So, you run a business, or your boss wants to know if PPC advertising is the correct solution for online growth.
Either way, you will have plenty of questions about how pay-per-click (PPC) advertising can help you reach the business’s online goals. Nowadays, there are not just Google Ads, but PPC advertising on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok.
Here are the most common questions with all the information you need to feel empowered.
How much will it cost?
This is the first question, but it has a fluid answer. There are so many factors that the answer to this will be unique. Factors that influence the costs that you’ll be charged include:
· The Budget available for your campaign
· The keywords you will bid on and the traffic volumes they generate
· The times and days you want to run your adverts
· The competition and how aggressive they are in their campaigns
After you have assessed the points above, you will need to set a test budget. This will be different for everyone, but it needs to be large enough to drive sufficient traffic to help assess the performance.
The keywords you choose will highly influence your test budget. By using keyword research and forecasting tools, you can assess what your spending will need to be to make an impact. Just to give you an idea of the range of a PPC campaign, keywords can be pennies, but major keywords can be costly. According to Wordstream, the most expensive keyword is “Insurance” at $54.91 per click.
How long to be up and running?
Setting up a PPC campaign can be done in a couple of hours, but it depends on the campaign’s type, number, and complexity. This is usually when a professional PPC management company can be worth its weight in gold. Experience in keyword research and setting up campaigns streamlines the process and can save money over the medium to long term. Shopping campaigns are notoriously complex and can take weeks without expert knowledge.
Will it work?
Naturally, you will want to know if PPC works. Worldwide, millions of businesses use PPC advertising, and it is safe to assume that they are receiving a return on their investment. According to Google, “businesses make an average of $2 income for every $1 they spend in Google Ads.”
Skillsets?
Do you have the skillsets in-house to make a PPC campaign work? It is wise at this point that inexperience can be costly. Although you can set daily limits on your campaign so you do not overspend, it is straightforward for the uninitiated to make errors with their keyword choices. This can lend itself to the daily budget being quickly used by attracting the wrong type of click-throughs.
At this point, the business makes a major decision. I would liken it to contracting for Legal or Accounting services.
You wouldn’t attempt to run these services in-house as they are ecosystem specialists. This is true of the SEO and PPC industries. The years of experience a PPC management company provides can bring faster and cheaper results.
Contracts?
Contracts are contracts, and they are there to protect both parties in the agreement. The main question regarding contracts revolves around the length. It is customary in the PPC industry for an initial contract to be three months. This would provide enough data to assess the campaign’s success and make relevant adjustments. After this initial period, the contract would typically drop into a rolling contract, which can be cancelled anytime. A professional PPC management company will be able to provide contractual flexibility to meet your individual needs.
SEO V PPC?
This is an often-argued point by the initiated. PPC is perceived as costly because the traffic generated will always be charged.
SEO is seen as cheap because it does not cost money to generate traffic. It is easy to gravitate towards SEO for financial savings, but both channels have pros and cons.
The most crucial point to take away from the difference is the speed of uptake. When your PPC campaign is initialised, it WILL generate traffic, whereas according to Mac McCarthy who runs an SEO Reading in Berkshire company, SEO typically takes months for any noticeable results, and the results are not guaranteed.
If you are serious about increasing your traffic, combining both channels is the best route, but at this point, you should look to the professionals.
How do we beat our competitors?
You will be familiar with your competitors in your business niche. What you will not know, though, is how their campaigns are performing. These tools will provide insight into your competitor’s average position and Cost Per Click (CPC).
If you choose to go it alone or use a PPC management company, there are factors to consider regarding where your adverts will appear. If you run a search campaign, the adverts appear on Google and the affiliate sites. The exact position they will appear in depends on the auction results based on:
• Your average bid
• Competitors’ bids
• Time of day
• Location you’re targeting
• Device it’s appearing on
• Advert quality
As your campaign is managed, the position and bids for adverts can be adjusted. As a side note, being top is not always best. Better written adverts in second or third position can generate as much, if not more, traffic than the expensive number one spot.
Summary
Whether you’re a digital marketer, a business owner or an assistant tasked with discovering more about PPC advertising, knowing how this channel will help your growth is essential. To find out more without any commitments, contact a PPC management company without delay.
