Google Ads runs an auction every single time it has an ad space available on a search result, or on a blog, news site, or some other page. Each ‘auction’ decides which ads will show at that moment in that space. Your bid puts you in the auction.”
Your goal is to bid a dollar amount based on how much you’re willing to pay for clicks, impressions, views, or engagements. The amount you bid can be determined by either:
- Google Smart (automated) Bidding is the most hands-off bidding method. You set a daily budget cap (how much you’re willing to spend each day) and the maximum amount you’re willing to spend for an impression or click, and Google optimizes it to maximize conversions. This method will produce very detailed analytics for you to review later.
- Manual Bidding is more time intensive. You set specific bids yourself based on preexisting keyword data and performance. While you have more control over your budget, it requires a lot of babysitting and manual adjustments. This method provides fewer analytics than Smart Bidding but more targeted results – if you know what you are doing.
We suggest trying different bidding strategies and further optimizing by target audience demographics to find the combination that works for your company and your specific campaign.
Tip #5: Don’t neglect your website or landing page
Are your ads not meeting your conversion goals? Maybe it’s your landing page or website that’s turning people off.
If you’re getting lots of impressions or clicks but few (or no) conversions, here are a few things to check on your website:
- Verify that the URL is correct
- Ensure the landing page matches your call-to-action and searchers’ expectations
- Check that all forms and systems (like ecommerce functions) on your landing page are working
- Proofread campaign tracking IDs to ensure they are accurately tracking your campaign details
- Use the same (or similar) language on your ads and your landing page so users know they’ve come to the right place
Make changes to correct any of the above as needed. Then, refine your campaign creative, messaging, and ad settings to optimise further.
How a Google Certified Ad Specialist can help
Have you tried Google ads but got disappointing (or zero) results? Out-Smarts Marketing is a Google Certified Ad Specialist and Google Partner, and we can help. For over 15 years, we’ve helped organizations like yours harness the power of Google Ads to boost their online visibility and convert visitors into customers.
Our women-led team of digital marketers will help create an effective Google Ads strategy based on your campaign goals. From strategy to execution to analytics, we’re with you every step of the way so you can maximize the return of investment of your digital advertising campaigns. To learn more, book a complimentary discovery call with our team today.
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