http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog The Source, featuring Daily Videos on SEO, PPC, Conversion and E-Mail Fri, 03 Feb 2012 18:46:28 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 en hourly 1 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-superbowl-ppc-strategy.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-superbowl-ppc-strategy.html#comments Tue, 31 Jan 2012 17:16:21 +0000 Brian http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4473
Oh wait there is a football game? I was thinking of something else.

The hype and anticipation surrounding the Super Bowl each year isn’t just for the big game (although in the Northeast there is most likely more excitement than in other parts of the country.) It is also for the commercials that play during the event. According to Nielsen, 51% of people enjoy watching the Super Bowl ads more than the game itself. Advertisers have an increasing pressure to not only provide memorable and innovative commercials, but also to find new ways to connect with the consumer outside of the television platform, even after the game is over.

The information in the chart here provided by Kantar Media proves this to be the trend. According to this Super Bowl ads are revealing a growing preference for 60 second commercials. As a result the total amount of time that ads play throughout the course of the game has increased. As a result less spots are available in which to advertise, which has further driven up the costs to over the $200 million dollar mark in the past 3 years.

This coupled with the rising use of social media and mobile devices throughout the game in the form of Facebook status update and Twitter posts has resulted in more of an opportunity to come up with a PPC strategy to capture some of this demand.

Some ideas therefore for how to advertise your brand during this highly visible time:

1. Come up with a Mobile PPC campaign. Mobile continues to be one of the fastest growing and most popular media channels. Creating campaigns for non-branded and branded keywords related to your competitors Super Bowl ads targeted to Droid, iPhone and iPad/Kindle devices are a good way to increase your visibility while minimizing your spend.
2. The second step would be to explore the use of serving your ads on multiple options, be it a sponsored ad on YouTube or Tweet on Twitter. These can be instances in which you can bring in the most amount of traffic due to the millions of dollars spent by competitors to in essence get your name out there in association with their brand.
3. The third step is to come up with a “game plan” if you will to exclude your name from searches from your competitor as well as include it. A great example of this is the Home Away Test Baby ad from a couple years ago and last years Groupon disaster. In both these cases, having a negative keyword strategy in place to not show up for these searches is something to keep in mind.
4. Lastly as quickly as you turned on these campaigns, don’t let it run no longer than 1-2 days after the big game. This is a very short window of opportunity in which to gauge performance. It’s best to allocate funds you set aside from this campaign to allocate to your branded and non-branded campaigns to build up the awareness of your brand and capture as many clicks and conversions as possible from those searching for your competitors ads. This could be something if planned and executed correctly that will result in pennies being spent by you compared to the millions spent by your competitors to in essence get the same result.

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]]> http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-superbowl-ppc-strategy.html/feed 0 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-impression-share-metrics-update.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-impression-share-metrics-update.html#comments Tue, 24 Jan 2012 16:00:15 +0000 Kevin http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4453
In the past, Google has provided Impression Share metrics on a campaign level. These metrics received positive feedback from advertisers as it allowed them to see the percentage of impressions received by your campaign divided by the estimated number of impressions you were eligible to receive. This is important as it gives you a pulse of where you are in the landscape with your competitors.

Advertisers were then allowed to add additional columns for further insight. Two of these columns allowed you to see where you were losing impression share for your campaign. There are two ways to see a campaign’s lost impression share. The first is lost impression share based on budget. The second is lost impression share based on rank. Advertisers were then able to determine whether or not to raise their campaign budget or keyword bids in order to further capitalize on successful campaigns.

The last column that can be viewed is the exact impression share. This allows you to see the percentage of impressions your ad could have shown for search terms that match your keywords exactly. If this percentage is low you can utilize Search Query reports in order to examine where you may be missing opportunities.

If this is something new to you and you would like to view these metrics for your campaigns you can do this by selecting the Columns drop down on the campaign view. You will then want to select the Competitive Metrics option and then Add the desired columns that you wish to see.

In an effort to continually improve the AdWords reporting and analytics for advertisers, Google is making Impression Share metrics available at the Ad Group level.

Advertisers will now be able to add three new impression share columns within their Ad Group view; Impression Share, Lost impression share based on rank, and exact match impression share. The only one not at this level is lost impression share based on budget as this is determined at the campaign level.

This will allow advertisers to identify further opportunity for successful ad groups in their AdWords campaigns. Using these metrics you can adjust bids to be more aggressive and capture more of the impression share as well as ensure your keywords are truly in line with searches.

These additional columns will begin to be rolled out to all advertisers on January 30th. At that time you will simply need to select from the Columns drop down the Competitive metrics similar to the campaign view described on the last slide.

We have used the campaign level impression share metrics to help guide our recommendations for strategic budget increases within the market in order to increase the overall ROAS.

At Exclusive Concepts we see this reporting update as an opportunity to identify on an ad group level whether to invest more within that category or not. If the impression share is low we now have the ability to determine if it is a result of rank or if the keywords need to reviewed. Any time we are able to gain clarity on a more granular level it allows better decisions to be made for our clients in order to ensure success and growth.

It is also important to note that with this update, Google is planning on updating the campaign level statistics as well. As a result they will be updating the campaign level impression share back to May 2011. If advertisers wish to keep a record of pre-May 2011 campaign impression share it is recommended to run a report before the January 30th rollout. ]]>

]]> http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-impression-share-metrics-update.html/feed 0 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-adwords-offer-extensions.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-adwords-offer-extensions.html#comments Tue, 17 Jan 2012 22:28:53 +0000 Matthew http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4435
In my last PPC Tuesday I spoke briefly about offer extensions, but I’d like to dig deeper and share some of my observations about the extension. Currently in limited release, offer extensions allow you to show an additional line of text within your search network ads that showcase a specific offer. These offers can include coupons, discounts and more. In the example above the specific offer is “20% off green lava lamps.” When this “View offer” link is clicked the searcher should theoretically be taken to a page that presents the green lava lamp selection with clear messaging of “20% off.” Another example of “view offer” messaging could be something like “Take 10% off with code TEN” which would take a user to a page that clearly shows the coupon code and how to redeem.

The offer can also be redeemed in-store. If you choose to do so you can create a Google hosted landing page which will act as a redeemable coupon. The user can print this coupon and use at the brick and mortar store. By utilizing the in-store coupon redemption, store owners can see how effective AdWords is in bringing foot traffic to the actual store location. With either option you set a start and end date.

One of the early benefits I’ve found with offer extensions is that they improve overall ad headline click-thru-rate. Similar to other extensions, the added search real estate doesn’t necessarily mean more clicks for that particular extension, but it does help to persuade users to click the ad headline. I believe the improved ad headline click-thru-rate occurs for a couple of reasons:

Uniqueness – Offer extensions are still in beta and are only being used by a select number of advertisers, thus ads utilizing this extension stand out because they are unique. Though users may not click the link for the particular offer they see that this ad differs from the rest on the page. Whether it be curiosity or a subconscious need to differ from the norm, users are clicking that ad’s particular headline, which leads into reason #2…

Credibility – When an ad takes up more real estate the advertiser can be seen as more credible. The searcher might ask, “Why is this ad the only one that has an additional line of text?” or “How come other ads don’t contain specific offers?” In one sense, the more real estate you occupy and the increased emphasis on specific offers can make your ads (and the associated brand) that much more authoritative.

One interesting thought related to offer extensions is the notion of individual campaign setup. In other words, does it make sense to craft campaigns around specific offers? For example, let’s say I sell Levi’s clothing. Normally, I might create a “Levi’s” branded campaign with ad groups around jeans, khakis, denim jackets and shirts. With offer extensions I can say something like “All jeans 15% off.” This offer is certainly relevant to this campaign, but if someone is searching for “levi’s denim jackets” this offer might not be the most applicable, however, there is the opportunity for cross selling knowing the search is brand specific. I could also create an individual campaign for “Levi’s Jeans” where this offer would be applicable for most if not all of the searches. At this point I haven’t tested this notion but essentially, each specific offer has the ability to influence how campaigns are setup.

If you would like to get offer extensions setup in your account I recommend sending an email to Google via the AdWords Help Center. There is no guarantee of getting your account whitelisted for this feature, but it is worth a shot.

*Image courtesy of http://liveinthephilippines.com ]]>

]]> http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-adwords-offer-extensions.html/feed 0 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-negative-keywords.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-negative-keywords.html#comments Tue, 10 Jan 2012 17:24:13 +0000 Brian http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4411
Negative Keywords Allow You to Filter What Searches Trigger Your Keywords, so by using them you can ensure that the right ads are showing for the right searches.

Negative keywords are included in your campaign by adding a minus sign in front of the keywords you would like to filter out, and you can use them at the ad group or campaign level.

Setting up negative keywords is fairly easy and can be accomplished using the following 4 steps:

1. Determine which level in which to exclude a keyword, be it at the AdGroup or Campaign level. Depending on the messaging in which you want to target you may want to exclude certain terms from being shown in one AdGroup but shown in another. However excluding keywords at the campaign level would override any settings you have for a particular AdGroup within that campaign.
2. Once you determine at which level you will exclude terms, the next step is to do some keyword research for targeted terms. One great area I believe to do so is by looking at Search Query reports during the past 3-6 months for terms that were entered that generated unwanted clicks to your campaigns.
3. Once you’ve identified keywords to exclude, the next step would be to use the Google Keyword tool to come up with different variations of the targeted keywords using all match types. The more variations you can find the better as it increases your chances of eliminating any wasteful impressions to an unqualified audience.
4. Finally once you’ve determined the keywords to implement as negatives along with the different variations implement them into either AdWords and/or AdCenter. Depending on the traffic those terms originally clicked for you, it can take as little as a day to as long as a week to see the impact made to your campaigns as a result of utilizing this feature.

So you heard about Negative Keywords, why to use them and how to set them up. Here are the benefits of using this option to optimize PPC performance for your brand:

1. Because you are excluding your ads from being shown for particular searches, you are thereby decreasing the chance of having impressions served on a more unqualified audience.
2. As a result of this, a more qualified audience will be shown your ad. Thereby with the fewer impressions you will see a higher click through rate on those impressions. Now that your ad aren’t appearing on unrelated queries, people will be more inclined to click on it.
3. Your conversion rate will increase. Your offering is now more relevant to the search term, so you should see this go up.
4. Your cost-per-conversion will go down. Your clicks are now of higher quality and your conversions are increasing. This will ensure your cost-per-click decreases.
5. Lastly as a result of this you will have lower overall PPC costs which in most cases with the rise in conversions and revenue will lead to a higher Return on Ad Spend.

In closing, the use of Negative Keywords is something we at Exclusive Concepts strongly believe and is one of the things we look for when we audit a prospective client’s PPC account. In addition when we take on a new client that is one of the first things we look to do in optimizing a client’s PPC structure. ]]>

]]> http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-negative-keywords.html/feed 0 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-3-ppc-predictions-for-2012.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-3-ppc-predictions-for-2012.html#comments Tue, 03 Jan 2012 15:37:44 +0000 Matthew http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4396
My first prediction has to do with ad extensions, but let’s look back for a minute. In 2011 AdWords rolled out a couple new ad extensions in beta. The first feature is known as the communication ad extension where directly within an ad are 2 fields for you to enter your email address and name and subscribe to that site’s newsletter immediately. Alternatively, some ads show “Request Call” and “Request Email” links if you wish to be contacted by the advertiser. With the communication ad extension advertisers can capture conversions without a user clicking to the website, though, I’m sure a cost will be setup for this form of lead generation. James Svoboda of webranking.com does an excellent job explaining all of the details of the communication ad extension if you would like more information about this feature - http://www.webranking.com/blog/communication-ad-extensions-for-google-adwords

The second beta rolled out in 2011 was the offer extension where advertisers can put redeemable offers within search network ads including coupons, discounts and more. The offer can be redeemed online or in-store. With in-store redemption a user is taken to a Google hosted landing page after clicking the “View offer” link. The offer can either be printed or saved.

With the addition of these 2 extensions we’re now up to 9 AdWords extensions that can enhance your ads:

• Location
• Product
• Sitelinks
• Call
• Social
• Dynamic Search Ads
• Seller Ratings
• Communication
• Offer

3 of the extensions are in limited release (dynamic search ads, communication and offer) while 1 (the seller rating extension) is achieved through receiving at least thirty 4 or more star reviews in Google Product Search. I predict that as we progress in 2012 more of these extensions will be available to all advertisers while we’ll also see new extensions appear as Google continues to make ads more interactive and informative.

My second prediction speaks to Google’s Search Partner Network, which I wrote about in October:
http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-the-google-search-partner-network.html

Currently you cannot exclude search partner sites in AdWords. Sites like AOL, eBay and Amazon are all part of the Search Partner network. It is nice that your ads show on these sites, but it would be even better if you could pick and choose the sites you want to target. Instead, you either opt into the whole Search Partner network or none of it. In fact, Google does not share its search partners, thus negating any granular reporting. MSN adCenter does allow you the ability to run a publisher performance report to view data related to specific Search Partner sites. You can then exclude partners who are performing poorly. You can exclude these sites by going into your campaign settings and clicking the “Exclusions” link.

I predict that Google will relent and allow some control over the Search Partner network. I don’t believe Google will share its search partners, but I can see them segmenting by vertical. It may be that Google gives you the opportunity to opt into 10 verticals, but you can exclude your ads from showing on select ones. For example, if you sell televisions you can opt into the “Entertainment” and “Recreation” verticals, but not the “Home & Garden” network. There would be a bit more transparency, but Google does not need to reveal the specific search partners.

My third PPC prediction for 2012 is that we will see plenty of change and updates within the industry which will force us to adapt and adjust strategies as necessary, which is a good thing! On January 1, 2011 I had a different perception of how to create and optimize PPC campaigns than I do now. Granted, the fundamentals of PPC are the same as they were 365 days ago, but in 2011 we were introduced to:

• Extended ad headlines
• Modified broad match, which was technically introduced in 2010 but really took off in 2011
• Top vs Others report showing that top ads have much higher click-thru-rates than side or bottom ads
• Greater emphasis and features within the Display Network More ad extensions

I can say with almost 100% confidence that we will all need to adapt our PPC strategy throughout the year to accommodate the ever changing PPC landscape. ]]>

]]> http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-3-ppc-predictions-for-2012.html/feed 2 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-post-holiday-ppc-remarketing.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-post-holiday-ppc-remarketing.html#comments Tue, 27 Dec 2011 14:23:40 +0000 Brian http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4379
This can be stated as well online, as according to Google 97% of new visitors do not convert the first time they arrive at your site. However through the use of remarketing you can increase your chances the second time around that those visitors who left your site come back and ultimately convert. With online marketing you can still have that opportunity through the use of Remarketing.

With remarketing a site is able to communicate with people who've previously visited key pages on their website but did not perform a conversion, be it a purchase, lead generation form fill, or email signup. This gives you another way to match the right people with the right message. By doing so the end result will be higher conversions and in some cases revenue for your campaigns.

For example, if you have keywords that you don't use because you haven't seen conversions in the past, you can use these keywords to drive traffic to your site, then use remarketing on the Google Display Network to capture incremental conversions from a more qualified set of potential customers.

This gives you another way to match the right people with the right message. By doing so the end result will be higher conversions and revenue for your campaigns.

This can also be another way to utilize some under converting keywords. You can use those keywords that drove traffic to your site to use remarketing to capture incremental conversions from a more qualified set of potential customers.

When thinking about the benefits that Remarketing brings, I think of the following four areas:

1. Through the promotions you have out in your remarketing ads, you increase the awareness for your brand. The “billboard” effect if you will. Those who go to the site and then later see the ad on another site will remind them to search for that brand when the user goes to search for that particular product offering.
2. The messaging can be tailored around the targeted group or the behavioral statistics of the audience. This can vary by people who do general searches for a theme that is related to a client’s product.
3. By doing this you prevent those customers who initially bounced from your site to go to another competitor site and making their transaction there. By coming up with enticing offers and promotions you can persuade those to come back to your site to give it another shot.
4. Lastly by doing this you not only secure new customers but more importantly you build upon the loyalty of your existing customers, ensuring higher retention and lower attrition.

So for those who are interested in testing out a Remarketing campaign, I would follow the following four steps:

1. Determine which area to target, be it people who just visit your homepage or a particular part of your page that can benefit from a remarketing campaign.
2. Create target remarketing campaigns based on the areas of the site. This can be those who visit the confirmation page, shopping cart, a landing page through a PPC ad. Google AdWords has a very easy to follow process in how to set this up.
3. Enable tracking coding from these campaign segments on targeted pages to gather a database of prospects in which to serve these remarketing ads and offers to.
4. Once the campaign accrues enough visitors in the database in which to remarket, in most cases being 500 at the minimum then activate the campaign and monitor to see what conversion activity transpires as a result.

This is a quick example of the use and benefit of Remarketing for a travel client that I worked on. Through spending $9k in Remarketing in one month they were able to generate an additional $115k in direct click and post impression revenue, accounting for a Return on Ad Spend of over 1,000% and representing 20% of their total SEO & PPC revenue.

This was a situation in which 1/5 of their revenue would have been otherwise lost had they not had Remarketing setup to accompany their PPC campaigns. This is a initiative that will help more than hurt, so don’t let this lost revenue past you by! ]]>

]]> http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-post-holiday-ppc-remarketing.html/feed 0 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-holiday-hangover-post-holiday-ppc-opportunities.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-holiday-hangover-post-holiday-ppc-opportunities.html#comments Tue, 20 Dec 2011 15:50:30 +0000 Kevin http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4359
You did it!

But as you are relaxing and enjoying seeing family you haven’t seen what seems like forever for the holidays, you should have a thought. What do I do now?

Taking cues from the brick and mortar traditions of after-holiday sale events, online retailers should be considering the same.

Often time January can be a successful month for businesses and we should take the opportunity to ensure that it will be.

By utilizing PPC, online stores can promote year-end sales, exclusive offers, and more. All of which can be done with some fresh ad copy to resonate with the shopper’s and their frame of mind.

Consumers are looking for deals. Actually consumers are looking for steals!

Often times people receive one too many pairs of socks and start to look for what they really wanted this past holiday. This provides online businesses to use PPC ad placement to ensure that your ads are being seen by the right pairs of eyes.

So here’s some tips for the next month:

First off, consider keeping your Holiday budgets where they are. While many PPC advertisers may turn them back down, keep in mind that there will still be larger than normal search volume.

Second, with the budget remaining the same use that flexibility to ensure optimal ad positioning. Remember these are still highly motivated shoppers still in prime buying mode.

And finally, with that positioning you will want to make sure your ad copy speaks to the audience. As I referenced in the last slide, take the opportunity to promote year-end sales, exclusive site offers, and more. Take some time to see what your competitors are saying and look for ways to make your ad copy stand out from the rest

Of course, with everything you will need to do what’s best for your business. PPC allows you to make changes quickly so you can test these tips and make them work for you and your needs. ]]>

]]> http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-holiday-hangover-post-holiday-ppc-opportunities.html/feed 0 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-google-adwords-extensions.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-google-adwords-extensions.html#comments Tue, 13 Dec 2011 15:10:00 +0000 Matthew http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4318
It is important to note that extensions help you take up more search real estate and further emphasize your brand and products/services. At Exclusive Concepts we have found that though the actual extensions themselves don’t always have high click-thru-rates, the ad headline tends to get clicked more due to the presence of the extra messaging and thus improves overall ad click-thru-rates.

The first extension I’m going to discuss today is Sitelinks. Sitelinks allow you the ability to add additional, relevant links to your ads. 1 – 6 sitelinks can show at any time and give searchers an option for their landing page. Generally, sitelinks work best on branded searchers as the search is more ambiguous in nature. In the image above, a search for “Best Buy” reveals 7 potential links to click (including the headline). I may have just been looking to get to Best Buy’s homepage, but now I have the option of checking out “epic deals,” “perfect gift ideas” and more.

Sitelinks can show in 3 formats: stackable below the ad, horizontally below the ad and embedded within the ad. The first 2 formats are the most common and will only show in the top ads position while embedded sitelinks can show in the right or bottom ads.

The product extension allows you to connect your Google Merchant Center feed with your AdWords account and show relevant product images and prices below your ads. The images above showcase the product selection for “nike shoes.” It is important to note that the searcher must first click the plus box link before seeing the images. However, when expanded these images take up much more real estate and push that much more product in front of the searcher.

Similar to how business locations can show up in the organic listings, you can connect your Google Places account to AdWords. If I’m looking for Crate & Barrel locations near me I can see addresses and locations on the map. Just like the product extension searchers will need to click the drop down link to see the addresses and search for additional locations. An address can also show directly below the ad without the dropdown link. To distinguish the source of a Google Places listing, AdWords denotes the location pin in blue while it is red in organic searches.

The fourth extension speaks to phone calls. There are 2 components to the call extension that will help drive phone calls to your business. The first is the ability to have a clickable number show on a high end mobile device so the user can tap your phone number to call you. This feature is especially handy for searchers on the go who want to get in touch with you quickly. The second feature allows you to put a dynamic phone number into your ad without taking up any characters. The phone number is generated by Google and is placed in the proximity of your ad. When called, this phone number will redirect to the company’s number. You are then able to view how many calls came in within the “Dimensions” tab. You can also see how long each call lasted and from what area code the call originated.

Note that all of these calls occur pre click. In other words, visitors call the phone number before ever going to the site. To see if AdWords ads are driving phone calls once someone gets to your site you will need to look into call tracking software.

The most recently released extension, the social extension, allows companies to hook up their Google+ page with their AdWords account. All +1’s will now be in sync with AdWords. So no matter if someone has +1’d an organic listing or a website page, this recommendation will now be visible next to that companies’ ad.

If you’d like to learn more about AdWords extensions check out Google’s help center. The link to the help center is below:

https://support.google.com/adwords/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=141826 ]]>

]]> http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-google-adwords-extensions.html/feed 0 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-ppc-over-the-holidays.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-ppc-over-the-holidays.html#comments Tue, 06 Dec 2011 16:15:47 +0000 Brian http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4294
It’s that Ho-Ho-Holiday Season! With most retailers this past Black Friday season opening up as early as midnight to meet the rush, 2011 saw a record year in Black Friday sales over the weekend.

According to the National Retail Foundation a record $52.4 billion dollars was spent on the Post-Thanksgiving/Black Friday weekend, up 16% from the same time period last year. This came as people were preparing for upcoming online deals to be taking place on Cyber Monday.

How did this translate then to Cyber Monday? With the rising popularity of Cyber Monday promotions to accompany Black Friday deals, ecommerce sites saw an opportunity to make more of a return using various online promotions. The result, according to Performics was a 128% increase in spend leading to an 87% increase in clicks on Thanksgiving. This resulted in a 18% increase in online sales. Cyber Monday saw a 65% increase in clicks resulting in a 26% increase in sales, making it the heaviest online spending day thus far this year.

So how do we utilize PPC therefore to build upon these successes as we move forward into December?

Following these 4 steps will give you a great chance to further increase your numbers and put a positive end to your last quarter.

1. Determine your offers: Analyze all offers out there, be it historically from what you may have offered the year before or looking at your competition to see what they are doing. Offers during the holiday season can vary by type, be it a discounted percentage off, free shipping, a combination of the two, or even a free gift with an order.
2. Once you determine your offers, the next step is to identify your opportunities to promote your offer. With Green Monday taking place on December 12th, this is a great opportunity in which to showcase your current or promotional offer in an attempt to get a piece of this pie on this day. In this time, it’s usually best to go with quantity rather than quality, so offering an incentive to purchase can make the difference between a sale occurring or the shopper bouncing from your site.
3. Once those promotional offers have been determined, the next plan is to research and come up with relevant keywords and targeted ad copy to attract your intended shoppers.
• Having high search but medium to low competitive terms are ideal, but another option is to again look historically at search query reports during the same time last year to see terms that converted that may be an ideal option to use this year.
• Once the keywords are selected, creating ad copy that is relevant to all types of holiday terms showing the incentive and having a strong call to action will help the visitor click to shop your site.
4. The last step above all else is to make sure your landing page that the shopper clicks to is setup in a way to convert the shopper into a buyer. PPC alone will not make the difference. While it will bring people to your site, it will not guarantee a conversion. This time of year people don’t have the time or patience so you have to ensure that the page landed on is relevant, appealing and easy to use. This is important as not having that could lead to a loss in potential sales.

This is an undertaking that takes both time and money. If run correctly it will result in profitable times for your business during this holiday season. The key is to be true to your brand, think like your customer and give offers and incentives to people to visit your site. And above all else make the site experience easy, interactive and fun for the customer.

This could be the on-going trend in future holidays to come in terms of how Santa does his holiday shopping. ]]>

]]> http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-ppc-over-the-holidays.html/feed 0 http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-new-adwords-updates.html http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/ppc-tuesday-new-adwords-updates.html#comments Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:13:45 +0000 Matthew http://www.exclusiveconcepts.com/blog/?p=4272
There is also better +1 reporting as you can now segment by +1 annotations. These annotations are broken out according to “personal” and “basic” +1’s. A personal annotation occurs when a searcher sees an ad that someone from one of his/her circles has +1’d. The basic annotation occurs when a searcher sees a recommended ad, but that +1 did not come from anyone in his/her circles.

The next update is an enhancement to product listing ads, or PLAs. Normally, PLAs show in the top right corner of the search results with a maximum of three showing at a time. AdWords is now also showcasing up to five PLAs vertically within the top ads section. Remember that PLAs aren’t driven by keyword bids, but rather a default ad group bid and if you choose to more granular product targets. Your bid had to take into consideration more competitive products with only three listings. The new format is still competitive, but there are two additional listings in the auction.

At Exclusive we’ve seen great results with PLAs so the announcement that up to five ads will now be showing in the top ads section is exciting.

The third update is a new ad placement as paid ads can now show below the organic listings. According to Google’s testing, ads showing below the organic listings had better click-thru-rates than those to the right. The idea being that scanning the search results page top to bottom better fits the searchers’ flow. If this format looks familiar you are right as it is also used in Yahoo. It is important to note that when bottom ads show side ads do not, which is why the “Top vs. Side” report has been changed to “Top vs. Other.”

Of the three updates I’m most excited about the top ad PLAs. This ad placement will allow advertisers utilizing a shopping feed to further showcase their products in a section that historically gets a much higher click-thru-rate (compared to side ads). I’m also interested to see how impactful bottom ads are. Will we see better click-thru-rates than we see on side ads? Only time will tell. ]]>

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