Month: January 2016

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If Your Desired Metric is Increased Impressions Use AdWords DSK

How to Jump Your Impression and Clicks in AdWords.
How to Jump Your Impression and Clicks in AdWords.

If you want branding activity or a large number of impressions and strong click activity in your AdWords account without strong conversion activity AdWords Display Select Keywords is the advertising protocol for you.

With DSK, your AdWords ads will show in on Google.com, on search partner search pages, and also on Google selected sites within their premium display network. The numbers can be big and the quality of sites very good. But, only use DSK if you are not overly concerned about conversions.

I’ve found that for new clients that are transitioning out of Reach Local or other platforms that starting out with DSK advertising gives them the comfort factor as they compare numerical results.

Over time, we want to wean these clients out of the comingled display and search programs and move them into campaigns that target search and separate campaigns that target the display network. This way dollars are funding the location where conversions  happen.

I have found that although DSK can give great numbers for clicks and impressions, typically very few conversions will happen there but as part of a marketing mix for certain clients, exposure can give a good balance of visibility and especially for low budget accounts where Google has not been spending the full daily budget.

If you need help with your AdWords program, make sure to check out our AdWords references and then call at 540-693-0385 to see how we can help optimize your AdWords account today.

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AdWords – The Disconnect Between Traffic and Conversions

Google Partner Badge
McCord Web Services is a Google Partner.

In early 2015 Google AdWords started to boost mobile activity for advertisers. But, in October things really ramped up. Many account owners are now seeing 50 to 66% of their AdWords traffic be served to mobile devices.

Although traffic is strong in the mobile space, there is a clear disconnect between increase traffic on mobile and increased mobile conversion. In fact what I have found is that there is about a 20% gap in performance.  There are fewer leads than sales.

So how do you adjust for this increase in activity but drop in overall conversions?

  1. Assure that your website and store are mobile friendly. If not, the differential you will see this year will continue to be a greater and greater gap.
  2. Review your mobile bid. Use the formula of mobile conversion rate percentage divided by the desktop conversion rate and then take that product and subtract one. Turn that into a percent and drop or increase your bid for mobile by that percentage.
  3. Don’t push too far down on mobile bidding. I’ve found that if you push down too far, your desktop conversion numbers will drop too.
  4. Monitor weekly and more frequently if you are able. Check to  see if you are bleeding cash in mobile and stem the flow before you lose your month.
  5. Mobile is important for lead generation, but will not convert as the same numbers as the traffic that is generated for nearly all (but not every advertiser). Make sure you are evaluating each account and business uniquely.

Mobile advertising is big business for Google and buyers are flocking to mobile to shop and buy, but don’t lose your shirt by not watching your statistics carefully for mobile as well as your cost per click and aggregate ad spend in the mobile space.

If you need a savvy Google AdWords account manager who’s service level is ranked by Google as being in the top 6% of all firms, contact me, Nancy McCord, at McCord Web Services.

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Social Media and Images

Pros and Cons Sign
Should You Add Image to Social Media Updates?

For several of our key clients we are testing out if adding images to Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ posts increases customer engagement. With a visual statement winning out over just pure text, we wanted to find out if adding images to tweets and Facebook posts enhanced engagement?

For Facebook, if you insert an image versus letting Facebook simply import an image from the page content that you link to, you get two things.

  1. A larger image will appear on your Facebook page.
  2. You get to select the image versus only being able to select an image that appears on a page you link to. So you get greater control.

For Twitter, if you insert an image, get ready to re-write your post to that by the time the link is shrunk and the image URL is shrunk as well you have about ten to twelve words of text. That means you’d better have something great to say or you are just making your page look pretty.

This is what I have found out so far:

  1. Having images in Facebook and Twitter updates does make your pages on Facebook.com and Twitter.com look nicer.
  2. But, do images translate into more engagement – so far the answer is no.
  3. What gets engagement is still what you write and not necessarily not even what you link to and not the image you insert.

So content is still king, but having images does make your page look more appealing visually. My recommendation is where meaningful add an image like twice a week on Facebook and every several tweets on Twitter, but I would not recommend putting images into every update. Instead make your updates interesting and you’ll get a higher level of engagement.

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Improved Conversion Performance for Bing Ads

Nancy McCord is a Bing Ads Accredited Member.
Nancy McCord is a Bing Ads Accredited Member.

If you have not checked out Bing Ads for a while, I recommend you look again. Bing Ads has quietly and steadily been making some very nice improvements to their ad platform.

Here are just a few reasons you’ll want to take a new look.

  1. Clients are getting improved conversion performance. We have some clients who have more conversions on Bing Ads than on Google AdWords.
  2. It is very easy to import what you are doing in AdWords into Bing Ads.
  3. Quality has significantly improved this past year making Bing Ads a vital place for many businesses to expand their pay per click marketing.
  4. Although Bing Ads clicks are not cheaper than those on Google AdWords, you may have less competition for top placement; allowing your ads to be seen more readily.
  5. For e-commerce and beauty Bings Ads may actually beat AdWords performance for lead and sale generation.

If you need help trying out Bing Ads, make sure to review our Bing Ads management program and pricing.