We understand that everyone is an individual. I mean, logically, we understand that each person is unique in their own way.
However, when you’re dealing with one system, they might as well all be grey for all the difference it makes in the questions we get asked.
That’s totally natural, people are spending money on their advertising – there are obviously going to be questions, anxiety, comments from others, it’s a difficult thing to put yourself out there. At least we can make sure it’s as “right” as possible.
So we thought it would be handy to answer a few of those questions for you upfront and right now 🙂
Why Aren’t My Ads Showing When I Do A Search?
This would have to be the number 1 question we get asked and the answer…..is actually complicated. So what happens when you ask this question?
Well there’s always some mild panic, a good Google Ads agency should always check:
- Are the relevant campaigns, ad groups and ads running?
- Is the keyword in question actually included in the account, or do we need to add it?
- Make sure you haven’t inadvertently blocked it via a negative keyword
- Then run the Ad Preview & Diagnosis tool (and google it yourself) to see what happens
Then we’ll send out an explainer very much like the below:
Re: Ad not showing up for “widgets nz”
Short answer:
Our ads will only show some of the time, and there’s nothing to worry about. So, I did see our ad when I just googled the same thing, but I might not the next time I search. This is because there will be variances during the time of day, level of competition and a number of other factors in the campaign.
Long answer – other factors we need to consider:
- We don’t have an unlimited budget, so Google Ads will only give us some of the available ad impressions that day, and will try to spread them out evenly during the day.
- If you’ve already spent your daily budget on clicks by lunchtime on a particular day, your ad won’t show in the afternoon or evening at all.
- The max level Google will ever give you is about 85% of search impressions (share of voice)
- If we bid high enough to get an average ad position of around 2.5, that average will include lower and higher positions as Google runs lots of tests. Some tests might place our ad below the organic results (or on page two).
- If you’ve been served a company’s ads a few times and haven’t clicked on them, sometimes Google will stop showing you any ads from that company (or at least far less often). Clearing cookies won’t prevent this.
- Insight and/or Google’s algorithms may have determined that certain combos of audience/day & time/device / demographic / location don’t produce conversions, so it won’t run ads to them.
At a glance, our ad has shown for that “widget” search term 217 times so far this month – so think we’re all good.
Hope that makes sense!
So What Do You Guys “Actually” Do With The Google Ads Management Time?
Ahh, this is another classic, it’s assumed that the campaigns are set and forgotten much like radio or TV. But the truth is because we’re constantly getting data into the campaigns, we can act on that data.
Once we have data to begin account optimization in earnest, our goal is to incrementally improve its performance over time. The goal is to generate more leads for the available budget, and in turn, lower the average cost per lead.
Using the data gradually generated by the account, the work will include (amongst other things):
- Weekly checks include tracking spend, dealing with any account warnings
- Adding negative keywords to the account to improve targeting relevance and avoid wasted impressions
- Identifying new high-performing keywords to add to the account
- Adjusting default ad group and individual keyword bids – spend more on high performers, less on low-performers
- Further bid adjustments to any “limited by budget” ad groups to maximise clicks
- Split-testing new ad copy to improve click-through rate – providing that client approval can be turned around in a reasonable timeframe
- Identify any major issues with Quality Score and make recommendations to improve
- Review ad time/day performance and create an ad schedule
- Implement bid adjustments by device, time, location etc, where appropriate
- Review and split test new ad extensions (Callout, Sitelink, Review etc)
- Optimisation strategy discussions with our dedicated Google rep were advantageous (new features etc)
- If time permits, optimising Remarketing campaign by excluding low-performing targets (placements, demographic groups)
- If time permits, use the new Remarketing For Search feature to try to get cheaper clicks on competitor brand names
Should We Bid On A Competitor’s Brand Name?
Any advertiser can bid for their ads to appear on search results for the brand names of competitors – both as a matter of Google policy and (last time I checked) under New Zealand law.
However, advertisers may not refer to their competitors’ names in the ad copy. Again this is both a Google rule and (usually) prohibited under NZ trademark law.
To defend against competitors bidding on your brand terms, the best we can do is to ensure our ads turn up for those searches as often as possible, and as high as possible. We can usually show up for our brand terms, and in the top spot, but neither of those is actually guaranteed – even with an unlimited budget.
We’ll also periodically check to make sure that any competitors who do appear aren’t using the client’s name in their ad copy. If we see them doing this, we can file a complaint with Google to get them to stop.
As for us bidding on your competitors’ names, we do run these kinds of campaigns for other clients, but the clicks tend to be pretty expensive because Google doesn’t see our ads as very relevant to those terms.
There’s also the risk that those competitors notice we’re doing it and may retaliate by bidding on ours.
For those reasons, we wouldn’t recommend bidding on competitor brand names.
So, How Does Google Ads Work?
Basic Mechanics
Buying ad space on Google search results pages.
- Choose search terms where you want your ad to appear, and how much you’re willing to pay for a click.
- Each time someone searches them, Google holds an auction and allocates ad slots to those who bid.
- The highest bid gets the top spot, which gets the most clicks (but costs the most).
- However, the relevance of ad copy & landing page to the search term changes the amount you pay.
- Only pay per click, not per impression.
Objective
Unless you have an unlimited budget, the idea isn’t to “appear for everything relevant”, but rather to strategically spend on the “best” keywords – based on data. “Best” means the ones that generate the most conversions/value for your budget.
Advantages Vs Traditional Media
- Highly targeted – people are telling you exactly what they’re looking for. So when someone Googles “find accountant auckland”, we know two things:
- they are definitely in the market for our offering
- we know exactly what to show them
- Data – Because we receive data and track conversions – the actions on the website that generates revenue – we know which keywords/ads/audiences are working and which aren’t. So over time, we can do more of what works and less of what doesn’t. (Compare old channels like radio, tv and print – “I know half of my advertising is working, but I don’t know which half.”)
- Paid vs Organic: Organic (non-paid) search results theoretically don’t cost anything, but in effect they do because to gain those top rankings you have to put lots of work in (SEO) or work with the best SEO agency. Organic keywords have higher volume in terms of clicks than paid ones but take longer to get there – paid gets you targeted traffic right away.
If you still have questions or need more information, you can download this definitive guide to Google Ads.