Everyone agrees that paid search is an essential part of any digital marketing eCommerce strategy. But how you implement it and what kind of PPC campaign you build makes a big difference.
For many businesses, PPC ads are the first thing that springs to mind when thinking about an eCommerce strategy, and for a good reason – this advertising channel is affordable and a great way to reach potential customers.
However, launching an unoptimised campaign will likely hurt your business more than help.
When creating a new PPC strategy for your eCommerce business, you should keep several things in mind. Here you will find 15 tried and tested tips on the different elements of an effective PPC strategy for eCommerce.
What Is PPC?
PPC stands for “pay per click.” This means you pay a certain amount (or “bid”) every time someone clicks on your ad. You’re charged based on the advertiser competition on Google or other platforms.
The most popular way to run PPC ads is through Google Ads, but you can also run them on Facebook, Instagram, and other platforms.
PPC ads are a great way to reach a new audience. They can drive quick clicks, resulting in quick sales.
PPC ads can also target specific users based on their search terms. This makes them very targeted—but also very expensive.
Implement KPIs and Tracking Metrics
Before you create ads, you must track data and use KPIs to make informed decisions about your campaigns, it’s one of the biggest elements of PPC strategies for ecommerce.
The first step to creating a successful PPC campaign is to identify what metrics you’ll be tracking. Analytics is the best way to see how people interact with your website. This will help you to determine what you need to fix and where your campaign needs to be re-directed.
You’ll want to keep a close eye on the following metrics:
– Impressions – This is the total number of people who saw one of your ads. This metric is good to keep an eye on if you notice a small number (or no) impressions, as it could mean your ads aren’t being shown.
– Clicks – The number of clicks your ads receive will reflect their success. If your ads aren’t generating clicks, it might be time to try a new strategy.
– CTR – Your click-through rate (CTR) is the overall number of clicks your ads receive divided by the number of impressions your ads receive. A good CTR is anywhere between 1-2%. Anything below 1% means you need to re-evaluate your ads.
– Conversions – How many people are clicking and then converting? This is the most critical metric and will help you determine your ad success.
Focus And Optimise For Your Analysed Audience
When creating your PPC strategies for ecommerce, trying to grab as many eyeballs as possible is tempting. But before doing that, you need to know your audience.
Take some time to analyse your traffic and see which keywords and phrases people are currently using to find your website. Once you’ve done that, it’s time to focus on your audience.
It’s easy to get carried away with “broadcasting” your products and services to the world. However, if you’re attracting the wrong audience, you’re wasting time and money.
Once you know your audience, you can optimise your keywords and phrases to attract them.
Target A Less Obvious Demographic
Don’t just focus on your regular customers; try to attract new customers as well.
How?
By targeting a less obvious audience.
You might want to choose a demographic that isn’t necessarily your regular clientele. This might be people who shop online but are outside your target market.
By targeting a less obvious audience with a pay per click advertisement, you can quickly expand your conversion rates. This can be done by tailoring your ads to a specific audience or choosing a niche in which your current customers don’t shop.
You can also try targeting customers outside your regular sales hours. For example, if you run a business that is typically closed on the weekends, you can target customers who shop during that time.
Choose Your Platform to Run Ads
It’s so easy to get caught up in the excitement of creating ads and clicking “launch” without first choosing the platform you want to run them on.
It’s essential to plan your PPC strategy before you start creating ads because the platform you choose will impact the type of ads you create.
It will also determine how much you spend.
There are many advertising platforms on which you can run PPC ads. You can choose from the following:
- Bing
Or a handful of other platforms.
Before you decide which platform to use, consider what your goals are with a pay per click advertisement. It’s important to consider how you want to measure your success.
If your top priority is increasing brand awareness, Facebook might be the best choice since it’s easy to measure engagement.
If you want to generate sales quickly, Google might be the best option since it’s easy to track conversions.
Optimise your display pages
You don’t have time for visitors to navigate your website and browse your products. With PPC ads, you’re likely to get people who have never visited your site before. This means that you’ll have to give them enough information to make a purchase.
Instead, you want your PPC ads to link directly to a product or service page. This means you’ll need to ensure that every product and service page on your website has a unique and compelling title, a strong description, and relevant images.
It’s also important to consider how your products page looks. Avoid using too much text, and keep click-to-conversion as low as possible. If your products are priced, include the price in a large font, so it’s hard to miss.
Be Dynamic
It’s easy for PPC ads to become stale. If you run the same ads for several weeks without changing anything, your conversion rates will likely plummet.
This might result in lower click-through rates and cost you money. It might also lower your brand sentiment.
If you want to avoid this, try rotating your ads weekly. You can do this manually or choose a platform that automatically allows you to “rotate” your ads.
Keep Your Product Pages Up To Date
It’s essential to keep your products page up to date. The information on your product pages needs to be accurate.
There is a high chance that the people who click on your ads have never been to your website before. This means that they are likely to rely on the information on your product pages to make a decision.
When you launch a new product or update one, update it on your product pages. This will help you to keep your product pages up to date and keep visitors informed.
Use Optimised Keywords
Your product pages are a great place to include keywords you’re hoping to rank for.
However, the keywords you contain in your product descriptions must be strategic and relevant. If you include the wrong keywords in your eCommerce business ads, you may be penalised by Google for trying to cheat the system.
Keep your product titles as focused as possible.
Use variations of your primary products and services. Avoid using vague or generic words, as these are less likely to be clicked on.
Optimise your Shopping Feed
Many factors influence the success of a PPC campaign, but optimising your feed is the most crucial.
A poorly composed or formatted feed won’t generate any impressions via a google search or clicks.
If you want to test and improve your feed, there are some best practices to follow: Make sure your feed has the right product identifiers (SKU, inventory levels, etc.). This is crucial for managing inventory and increasing your relevance.
Use structured data to increase click-through rate (CTR). You can use structured data in Google Shopping to enrich your ad’s text and make your product information more helpful to people who google search.
Set Your Budgets
When setting your digital marketing budgets, consider the amount you are willing to invest in your PPC campaigns.
It’s essential to look at it like this in the reality of your situation – in other words, how much revenue are you expected to generate from these campaigns?
It’s important to understand that PPC is a long-term strategy. You may not see immediate results. However, if you do your research, set up your account correctly, and track your performance, you should eventually start seeing a return on your investment.
Always have a goal in mind. If you already have a crystal clear idea of what you want to achieve, it’ll be easier to measure your success. For example, you might set a target of increasing the average order value.
Create your Ads
When creating ads, you need to remember your target audience’s mindset.
What would they be thinking when they see your ad?
What kind of words or messages will catch their attention?
Writing a compelling ad headline is one of the most critical aspects of creating your ads. Your headline is the first thing your potential customers will see. It will be what persuades them to click on your ad.
After writing your pay per click advertisement, you must also ensure it follows Google’s guidelines. This will ensure your ad is approved, and you won’t waste your money on disapproved ads that won’t show up.
Use Social Media For Your PPC Campaigns
If you already use social media, you might want to start running PPC campaigns on your social platforms.
If you use Facebook, you can create boosted PPC campaigns. On Twitter, you can run promoted tweets. You can also run PPC campaigns on Instagram.
Boosted posts and promoted tweets are easy to set up and don’t require as much work as creating ads on Google or Facebook. However, you still want to ensure that you include the right keywords and choose a compelling image; a ppc agency uk could absolutely help here.
Use Ad Extensions
Ad extensions make your ads more attractive to potential customers and convince them to click.
You can add extensions to your PPC ads, such as product images or call-outs. Moreover, they help ensure you’re filling your ad space with relevant information. Remember that you can use up to three ad extensions when creating your ads.
However, you can only use extensions related to your products or services. If you aren’t sure what extensions would work best for your eCommerce business, use the Google Ad extensions tool.
Be Prepared To Change The Boundaries
When starting an eCommerce PPC campaign, you must be prepared to change your boundaries. In other words, you may need to tweak your targeting and bid settings so that your ads appear for the right audiences at the correct times.
You should look at your targeting if you start seeing a poor performance.
If you narrow your boundaries, you will not see much success. On the other hand, if you set them too broadly, you may lose out on potential sales.
Always remember that your eCommerce business will evolve over time, and your PPC strategies will have to change.
Use Tracking To Continually Develop and Improve Your PPC Campaigns
You can improve your PPC strategies by tracking your performance through different tools, such as Google Analytics or CRM.
Google Analytics is a free tool that you can use to track your PPC performance data. You can use this data to see which audience segments are bringing in traffic, which times of day they’re most active, and what devices they use.
Knowing this information will help you decide how to best optimise your digital marketing PPC campaigns. You can also use this information to track your AdWords cost per acquisition or CAP. This will help you see how much profit you’re bringing in from each source, allowing you to determine your ROI.
What’s Next?
PPC campaigns can effectively generate new leads for your business, but only if you know what you’re doing with your PPC strategies for ecommerce.
Before you create your PPC campaign, you must conduct thorough research and make the right decisions at the time- which can continually change as your ad performance changes.
If you’ve followed these tips so far, you’re on your way to creating a successful PPC strategy for your eCommerce business.
Now, it’s time to put these strategies into action.
As we’ve discussed, ecommerce ppc is a long-term game. It may take several months to see any significant results from your campaigns. But as long as you keep your eyes on the prize and follow these tips, you’ll be well on your way to success.
