Developing a Winning PPC Strategy: Tips & Best Practices

So, you have just started a business and know your products will be a smash hit. But simply having winning products isn't enough anymore. You also need to know how to advertise your business.

And what better way to do that than with PPC ads? According to Formstack, PPC ads are one of the top three generators of high-volume leads.

However, creating an effective paid advertising strategy can be challenging. It is crucial you understand the key components involved in developing one. In this guide, you will learn how to create a winning PPC strategy that will help you achieve your business goals and grow your brand.

What Is PPC?

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) marketing is a type of online advertising model that lets you run ads. The most popular PPC platforms include Google Ads, Microsoft Ads, and Facebook Ads. This type of advertising is typically used for search engine advertising. You create an ad and pay for it to be displayed in search engine results pages (SERPs) for specific keywords.  

The cost of the ad is based on the competitiveness of keywords. The higher the competition, the bigger the cost. Fortunately, you only need to pay each time a user clicks on your ad.

PPC advertising is a highly effective way to drive traffic to a website and generate leads or sales. It provides immediate results as opposed to other marketing tactics, such as SEO, which can take you several months to see results. In fact, the top three paid ad spots on SERPs get 41% of the clicks.

With PPC, you can target specific demographics, locations, and device types. It also offers granular reporting and tracking capabilities, so you can measure the effectiveness of your campaigns and make adjustments accordingly.

How to Develop an Effective PPC Strategy That Converts

Developing an effective strategy is crucial for the success of your advertising efforts. Here are the steps you can follow to create a successful PPC campaign.

Define Your Goals

Defining your goals is the first and most crucial step to developing an effective PPC strategy. It provides a roadmap for making decisions and optimizing your campaigns to achieve your desired results. But when making goals, make sure they align with your overall business strategy. They should also be SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound).

Clearly defined goals can help you focus your PPC efforts on achieving your objectives. If your goal is to generate leads, you can target niche-specific keywords relevant to your products or services. If your goal is to increase website traffic, you can focus on targeting a wider audience and promoting your brand.

Segment Your Audience

Audience segmentation can be incredibly useful in helping you target your advertising efforts more effectively when developing a PPC strategy. This involves dividing your target market into smaller, more specific groups based on common characteristics such as demographics, behavior, interests, and more.

This strategy also lets you tailor your PPC campaigns to specific groups using messaging and images that resonate with them. It not only improves the chances of your target audience seeing your advertisements as relevant and appealing, but it also increases the chances they will convert into paying customers.

Segmenting your audience allows you to test and refine your PPC campaigns more effectively. By dividing your audience into smaller groups, you can compare the performance of different campaigns and see which ones are generating the best results.

Research Keywords

Conducting keyword research can help you determine which keywords are being used by your target audience and how often they are being searched. This information lets you target the most relevant keywords in your PPC campaigns. It helps ensure your ads are being displayed to the right people, leading to higher click-through rates and conversions.

Of course, targeting relevant keywords alone isn't enough. You should also target based on intent to improve your chances of conversion. The three primary categories of search intent are informational, transactional, and navigational.

Informational users want to learn more about a specific product or service. Transactional users, on the other hand, are ready to buy. As for navigational users, they already know what they want and are searching for the specific page where they can make the purchase.

Choose the Right Ad Platform

With so many ad platforms available, choosing the right one for your business can be overwhelming. But making the right choice can have a significant impact on the success of your PPC campaign.

The target audience is one of the most important factors to consider when choosing an ad platform. Different ad platforms may cater to different demographics, so choosing one that aligns with your target audience is important.

You should also make sure the platform you choose supports the type of ad you want to create and provides the tools and resources you need to create effective ads. Another thing to consider is the cost. Some ad platforms can be more expensive than others. So, it is vital to choose one that fits your budget.

Optimize Your Landing Page

Creating unique landing pages can be challenging, especially if you are targeting many different keywords. You may be tempted to redirect users to a generic landing page. But that won't do you any good. You will just be wasting ad spend.

Aside from lower conversion rates, this will also lead to lower Adwords Quality Scores, making it harder to reach people with your PPC campaign. So, make sure to create a strong link between your ad and the landing page. If your ad is promoting a specific product or service, your landing page should be focused on that.

In addition to relevance, ensure your landing page is optimized for the user experience. This means the page should be easy to navigate and visually appealing. It should also load quickly. The more relevant and optimized the landing page is, the more likely people will convert.

Create Compelling Ad Copy

Your ads serve as the starting point of your sales funnel. Once you have identified your target audience and optimized your landing pages, it is time to create compelling ad copy.

Google Ads has made a lot of improvements to make automation of ad creation and optimization easier in recent years. The only thing left is giving it the right prompts and ad copy variations to rotate.

Make your ad copy as clear and concise as possible. It should highlight your unique selling point and what value you offer. Include attention-grabbing images to create a visual impact. This also makes your ads more memorable. Don't forget to include a call-to-action that encourages people to click on your ad.

Monitor and Measure Performance

Monitoring and measuring key metrics help give you valuable insights into the performance of your ads. This makes it easier to identify which ads and keywords are performing well and which are not. This information can help you optimize your campaign and allocate your budget more effectively.

Here are some essential metrics you need to track and analyze.

Click-Through Rate (CTR): This can help you determine the relevance of your ad to your keyword or audience targeting.

Conversion Rate: A high conversion rate indicates your choice of keywords, ad copy, and landing pages are spot on.

Cost per Click (CPC): Your ideal CPC is how much you are willing to pay to grab a potential customer's attention.

Cost per Action (CPA): This metric indicates the competitiveness of a keyword and if it is worth investing in.

Quality Score (Adwords): This gives you a sense of the overall effectiveness of your ads and landing pages.

Bounce Rate: This measures the percentage of visitors who leave your landing page without taking action.

Return on Ad Spend (ROAS): This metric measures the return on investment from your PPC campaign.

Other metrics you can monitor include the number of page views, on-site engagement, and new or returning visitors. These are especially important if your goal is lead nurturing.

Types of Audience Targeting

Targeting the right audience is key to the success of any marketing campaign. With the vast amount of data available today, reaching specific groups of people with highly tailored messaging and advertisements is possible. Understanding the different types of audience targeting will help you choose the right approach for your marketing efforts and ensure that your message reaches the right people at the right time.

Affinity Audiences

To drive brand awareness, you may want to check out how affinity audiences work. These are groups of people who share a common interest, hobby, or passion. This type of audience targeting catches individuals early in their buying journey.

Effectively driving them down your sales funnel will depend on how relevant your ads are to them. But since you already have an idea of what they like, you can use that information to make your ads more targeted.

In-Market Audiences

These are groups of people actively researching and considering buying a product or service. For example, a person who has recently conducted online research about a specific product or has added the product to their online shopping cart would be considered an in-market audience.

This type of audience targeting is perfect for reaching individuals nearing the end of their buying cycle. Targeting these people can help improve the overall effectiveness of your PPC campaigns.

But a lead is only considered a part of this group for up to seven days. After that, they may already lose interest. The reach may be smaller, but it is far more targeting than other options.

Life Events

Life events audiences are groups of individuals who have recently experienced a significant life change or milestone. These life events, such as getting married, moving to a new home, having a baby, or starting a new job, can trigger a need or desire for a specific product or service. Targeting these individuals with relevant and timely ads increases your chances of generating more leads and sales.

Remarketing

Remarketing lets you reach people who have previously interacted with your website or mobile app but haven't yet made a purchase. Its goal is to reengage with them by showing them an ad. This helps encourage them to come back to the website and complete the desired action.

Remarketing is a highly effective advertising strategy as it lets you reach people who have already expressed an interest in your offerings rather than trying to generate new leads from a cold audience.

Best PPC Platforms

With so many options available, choosing the right PPC platform for your business can be a challenge. To help you decide where to run your ads, we have listed some of the best ad platforms currently available.

Google Ads

Google Ads displayed in the Google Display Network can reach over 90% of Internet users worldwide, making it the largest and most popular PPC platform. It offers a powerful way to capture a large and highly targeted audience. With its vast reach and advanced targeting capabilities, Google Ads can help you generate leads and increase sales.

Microsoft Ads

Microsoft Ads (formerly Bing Ads) works similarly to Google Ads. You can create and display ads on Bing, Yahoo, and other partner sites. It may not have the same reach as Google Ads, but it can reach an older and more educated audience with higher income.

Cost-per-click is also more affordable. One might argue that competition is low because nobody is using it. But this study clearly shows you get more value for your dollar with Microsoft Ads. So, there is still a huge potential in using it to run your ad campaign.

Facebook Ads

Facebook, the largest social media network, lets you create PPC campaigns within the Meta Ads Manager. Once set, your ads can take the form of an image, video, carousel, or other types of creative. They can appear in users' News Feeds, Stories, and other areas of the platform.

They may also be displayed on Instagram since Facebook also owns this platform. But unlike traditional PPC platforms that make use of keywords, Facebook targets users based on their specific likes and interests.

Instagram Ads

Instagram, although owned by Facebook, is perfectly capable of running its own ads. After all, it is a separate platform with its own demographics.

It is also shown that users on this platform are more receptive to ads. Did you know that 70% of surveyed users don't mind watching ads on Instagram? So, if you are not advertising on this platform, you are missing out.

Pinterest Ads

Pinterest may not be as big as Facebook and Instagram, but it has its fair share of active users. In fact, it has seen massive growth in recent years. It now has over 400 million monthly active users worldwide.

Pinterest’s growing popularity on a global scale should be reason enough for you to consider using this as a PPC network. Overall, it is a great platform for businesses looking to reach a large and engaged audience on a visual discovery platform.

Conclusion

Developing a PPC strategy is a crucial step in achieving success in your digital advertising efforts. By understanding the key components involved in creating an effective campaign, you can reach your target audience, drive traffic to your website, and increase your sales and conversions.

Whether you are a small business just starting out or a large corporation looking to stay ahead of the competition, a well-designed PPC strategy can help you reach your goals and grow your brand. Remember to constantly evaluate and optimize your campaigns, using data and insights to make informed decisions and refine your approach. With a solid PPC strategy in place, you'll be on your way to achieving success in the ever-evolving world of digital advertising.

‍