Introduction to PPC Advertising

Okay first the bad news, the bad news is that there are no shortcuts to a better SEO ranking. Building your website up on the search engine results, capitalizing on keywords, and ultimately seeing great organic growth can take some time and effort. 

Ready for the good news yet? 

You can drive traffic to your website right away with Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising! PPC ads guarantee that your website appears at the top of search engine results pages (SERPs) when users search for keywords related to your business. The catch? You pay a fee every time someone clicks on your ad. While nothing’s free, when done right, PPC can offer a solid return on investment, driving both immediate sales and organic growth.

PPC Ads: What Are They?

PPC ads are common on search engines like Google and Bing, but they also exist on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram (though those work a bit differently). For this post, we’ll focus on Google Ads.

“Let me Google that real quick”, “I Googled it and it said…”. Think for a moment about how the word Google is both a noun and a verb. This is why Google Ads are so effective. Google Ads are particularly effective due to the platform’s massive traffic. With Google processing over 99,000 search queries per second, having your business appear on the first page of results can dramatically increase your audience. The downside? High competition means higher costs for popular keywords.

Benefits of PPC ads

• Cost effective- You control how much you spend and you only pay when people click meaning you are paying for direct traffic to your website which has a high chance for conversion 

• Quick Results - Particularly with startups and small businesses, often time is of the essence and you can’t wait to see the slow payoff of organic growth. PPC puts you at the top of SERPs right away

• Easy to test and control - PPC ads allow you to control the exact keywords you target, your ad placement, and your budget. You can also test various ads to see which are the most effective through A/B tests.

• Highly Targeted - PPC ads allow you to target not only specific keywords but also past online activity or demographics even those you have visited your site in the past but did not purchase anything yet. 

• Unaffected by algorithm changes - Google’s algorithm changes often and there are about 200 ranking factors to consider when trying to achieve organically high ranking of SERPs. PPC ads aren’t susceptible to any of that!

• Not dependent on domain authority - Keywords are competitive. So, if you have a low domain authority because you are a new/small business it can be difficult to get into the top rankings on SERPs. PPC ads ensure you rank highly no matter your domain rating.

• SEO insights - improving your SEO and driving organic traffic can be informed by the data gathered from your PPC ads. You will have insights into your audience’s search intent through keywords and you will have a better idea of your target audience

Important PPC Terms:

As with many technical areas, PPC is wrought with jargon and TMA (too many acronyms)! Here are some that you will want to keep in mind as you dive into your PPC journey (see there’s another one).

• CPC (Cost-per-click) - How much you pay for each click on your ad. CPC is your bid in the auction that determines your ad placement. Higher bids = better ad placement.

• CTR (Click-through rate) - A ratio of the number of people who see your ad to the number of people who click on your ad. CTR tells you how well your keywords and ads are performing.

• Ad Group - The series of ads within your campaign based on related keywords.

• Keywords - Specific words that will tell search engines which search queries you want your ad to be displayed with.

• Ad Text - The text in your ad that should match the keyword terms you target. The relevancy of your ad will increase the quality of your ad.

• Landing Page - Where users will end up once they click on your ad. This should be the page that will maximize conversions.

Where to Begin?

Getting your PPC ad on Google off the ground works a lot like an auction. You will bid on the keywords you want to target and then Google will choose which ads get displayed as well as their position based on the ads' relevance, CTR, and your bid price. 

The first step for you is to choose which keywords you want to bid on. These should be relevant to your business’s product/services. After you’ve created your list, you now need to write the PPC ads that are relevant to those keywords. Remember good ads will raise your ad rankings and will in turn lower your advertising costs so it is important to make sure you have high-quality ads. Once you’re in, monitor the effectiveness of your ads, and don’t be afraid to tweak them to increase their effectiveness based on their performance data.

At the end of the day, if you would like some help setting up and maintaining your Google Ads, Space Bison is here to help!