Small Business Marketing – Pay Per Click – C T R (Click Through Rate).
The endless search for new clients is important for any small business however is often made complicated because of the options and the choices that need to be made. i.e what marketing medium should you use.
In the UK like every other country on the planet we all have very similar mediums, local – newspapers, magazines and radio along with national publications and broadcasters. The real key to using these is being able to break through the noise and make your own sales message stand out. Sadly many don’t which is why much small business marketing does not money like it should.
As the internet took shape as a research tool it was clear that advertising online, placing your marketing message in front of those searching for solutions was always going to be a winner. Indeed never before have business owners been able to secure such a targeted medium for attracting clients.
Some of you have not used Pay Per Click and this post is probably not for you but if you are currently using this kind of advertising read on.
The two major faults we see with new clients and their online advertising are Click Through Rate – the number of times your ad is clicked/the number of times it is seen and the Quality Score. Both of which determine how successful your ad campaign will be and importantly how much much you will be charged per click. I have provided the Google definitions of these at the bottom of the post.
Whilst these problems are easy to solve (provided of course you have some knowledge of what is required) it is something that is often ignored. Consequently the costs increase and the overall effectiveness is reduced which is why most of you give up. As this is such an important part of modern marketing you should take the time to either learn what is required or get someone in that really understands it.
My top tips for improving CTR are :-
1. Make sure you test alter and adapt your ads always trying to beat the existing CTR with your new ad, and never run more than two ads at the same time.
2. Ensure you make the most of negative keywords, this will ensure that your ad is not shown unless there is a specific search e.g you sell plumbing fittings but as you don’t operate a charity you may choose to not show you ad when someone searches for ‘free plumbing fittings’ – thus improving your overall CTR.
3.Initially focus on one or two targeted keywords. It’s easy to get caught up in having hundreds of keywords which is great until you come to manage them. The more you have per campaign the harder it becomes to manage. Get good at a handful of phrases and then with your new confidence you can increase to as many as you want.
Of course this not meant to be a comprehensive guide to Pay Per Click but will be a helpful check and balance as to what should be happening.
Get in touch today if you want a review on your marketing.
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Google defines CTR as noted below.
Clickthrough rate (CTR)
A ratio showing how often people who see your ad end up clicking it. CTR can be used to gauge how well your keywords and ads are performing.
Quality Score
Quality Score is an estimate of how relevant your ads, keywords, and landing page are to a person seeing your ad. Having a high Quality Score means that our systems think your ad, keyword, and landing page are all relevant and useful to someone looking at your ad. Having a low Quality Score, on the other hand, means that your ads, keywords, and landing page probably aren’t as relevant and useful to someone looking at your ad.