By Ty Alyea, Director of Search Marketing Product at Service Direct.
Buying clicks is one of the best ways to promote your business online. Of course, you probably knew that already. Google Ads is one of the most popular marketing channels of the 21st century, with businesses of all shapes and sizes racking up significant ad spend daily.
But are you getting the most out of your ad campaigns? Maybe not. By leveraging the power of responsive search ads, you may be able to reach a wider audience while maximizing the impact of your marketing dollars at the same time.
Considering Responsive Search Ads
We understand that there can be some skepticism involved in trying responsive ads for the first time. In fact, we shared those same emotions. Since you have put so much time and effort into developing your marketing skill, it can be hard to turn over some of the control to a computer.
So, what’s our advice? Just give it a try. We recently ran a beta test running RSAs with select campaigns. In short, our Campaigns with RSAs increased impressions by 243% and increased Conversion Rates by 5%. As a marketing service that generates leads for our clients via digital advertising, but on a pay per lead basis, improving conversion rates just but a small percentage has a huge impact on our business.
But, even if you only run a small campaign, that will likely be enough to demonstrate the power of this technology. Once you see the benefits it can deliver, you’ll naturally want to dig deeper. We were able to achieve a huge increase in overall impressions while bumping up our conversion rate slightly at the same time. That’s a powerful combination and one that can mean big things for your business.
When you are ready to make the jump, use these three basic tips to point yourself in the right direction.
Feature Your Strengths
This first tip isn’t going to stray too far from the familiar. In marketing, you always want to play up your strengths to highlight why customers should choose you over the competition. And the story is no different here. With so many businesses running Google Ads, be sure to touch on exactly what it is that makes you unique.
As it relates to responsive ads specifically, including as many strengths as possible in your ad copy will give Google plenty to work with. Google is going to be pairing up various headline phrases and description lines to come up with an effective ad. You want to feed that machine as much good material as you can.
For instance, imagine that your strong customer reviews are a main selling point for your business. That’s great! But it’s not enough for a solid responsive ad campaign. Think about other reasons customers should choose you, such as experience, prices, turnaround time, customer service, etc. With a powerful mix of core strengths to pick from, it will be easier for Google’s computers to compile a powerful ad message.
Don’t Obsess Over CTR
In the internet marketing world, click through rate is an important metric. Many marketers track this number closely, wanting to maximize their percentage of clicks for each impression. We aren’t here to argue that it isn’t important, but keep in mind that there are other data points that may be a better indicator of your success.
Think about it this way – what do you want to happen as a result of placing your search ads? Most likely, you have a type of conversion in mind, whether it is a sale, joining a mailing list, or something else. If you are getting plenty of people to convert, who cares about CTR?
By utilizing RSAs, you will likely place your ads in front of a much larger audience, and your CTR may decline as a result. However, if your conversion rate holds steady – or even bumps up as was the case for us – you’ll still be in good shape. You can still strive to keep your CTR as high as possible, but don’t let a dip in this number dissuade you from using RSAs.
Test Your Results
You may find some exciting results by using RSAs. But you don’t have to be content with taking a completely hands-off approach – you can still perform tests and try to optimize even further. After all, there is no such thing as a perfect marketing campaign, so you will always be able to take a step forward.
One simple idea is to track the performance of your various RSAs and grab the one that is beating out all the rest. Then, create that same ad in a traditional format. As you move forward with RSAs, you can see how well-performing ads in the future compare to the one you’ve already identified as a winner. Continue on with this process and you are bound to track down a collection of outstanding ads that can drive affordable conversions to your site.
Although responsive search ads are a relatively new, and high-tech, way to track down customers, the basics of marketing never change. You need to offer value to your customers, and you need to be able to explain that value. Keep working to hit on those two essential points and responsive search ads from Google can aid in creating an even more effective marketing campaign.
Ty Alyea is Director of Search Marketing Product at Service Direct, where he is responsible for creating and managing thousands of digital ad campaigns across hundreds of local service industries for 1,000+ clients across North America. He has an M.A. and PhD from the University of Texas at Austin.
