You’re planning out your Adwords bid strategy, which means you’re about to make a big investment in your business. And the word ‘big’ is used intentionally, even if you aren’t working with a huge budget. Well-thought out Adwords bid strategies take your most valuable resources as a business owner: time and energy.
But with the right strategy and some foresight, your Adwords campaign can become a serious asset for growing your business.
In this article we’ll look at the secret—no, secrets—behind a winning strategy for Google Adwords.
Let Google Help You
As a business owner—or someone preparing a pitch to go to the business owner—it’s important to remember that the key to a good strategy is to use the information Google gives you. Google is, quite literally, the titan of the internet. One way they prove that is by literally showing you on their website how to structure a good Adwords campaign.
For example, the first thing Google does is ensure that you have a goal for your campaign. There are several different reasons you might run an Adwords campaign, and they may be more specific than you think. Don’t assume just because you’re trying to grow your business that every option will work.
Do you want customers to go directly to your site? Do you want them to click through or work their way into a sales funnel? How about capture leads in an email list?
Knowing this will help you set up the rest of your campaign.
Choose Manual Or Automated
Google gives you the option to automate your Adwords bidding nowadays. Unless you want to be totally hands off (and have the budget to do so), it’s probably best to be at least somewhat involved in the process. This might mean doing it yourself, delegating the task to someone on your team, or using a third-party service to keep track.
A manual cost-per-click strategy, for example, gives you options. You can set bids at prices based on the ad group or the keyword level. Since these can change pretty quickly, knowing what’s going on is important.
Obviously Google wants you to have a good experience, so their automated system is set up to help you accomplish your goal. But you’ll have less freedom to do what you want if you hand over the reigns to them.
Research, Research, Research
If you’re new to Adwords bidding strategies, you might be thrown off by the amount of options you have to choose from. Here’s a quick rundown of some of the things you should be clear about before starting your campaign.
- Keywords: Whether you use Google’s tools or consult a third-party to determine the short and long tail keywords you’ll use in your strategy, this is important. Because these are what you’ll be bidding on, keywords are essentially the building block of your whole strategy.
- Competition: As is the case with most business decisions, it’s going to behoove you to know what your competition (or friends) are doing and what they’ve been successful with. This might help cut out some of the learning curve or “lost” dollars early on. Most important, though, is knowing who is ranking at the top of the keywords you care most about.
- Who Are You Targeting?: Last is knowing your audience. Other than the obvious sites that most people buy from—Amazon and the like—where are your people buying stuff from? If there’s a pain point you can address (through keywords or through the actual service you’re providing), this may help you find a niche “in” that can make your campaign far more successful.
Final Thoughts
Here are a few final things to consider that will help you run a rock solid campaign.
1. Consider How Long You Plan To Use Google AdWords
It’s important to consider the duration of time (or how much budget you have to sustain) you plan to continue with Adwords. The reason being is this can change your strategy.
For example, as your Adwords account grows, it may become difficult to keep on top of your bids—especially if you’re in charge and not letting Google do it.
2. Consider The Time Of Year
Depending on the product that you’re offering, your Adwords bid strategies might totally benefit or be completely thrown off. That’s one reason Google offers a seasonal campaign, where you can time your product, service, or website around holidays.
This, however, works both ways. Because people are generally more distracted during the holidays, they may be less inclined to click on something they would normally dive into in April or May.
3. Start with PPC Bidding Strategies
If you’re still overwhelmed or have a little bit of budget to test the waters with, the simplest approach is to go with a PPC, or pay per click, bidding strategy. These are the ads you commonly see at the top of a Google search.
Your conversion rate may not be as high, but at least you can get a feel for the effectiveness of your keywords. And because of your position, you’re likely to get some leads.
Here’s where you can learn more about PPC strategy if you’re interested.
Adwords Bid Strategy: Wrap Up
There might not be any magical “secrets” when it comes to your Adwords bid strategy—at least none that will transform your business over night—but doing your research and being clear on your strategy can help eliminate wasted money and measure the effectiveness of your campaign.
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