Google AdWords Workshop:

Four Strategies for Winning Top Spots

Presented by KeywordFirst

Changes to Google’s SERP Layout

• Google recently made significant changes to the layout of its Search Engine Results Page (SERP):

• One additional paid search result has been added at the top, for a maximum total of four.

• Side ad positions have been removed.

• Three ads have been added to the bottom, but they are much less valuable.

• Net effect: there will be 30% less advertising opportunity on the page (a maximum of 11 spots is now down to a max of 7).

• Winning one of those four places is very important but difficult.

Competing for Top Spots

• These changes continue Google’s concentration on large advertisers with significant budgets since they’re usually in the best position to bid on those coveted positions.

• Small-and mid-sized businesses will be less likely to be able to compete for those top spots.

• If your organization is one of the fortunate few that can take advantage of this expansion at the top, there are four things that you can do to improve your pay-per-click (PPC) and click-through rate (CTR) campaigns.

Be Strategic with Ads and Messaging

• Google has a number of criteria they use to determine who gets the top ad spots.

• You can produce better results by making effective use of manual AdWords™ ad extensions, such as apps, calls and locations.

• There are seven, including structured snippets, that can be used to maximize real estate, carry a variety of messages to your audience and encourage immediate action.

Be Strategic with Ads and Messaging (continued)

• It’s important to eliminate redundancies, especially if multiple people are working on your AdWords campaign.

• Have someone perform an audit to understand what consumers are seeing on the SERP so that you can make adjustments and continually evaluate and make tweaks.

Get More Specific with Targeting

• AdWords continues to evolve, making it easier to reach highly qualified audiences.

• Last year, Google rolled out Customer Match, which provides greater control over which customers you can include and exclude in your ads.

• As long as you have a customer’s email address, you can use Customer Match to serve up the right ad based on where they are in the buying cycle (provided they are signed in to their Google account).

• It’s very effective at pulling customers through the sales cycle and gets better with the more data you have on your customers.

Get More Specific with Targeting (continued)

• Another great option is remarketing lists for search ads (RLSA), which makes it easy to tailor your search ads and campaigns for people who have already visited your website, whether or not they made a purchase.

• If they had enough interest to click on your site once – they’re likely to click again if you show them the right message. You can use RLSA to capture one of those top spots based on previous history.

• Other targeting features allow you to use Google AdWords to tailor ads and campaigns based on factors such as income and geography.

Take Advantage of Shopping Improvements

• Smart retailers can use shopping campaigns and Product Listing Ads(PLAs) to gain additional advantages.

• If typically you’ve been in one of the top spots, it’s likely that you’ll now see an increase in traffic. If you’re not in one of the top spots, shopping ads are a good way to stand out if/when customers scroll to the bottom of the page.

• The best thing that you can do is to hone your skills on feed optimization, negative keyword fencing and other techniques that will help you ensure that the right ads are being served to the right customers at the right times.

Consider Other Channels

• If you’re having trouble competing, you may want to consider other channels, such as Bing or Yahoo!, which can still yield excellent results.

• By testing ads on multiple platforms, you can determine whether you need to keep all of your investment with Google or if you can branch out to others where you can gain a more dominant position.

Consider Other Channels (continued)

• You may also want to consider alternatives such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, which also have high traffic.

• While once considered second tier, many advertisers now find them to be very effective.

• YouTube is now the second-largest search engine, with more searches than Bing, Yahoo!, Ask and AOL combined.

Summing Up

• Google recently made significant changes to the layout of its Search Engine Results Page (SERP), resulting in a 30% reduction in ad space and fierce competition for top spots.

• There are four things you can do to compensate for the changes and improve your PPC and CTR campaigns:

• Be strategic with your ads and messaging

• Get more specific with targeting

• Take advantage of shopping improvements

• Consider other channels

Analytics and paid search article on our FirstWord blog: http://keywordfirst.com/nuts-bolts-five-ways-analytics-make-paid-search-campaigns-better/

Turning browsers into buyers article on our FirstWord blog: http://keywordfirst.com/retailers-turn-browsers-buyers/

Google Adwords™

•Ad extensions: https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/2375499?hl=en

•Customer Match: https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/6276125?hl=en

•Remarketing lists for search ads: https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/2701222?hl=en

•Shopping campaigns and product listing ads: https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/2454022?hl=en

Resources

Mark Smithhttp://keywordfirst.com/about-us/our-team/

Co-Founder, KeywordFirstMark@KeywordFirst.com

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