Justin Miller

To Bid Or Not To Bid on Your Branded Keywords?

April 9, 2018 by Justin Miller 1 Comment

As a PPC manager for an agency, I have heard multiple reasons from clients why not to bid on their own branded keywords. “Branded searches should lead to Organic/Free clicks” is definitely the most common. But what if it doesn’t… what if a search for your brand leads to a competitor’s sale?

Let’s say a potential customer is looking for you, but he or she found your competitor instead because you assumed branded keywords generated free organic traffic to your site. That’s a loss for you and a win for your competitor. Who would want that?

Does Paying for Branded Keyword Clicks Help or Hurt Your Bottom Line?

If your competitor is bidding on your brand name and you are not, there is a good chance their ad is showing above your Organic listing. This means they are likely stealing clicks which could be leading to sales. This would definitely be hurting your bottom line!

If you are bidding on your branded keywords, you should easily have a high Quality Score and therefore, should only need a minimal bid to capture the #1 position. This would prevent competitors from stealing potential clicks and sales away from you. However, does it help your bottom line or just do damage control?

Fortunately, studies looking at running Pay per Click (PPC) for keywords that you already rank for organically have already been analyzed and written. Thank You, Search Engine Land (@sengineland) and Google Research (@googleresearch)!

The Research is in – Bidding on branded keywords does not steal from your own organic clicks, but rather leads to incremental clicks, leads/sales, and revenue! The question is not longer “To Bid or Not To Bid?” instead it should be “Why aren’t you bidding on your branded keywords?”

Have any questions concerning PPC? We would love to hear from you via Facebook, Twitter, or comment below. If you are looking to build, protect, and/or improve your brand awareness, we can help you with that, too.

Google’s Retail & Ecommerce Marketing Event Recap

August 23, 2017 by Justin Miller Leave a Comment

On Wednesday, August 16th, Google provided some great tips, insight, and advice to retailers regarding ecommerce marketing. Kristen Johanson, Head of Industry for Retail at Google and Alex Chen, Product Marketing Manager at Google Shopping, did a great job presenting 3 major problems the shoppers and retailers face online, and steps that retailers can take to remedy these problems.

Problem #1 – Discoverability – Can Consumers Find You?

While having a storefront on the main street helps, in-store foot traffic has been and continues to decline. However, shoppers are not disappearing, rather relocating online. Making your website and overall online presence (local listings, social media, reviews, etc.) that much more important. Today, having a great website isn’t enough, it has to be easily viewed and used on multiple screen sizes especially smaller mobile devices.

Problem #2 – Personalization – Mass Message Is an Easy Way to Fail

Each of your customers’ want/need something, but not all the same thing. While communicating with your client base according to their wants/needs is challenging, it is also a huge opportunity. Present the right offer to the right person at the right time, and watch your sales increase. For instance, imagine your favorite coffee shop texted you a discount coupon for your favorite drink when you are within walking distance of their new location (which you might not have even known about). Are you going to visit the new locations? – most likely.

Problem # 3 – Frictionless – Easy Consumption or Loss of Sale

Being found is step one. Customizing communication with your customers is step two. Step three is ensuring a good user experience. This includes fast load times, fewer clicks to check out, streamlined forms, ease of navigation, and much more. With global competition, sometimes the littlest pain points for a customer could drive them away.

Essentially, consumers are online looking for stores that cannot only provide the products they need/want but also a service that makes purchasing and receiving these products easy. The full Google video can be viewed on YouTube.

If you have any questions or would like to discuss your ecommerce marketing further, you can contact DaBrian Marketing Group, a certified Google Partner.

The Simple Complexity of Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertising

March 20, 2017 by Justin Miller Leave a Comment

Does PPC Advertising Even Work?

True Story: Recently, I was told that Pay per Click (PPC) advertising does not work. As the Search Manager at DaBrian Marketing, I was naturally curious as to why the person had renounced paid online advertising. After having a longer conversation with this person, I found out that his/her existing campaigns simply did not consider the appropriate keyword match types. The campaigns were not complete!

Yes, If You Do it Right

While the campaigns may have contained relevant ad copy and led users to helpful landing pages, there was no sufficient targeting. In other words: this person’s ads were displaying for a multitude of search queries – many of which did not actually pertain to the advertised product or service.

Only broad match type was implemented without negative keywords. In other words: the person spent a marketing budget on impressions and clicks without considering how to actually gain new customers. For any advertising campaign – including a PPC campaign – to work, it must consider the complete sales-process.

Accomplishing desired goals connected to new customer acquisition requires precise and accurate targeting in PPC campaigns. Like the kind of targeting the gif, below. But, just with a much happier ending: more sales for your business rather than a concussion. Using several match types (broad modified, phrase, exact, and others) as well as negative keywords could have prevented several unwanted impressions and costly clicks for the person in this story.

Make Your Ads Count & Stop Wasting Money

For your own paid online advertising, eliminate wasted ad spend by ensuring that your ads are reaching the right target audience with the right search queries. Create well-managed keyword groupings that:

1) Cover a host of in-the-moment needs for your potential customers
2) Filter out users that are searching for content that is irrelevant to your business.

When you account for these factors, your PPC campaigns will effectively create impressions, clicks, conversions, and ultimate sales for your business.

For in-depth knowledge about this topic, download our white paper on PPC Keyword Match Types.

When have you seen a badly targeted paid ad on Google or Bing?

Tell us about your experience in the comments to hear from us. Or, just give us a call for fast help and improvement of your PPC account.

Gk Elite Case Study – Conversion Tracking Using Google Adwords

January 17, 2017 by Justin Miller Leave a Comment

You Can't Improve What You Can't Measure (Accurately)

Recently, DaBrian Marketing Group wrote a case study on one of our Pay Per Click (PPC) clients. When we first reviewed their Google Adwords accounts, it appeared they were receiving several conversions. However on further review, their conversion configuration did not align with actual online transactions. After establishing new conversions that lead to and track online sales, DaBrian Marketing was able to measure return on ad spend (ROAS) and optimize our client’s PPC to increase transactions and their bottom line.

To learn more about this case study, watch the video below and download the full case study. If you have any questions, or would like DaBrian Marketing Group to take a look at your PPC, give us a call at 610 743 5602.

What problems are you having with your Pay Per Click advertising? Tell us in the comments below!

Grow Your Ecommerce With PPC Remarketing

November 14, 2016 by Justin Miller 1 Comment

The U.S. Commerce Department reports that web sales (Ecommerce) have been increasing 10+% year over year since 2010. Last year (2015), web sales were over $300 billion and are expected to exceed $500 billion in the next 5 years. As a retailer, are your online sales rising with the industry or are you losing out to competitors who are attracting more customers online?

There are many factors that go into a retailer’s online success – user experience, ease of completing a transaction, mobile-friendliness, and more. This post is going to focus on driving repeat visits and sales through the art of Remarketing.

What is PPC Remarketing?

Remarketing is targeting your Pay per Click ads to users who have or are similar to those who have, interacted with your brand via the web. This interaction could include previously visiting your site, watching one of your YouTube videos, or voluntarily giving you their email address. I am sure that you have visited a site and have then noticed that their ads seem to “follow” you as you visit other sites – this is an example of remarketing.

Why Utilize PPC Remarketing Efforts?

Reach users that are more likely to purchase because they have previously interacted with your brand.

Bring back current customers – people that purchased that winter coat may be in the need for gloves, scarves, hats, and other winter clothes
Rescue abandoned shopping carts – A person did “window shopping” on your site and created a wishlist or shopping cart, but never purchased. Reach him or her with a remarketing ad and close the potential sale.

In addition to that short list, remarketing can often lead to higher conversions (sales from ad clicks) at a lower cost (CPA) which means higher margins and Return on Ad Spend (ROA) for you! If you have questions or would like help leveraging remarketing to boost your sales and Return on Ad Spend, contact DaBrian Marketing Group today or leave a comment below.

Pay Per Click Ad Copy Writing Just Got… (Easier?) Longer

September 12, 2016 by Justin Miller Leave a Comment

PPC ad copy character limits have been one of the most challenging components of Pay per Click. Google AdWords has announced/released Expanded Text Ads (ETA). While this new update to the Ad format gives advertisers more characters to use, does it make this challenge any easier?

The new Ads increase the character limit on the Headline, add an additional new Headline, and combine the two description lines into a longer single block of text. Here are the specific details:

	Old (Traditional) Ad Format	New Expanded Text Ads (ETA)
Headline 1	25 Characters	30 Characters
Headline 2	N/A	30 Characters
Description Line(s)	35 + 35 Characters	80 Characters
Display URL	35 Characters	Your URL + 15 + 15 Characters
Total	130 Characters	170 + Your URL

When Are Pay Per Click ETAs Coming?

While ETAs are available now, October 26th January 31, 2017 (Google just gave you more time) is when Expanded Text Ads will be the default text ad format shown when you conduct a search on Google or create a new Ad Copy in AdWords.

Why Is Google Making an Ad Copy Change?

This change furthers Google’s attempt to align a user’s experience on all devices (desktop, tablet, and mobile). In addition to a consistent user experience, Google is reporting that the testing of Expanded Text Ads has boosted Click-through rates (CTR) as much as 10-20%. These additional clicks bring more visitors to your site and offer more opportunities for new leads, online sales, and revenue.

What Is NOT Changing - Ad Extensions & Customizers

All Ad Extension (Location, Call, Sitelinks, Callouts, Review, and more) will continue to work with Expanded Text Ads. However, if your Ad Copy and Ad Extensions are duplicates of each other, then they will be less likely to be shown.

Along with Ad Extensions, Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI) and Ad Customizers will continue to work within Expanded Text Ads. With the increase in character limits, not only will these features work, but they are easier to fit into your Ads.

My Thoughts on Pay Per Click Expanded Text Ads

I am very excited for this change! More characters mean we can communicate more features, benefits, and unique selling propositions. As I am writing new Ads in the Expanded Text Ad format, I am working on utilizing DKI and Ad Customizers. I look forward to improved Quality Score, higher CTRs, and lower Cost per Click. More importantly for our clients, these new ads should result in more Conversions (Leads and Sales) at a lower Cost per Acquisition (CPA), and higher Return on Ad Spend (ROAS). Larger character limits may not make Ad Copywriting easier, but it will be interesting to see how advertisers use them. How are you planning on utilizing the additional characters in your PPC Ads?