PixelMEDIA Inc.

As “Web Analytics” becomes an increasingly hot topic in our digital world, there seems to be more and more confusion about what it really means and why it is important.  Web Analytics is currently the most effective way you can measure whether your web properties are performing successfully.  Haven’t you always wanted a concrete answer to the question, “How is our website doing?”  Well, that is exactly what web analytics can tell you.

If you have already started down the web analytics path, it is important to note that there will be preconceived notions about Web Analytics that may take considerable effort to adjust.  Senior management may already be keeping an eye on website traffic, page views, or bounce rates, but those numbers are only important in light of your business goals and website objectives.

For example, a client of ours routinely provided website visit data to senior management, who relied on this information to measure the ROI of their corporate website.  If  traffic was going up, everyone was happy, but when traffic was trending down, the site was thought to be underperforming.  Yet, their business was not driven by site visits, but by sales, which are measured in submitted leads from the various forms.  A well-targeted search engine marketing campaign may actually bring fewer, but better qualified leads.  If site traffic goes down, but sales increase; management should be pleased – but they won’t see the gains if they are not paying attention to the right metrics. 

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Google AdWords has recently added three new features to the paid platform. Two of the features are still in beta and only available to select advertisers, but all three help to bring better targeted ads to users. John A. Lee of The Clix Marketing PPC Blog does a good job of explaining these new features.

The new feature I am going to discuss is Ad Sitelinks.  Similar to the sitelinks you see in an organic listing, the paid Sitelinks allow four additional links to show within your ad.  Take the example below:

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I am going back to the basics with this entry and discussing how to write text ads that will garner clicks. Too often I see ineffective ad copy that leads to low click-thru-rates (CTRs). I will share why it is necessary to include your targeted keywords in your ad copy and techniques to make your ads stand out.

First and foremost, when you write ads “one size fits all” does not apply. Why not? Let’s take a look at this example. When I search for “Panasonic televisions” I see these ads.

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In my experience managing pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns, a frequently overlooked topic is the landing page.  Once your users click your ad, where are they going to go?  Setting up a structurally sound campaign is imperative, but it is only half the equation.  The user needs to land on a page that continues the messaging and call to action that is used in the ad.

Several factors go into creating a good landing page, none of which should be ignored.  These techniques will determine how many of your clicks turn into conversions.  Conversion rate, as I have previously written about, is a tier one success indicator of how well your campaign is doing.  Give your users an effective landing page, and you should see your conversion rates increase.

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Google AdWords offers many great reports to help you determine the success of your pay-per-click (PPC) campaign.  I’ve already discussed the benefits of the Search Query Performance report, but today I’m going to discuss the importance of the Geographic Performance report.

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Pay-per-click (PPC) is a highly competitive advertising platform. With more and more companies signing up for PPC campaigns every day, advertisers have to bid higher—not only be within the top three positions of the sponsored listings, but to be on the first page of results. Though bid position is not solely based on the maximum amount of money you are willing to spend per click (also known as maximum cost-per-click, or CPC), it is one of the key components. The conundrum: how much you are willing to bid for your ads to show up as close to the top of the listings as possible?

Your budget plays a huge role in how much you are willing to bid, but other factors come into play as well. Among these are the importance of each targeted keyword to your campaign, the way the ad copy is written, and the landing page of each ad. Here’s a look at each of these factors in greater detail:

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Following up on my last post, an immensely valuable resource that can further hone the success of your pay-per-click (PPC) campaign is the Search Query Performance report.  Often overlooked, this report provides valuable information that can ultimately increase the ROI and the number of conversions in your campaign.

The Search Query Performance report shows you actual terms that users have typed in to see your ads.  You are also able to see metrics, such as conversions, clicks, costs, and impressions, for each of these terms.  For example, if you are bidding on the phrase match of the term “office furniture,” you will be able to see what terms trigger your ads.  You will find that some users type in this exact term, while others are also typing in such phrases as “large office furniture” or “wooden office furniture.”  Remember, you are bidding on the phrase match of “office furniture,” so these other queries will also trigger your ads.

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ROI, CPA, CTR, CPC…these are all metrics that you can use to evaluate your pay-per-click (PPC) campaign.  The amount of data available to you can be overwhelming (so can the acronyms, defined below).  The challenge is determining which of these are true key performance indicators (KPIs) and why they matter.

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Recently, I was asked what to do when a pay-per-click (PPC) campaign has been running for a few months with no hiccups. In other words, what optimizations do you make to the campaign when it is running smoothly and providing good results? My reply was to continually test new things as your campaign can always perform better. Here are a few items I like to try:

• Vary the letter cases
• Try different calls to action (CTA)
• Add more keywords throughout the campaign
• Test different variations of landing pages

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In my experience, pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns have the highest ROI when users see ads containing the exact term searched for. Dynamic keyword insertion (DKI) is a method to ensure that the user search query will match the text seen in a PPC ad. As long as you are bidding on the keyword that the user types in and it is under the character limit, the user’s search query will show up in the ad exactly.

For example, if you type in the term “coffee tables” you would expect to see ads that contain “coffee tables” within the text. In fact, terms that users search for are bolded when they show up in ads to ensure users’ eyes are immediately drawn to these ads. Most likely the ads will be more relevant to the query, making DKI a very powerful tool to increase click-thru-rate (CTR).

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