Mistake #2: Running a Google AdWords Campaign without a clear call-to-action or the ability to track results.
When your Marketing resources are limited and you are focused on results, it is not wise to run a Google AdWords campaign or any other PPC campaign without a call-to-action* and a tracking mechanism built in. You must understand the potential ROI (return on investment) prior to making that investment, or you are just wasting money!
Knowing the effectiveness of a Google AdWords campaign, both from an internal cost standpoint and a customer acquisition standpoint is absolutely necessary. If you do not clearly understand both, you should not be spending dollars on digital advertising. PPC advertising is NOT a place to build brand awareness, there are much more effective ways to do this.
I have seen this scenario too many times…Organizations spending on PPC campaigns without a clear call to action and no ability to measure an ROI. These companies are easy to find and likely waste thousands of dollars.
A solid AdWords campaign is focused on conversions (the act of converting a website visitor into a paying customer)! There are basically 2 key types of conversions:
- Convert a web visitor directly into a buyer (like in the case of eCommerce)
- Convert a web visitor into a lead to be converted to a buyer after a longer sales process
Regardless of the type of conversion your business is after, the rules remain the same. Here are a few pointers to help you avoid wasting money on PPC campaigns:
- Make sure you focus on a clear call-to-action* which has the highest chance of converting a visitor (This may require you to try multiple approaches with multiple landing pages)
- Track what you are doing and make frequent adjustments (Daily at a minimum, hourly for high volume campaigns)
- Don’t be afraid to try new things, PPC is as much about trial and error as anything.
- Do not run campaigns and ignore them for a period of time.
Hope this helps you think about Google AdWords in a different way.
*Call-To-Action: An instruction to the audience to provoke an immediate response, usually using an imperative verb such as “call now”, “find out more” or “visit a store today”