Search Engine Marketing (SEM) with Google Adwords Account Setup A thorough account setup will ensure that your search engine marketing efforts are on a solid framework. This ensures the campaigns, ad groups and keywords that comprise your account are all working to meet your business needs.
Organization Defining your business needs Develop a comprehensive understanding of your core business needs, and the goals of your online advertising. What do you offer? How is it different than your competitors? What do you want to achieve with your advertising? Who is your core audience? Where do you provide products / services? Developing the campaigns Campaigns are structured around specific themes and/or products that you offer. Each campaign will customized based upon: Goals (i.e. increasing sign-ups, selling more products, developing brand awareness, etc...) Target location / language Display network Daily spend limit Splitting each campaign into ad groups. Just like campaigns, each ad group is focused on a single theme or product within a general product category. This makes it easier to create targeted keywords and focused ad copy. Coffee Co. example :
Keywords List List as many keywords that relate the campaign themes as possible. What would you search for if you were using a search engine to find your products? Group With the keywords listed, they are placed into relevant groups known as ad groups. Having ad groups based on specific themes or similar products makes it easier to write ad copy that is compelling and corresponds directly to those keywords. Refine With the keywords placed into their appropriate ad groups, they are refined to eliminate ones that are too generic, too specific, or irrelevant to the business needs. Keyword matching is then set to determine how a user triggers the ads: Broad match: will reach the largest audience as the ads will display whenever a user searches for the keywords and/or variations of the keywords Phrase match: narrows the ad reach by only displaying when the users search query contains the keyword(s) as they are listed in the ad group. Additional may come before or after the keywords and still trigger the ad. Exact match: narrows the reach even further by only displaying the ad when a user searches for the exact keyword(s) as they are listed in the ad groups. Negative match: will prevent the ad from displaying if certain words are included in the user's search query
Ads Composing the headline The most effective headlines are ones that related directly to the keywords that are being searched for. This demonstrates relevancy to the searcher and increases the likelihood the ad will be clicked. 25 characters in length Keyword match listed in bold Keyword insertion for increased relevancy Writing compelling copy The descriptive text (or copy) for each ad should speak to the key benefits of the theme or product of the ad group, and contain a compelling call to action. 2 lines of descriptive text 35 characters in length (per line) Keyword match listed in bold Keyword insertion for increased relevancy Designating display and destination URLs The display URL, which is what users see below the descriptive text, does not have to match the destination URL, which is where the user is taken once they click the ad. 35 character limit Keyword insertion can be used to increase relevancy Keyword match listed in bold Keyword insertion for increased relevancy Destination and display URL domain must match
Search Engine Marketing with Google Adwords Cont. Account Optimization An Adwords account should be regularly monitored and revised to maintain optimal performance. This ensures that campaigns keep up with a continuously changing business landscape. Factors such as seasonality, customer trends/behaviors, and competitor advertising all affect SEM results.
Performance Maximizing Monitoring campaign results Daily monitoring of the campaign will ensure that keywords and phrases are being properly triggered, ad copy and keyword insertion are displaying properly, and daily spend thresholds are providing a return on investment. Revising for continuous performance Once the campaign is in full swing, it is important to actively review and revise the campaign, ad groups and keywords so that they are performing at optimal levels. This involves: Eliminating low quality and expensive keywords Expanding high performing keywords Allocating the budget towards high performing ad groups A/B split testing ad copy, bids, placement and delivery to increase conversion rates Reporting key metrics Each month, a customized report will be issued that will detail the key performance metrics associated with the Adwords account. It will include statistics for items such as average cost per click, number of clicks and conversions per click. Reported monthly Average CPC Daily spend Conversion rate Display network Number of clicks Number of impressions
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Keyword Research The foundational piece of SEO, which will determine the keywords that users are typing into search engines, how relevant they are to your business objectives, the frequency at which they are being searched, and their relative competitiveness.
Keyword Analysis Brainstorming What products / services do you offer? Where do you offer them? How might customers refer to, and search for, these products / services? Attributes Determine the relevance, demand, and competition for the keywords that are to be targeted with a focus on long-tail keywords (2-3 words) for higher relevancy and lower competition. Do the chosen keywords accurately reflect the nature of the products / services that you offer? The number of searchers per month for a particular keyword The number of other websites competing for a particular keyword or phrase Categorization Develop groups of similar topics, product categories, or themes for the chosen keywords. Wine Co. example :
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Cont. Site Optimization Improving the quality and relevancy of the site by optimizing its textual and non-textual elements, and promoting usergenerated content.
Content Optimization Contextual elements Optimizing the contextual (text-based) and HTML elements on your site will improve the page rank within search engine results pages and provide a more relevant experience for users searching for the targeted keywords. Uniform Resource Locator (URL) Title Tags Meta Descriptions <h1> through <h6> heading tags Page content Image source and alternative attributes Non-contextual elements Optimizing your sites non-contextual content including images, videos, audio files and.pdf s will help search engines better understand the content and index it for search engine results pages. Optimizing before-and-after contextual elements Micro-formatting HTML meta data markup Video specific XML sitemap files Content Curation Defining and understanding your target audience Who are the people that you would want to be visiting your site? Develop customer profiles Fill in the gaps not provided by competitors Compose blogs, how-to s, before-and-after, videos and image slideshows Promote user generated content and social sharing
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Cont. Link Building Internal and external links provide search engines with information about the context and organization of your page content, and its relative authority.
Link Optimization Internal links Internal linking helps search engines understand the structure, topic and relative importance of content within your site. Navigation links Contextual links Anchor text Link Building External links External, or inbound, links from other websites inform search engines about your sites relative authority. The more inbound links your site has from relevant, authoritative and industry-specific pages, the higher your sites page rank will be in search engine results pages. Qualified web directories Industry-specific pages Local pages Social sharing Competitor back links Analyzing the back links, or the external links of other sites that competing for the same keywords that your site is attempting to rank for. Sites with high page rank and domain authority Guest blogging / content curation Educational outreach
Pricing - SEM Three unique pricing plans, all of which include comprehensive account setup and monthly optimization best practices. Pro $399 account setup + $349 per month Premium $699 account setup + $649 per month Deluxe $699 account setup + $949 per month Campaign 1 3 8 Ad groups 3 6 10 Keywords up to 30 up to 100 up to 200 Dynamic keyword insertion Make your ads more relevant by customizing the copy to match the user's search query Conversion tracking Track the actions of a user after they click your ad Monthly reporting Metrics that help you stay on top of your account s budget & performance Ad extensions Enhance your ads with phone #, address, images & pricing Custom bid type Maximize ROI with manual CPC bids for every keyword in your account Display ads Expand your advertising reach with image & video ads A/B split testing Optimize your account with real time keyword, bid, ad & placement experiments
Pricing - SEO Three unique pricing plans, all of which include comprehensive keyword analysis, page indexing / directory listing and expansive link building. Pro $399 per month Premium $699 per month Deluxe $999 per month Target Pages up to 10 up to 25 up to 50 Keyword Analysis Evaluate targeted keywords by analyzing their relevancy, frequency and competition. Page Indexing XML sitemaps and robot.txt to top search engines. Custom site submission to authoritative Link Building Enhance page rank and site authority with enhanced internal and external linking Content Optimization Improve the quality and relevance of contextual and non-contextual site elements for greater relevancy of Local Search Increase local visibility with a custom Google+ Local business page complete with photos, videos, and customer Social Sharing Promote user generated content and social sharing with integrated social content promotion Content Curation Develop customer profiles, define content types and industry short-falls, implement curation schedule.