Tips and Tactics for your AdWords Ad Text Part 2
In today’s post, I will continue to discuss tips and tactics for ad writing pay per click marketing campaigns. Now, keep in mind that there are several great resources on the web for this, and some fantastic articles written by experts. Last post we discussed creating small ad groups to enable the ability to use keywords in ad text, and the tactic of using keywords in the “/” of Display URLs.
The next tips center around the body of the ad itself. Here is where the two campaigns - holiday gift baskets, and plastics manufacturing, bring examples to bear as to where campaign goals have an impact on writing.
Headlines: Don’t forget about headlines. From a usability standpoint, this is what gets your searcher’s attention. We have 25 characters in the headline to stay within. Again, based on my previous posts, using keywords in your headlines is an important tactic to qualify and motivate a user to click. However, sometimes due your competitors, it isn’t that easy when it comes to improving your click through rate. In light of this, use motivational headlines that stand out from our competitors. For gift baskets, “Act Now, Save $20″ can appeal to a consumer. For the plastics manufacturer, “Plastics Molding Experience” may appeal to the purchase engineer or plant manager looking for a trusted partner.
Lines 1 and 2: In our ad lines, we have 35 characters to work with on each, which of course makes the challenge fun. For holiday baskets, ads are crafted against a heavy amount of direct competition. In this environment, where most players are using keywords in their ad text, it is important to differentiate to get a qualified click. Ways to do this in an consumer driven environment would be:
- Including cost
- Phone number
- Any sales or offers: “Holiday Gift Baskets, Act Now to Save %20″
Another way to differentiate in this case is to try to be specific on the details of the product.
“Comany X Gift Baskets”
“Holiday Gift Baskets, wine,
cheese, and tasty chocolate”
The key to this approach to do searches and study your competitor’s ads. (And don’t be malicious and click on them, of course) Just like any advertising, be thinking what will make your “billboard” on the Google highway stand out.
For the plastics manufacturer, it is important to differentiate against your competitors. The goal is entirely different, we are not selling online we are trying to generate a lead. In this case, less energy in the ad is needed, but we still need to stand out. Again, relying in keywords in ad text is very important here, so that we may best resonate with the user. Focusing on your experience, your location, sub segements you reach:
Plastic Molding Company
80 years of plastics exp.
Focused on Medical Suppliers
Some very broad key points before I wrap this post up:
Keywords in your ad text. The most important point that I am driving home and have talked about before on this blog is to use keywords in your ad headline and text. Nothing helps out better qualify and motivate your users to click, as well having a positive impact on Quality Score. If you do nothing else, do this. And in order to do this, you must craft small ad groups with focused sets of keywords. It is very hard to write a relevant ad for a keyphrase “holiday gift baskets” if your ad text is focused on Wine gift baskets.
Writing ads for search engines is challenging, and requires creativity! You must qualify the searcher, motivate them to click, and tell your message all in about 90 characters. And, many times you must do this with competing ads all around you.
Which is why my final point is important: Research and test. These two items are coming up on my next post.
Tips and Tactics for your AdWords Ad Text
Now, either I have been really lazy or really busy — no posts since November 11th? Terrible! Especially when my blogtastic business partner Adam Henige has been posting like crazy. Oh well. Things have been busy at Netvantage, we have several new Pay Per Click campaigns starting this week. Two of the campaigns are in very different sectors - one is for higher end, consumer based, luxury goods, and very seasonal - wine gift baskets. The other is manufacturing based, business to business focused, and is very widgety, for lack of a better term - plastic molding.
There are the obvious advertising thought processes that needs to go into developing and launching this campaign: audience targeting, audience personas and associated keyword selection, product mix, landing pages, bid amounts, you know the usual. However, despite the massive differences in the two campaigns, there are some definite similarities. And one of those is in the make up of the ad text.
As you consider your search marketing campaigns, an often overlooked component is ad text. I spoke of it at the Google 101 event in October, and it is important. Ad text in structured for your target audiences for your search results pages is tricky. All engines, Google included, have character limits on each of the lines for headlines, ad text, and display URLs. Some basics:
Use keywords within ad text. And to do this, create ad groups with a low number of keyphrases. As I covered in my horrible stab at Halloween humor in the attack of the Adblob, large ad groups in your campaigns do not lend themselves to well written ads. So that is tip number one, and the most important for running good foundational campaigns, not use writing good ads. Use small ad groups to give yourself the opporutnity to write ads that incorporate your keywords. Remember, as keywords appear in your ad text, they will be highlighted and provide visual incentives to click.
Display URLs An interesting tactic that we are seeing that has positive impacts on click through rate is the use of effective display URLs. Keep in mind that you must use the domain name for your website. However, in the display URL /, you can leverage your keywords to display in your ad text. For example, www.netvantagemarketing.com/seo. But, keep it in mind that you’ll have to keep it within the character limits, and if you have a long URL, this may not be an option.
That’s all for now, more tips to come this week! ( I promise, not January 11th,)
