What is Pay Per Click advertising (PPC) ?
Basically, it’s paying a search engine to display your ad in front of people when they type in particular words into the web search.
Example: You’re a dentist, you create an advertisement to pop up when people enter words like “dentists near me” “how do I get a filling”
This would be a perfect time to show your ad when people are actively searching keywords. In order to be in front of those dominating competitors that show up on the first page you’ll need to use paid advertising like PPC (google ads). Below is an example of a Google Ad you could display:
If you want to want to be on the first page organically without paid ads you’ll need to work on your SEO (search engine optimization). Being on the first page of google organically means you’ll not need to spend as much on paid advertising as people will naturally click on your website in the search results. To know more about SEO check out or blog here
How does PPC work?
Imagine you have a fashion business and are surrounded by competitor shops. You want to drive sales, so you pay a spruiker to stand outside your shop and entice buyers to come in. You pay a spruiker to say particular words that will get customers into your shop.
The same applies to pay per click advertising, or PPC.
You pay for ads to be placed using key words that customers would be searching for.
Once they click on the link to your website, you pay a fee. You might pay $3.00 for the click but the fashion items they purchased from your enticing online store amounted to $400.00. You may have paid a fee but it’s a sale you might not have had otherwise,
How does Google pay per click advertising look like online?
To see how pay per click works, do a search for anything you might like to buy.
At the top of the search results page ( SERP) are the symbols Ad followed by a dot and a web address.
In the image above you’ll notice they are prompting you to book an appointmentm this is called a CTA or Call To Action statement that grabs the customer’s attention followed by a carefully structured description of the goods using key words that many shoppers use to search.
Pay per click management is used to choose, target and manage the words purchased to appear here.
Have you noticed that the ads are above the regular list of search results? Advertisers pay for these positions by allocating a budget to target these key words so the ad will be displayed to the relevant people at the right time.
It’s like paying for pushing in, but you get to be ahead in the line.
What PPC strategy should I use?
First, work out your average customer purchase.
The choice of PPC campaign needs to be worked out using your average purchase in dollars.
EXAMPLE: if your average purchase is say $30.00, then a pay per click cost of $3.00 would mean you paid for 10% of the sale… but it’s for a customer you may not have had.
If yours is a very competitive market, then you might pay 25% of the sale but you had the sale ahead of your competition.
Remember, you pay for the customer clicking through to your website but then it’s up to the marketing at your website to entice the customer to actually make the sale. The best way is to create high converting landing pages.
To manage pay per click effectively, it is a good idea to engage a PPC marketing company to make money with pay per click.
They can: monitor competition; suggest strategies including timing of the PPC advertising; help you set a budget and monitor customer behaviour to refine each PPC campaign.
Other benefits of PPC advertising:
- A new business ranking above the competition in search engine results
- Brand prominence on the SERP (Search Engine Results Page)
- Customers targeted more directly
- Monitoring campaigns to see which are most effective and continuing with them.
- Increasing market share by being more competitive
- Better customer flow to your website or online store
- Advertising a range of products to your target audience in different ways and platforms
How do I choose a pay per click consultant?
A good pay per click search engine marketing company will look at the whole picture of your business to determine the best way forward.
They will be interested in your website’s capacity to make sales. How it enhances customer experience to boost average sales per customer and check the economy of cost per click.
They will be interested to understand who, why and when your customers want to buy your products and the platforms that would be best to use, be they Google pay per click, Bing, or social media platforms.
They will be sympathetic with your budget but wanting to move your company forward with PPC advertising.
Pay per click advertising is one form of marketing online, but there may be other more effective modes of marketing online for your business. A digital marketing agency such as Hinton Digital can assist you to make these choices for your business and drive sales.
