Pay-per-click marketing or PPC marketing is one of the most popular and effective ways for any brand to grow and rake in those conversions. Some businesses make $4 for every dollar they spend on Google Ads alone. However, without the right knowledge or the help of a marketing consultant, it might take you a little while to reach that glorious 4:1 revenue-to-marketing ratio.
To that end, our skilled and highly-knowledgeable marketing consultants have compiled this list of the most common mistakes committed in PPC marketing. With no further ado, here are the mistakes you need to avoid:
1. Under-strategizing your approach
A good PPC marketing strategy consists of the following: a thorough understanding of your target market, clear and executable goals (both short- and long-term), and well-defined action plans to achieve those goals. If one or more of these is too weak or vague, you might just end up wasting money paying for clicks.
Don’t start designing your ads and writing your copy just yet. Plan as much as you can before taking the plunge to maximize your profits and your visibility. To achieve this, marketing consultants recommend using a multi-stage conversion funnel that begins with drawing in customers and ends with their conversion.
2. Choosing the incorrect measures of success
With all the data available to businesses about their marketing, it can be difficult to choose which ones are important determinants of success. After all, not all businesses are the same. That means that not all conversions will be valuable to you.
As such, it is crucial to use the metric that lies as close to your profits as possible, whether that’s registered emails or outright purchases linked through your PPC ads.
3. Not testing beforehand
No matter what service or product you provide, no matter what type of campaign you decide to run, it is vital to test your conversion funnel before launching it. Through the right testing and examination of analytics, you can make your campaign more effective, operating at lower costs and maximized profits.
Some of the ways you can test your conversion funnel are as follows:
- Performing heuristics analysis
- Performing user tests
- Conducting cross-browser and cross-device testing
- Examining your Google Analytics
4. Not using the right balance of keywords
If you tie your PPC ads to keywords that are too broad, you might end up getting a lot of clicks from people who aren’t part of your target audience. This can result in wasted money on useless clicks. When fiddling with your PPC settings on Google Ads, do not use Broad Match on your short-tail terms; always stick to Exact Match, then use all the bid modifiers and keywords possible.
Final thoughts
The principles of marketing are the same all across the board; it is only the platform and practices that change. If you follow these principles and use the right strategies, you might just reach that 4:1 ratio on Google Ads, no matter the size of your business.
If you’re looking for the expertise of an Ontario-based marketing consultant to help with your PPC marketing, send us a message at Oake Marketing. We have what it takes to help your brand soar, no matter what type of marketing campaign you’re trying to launch.