How to Beat the Odds in AdWords with Competitive Intelligence
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The document discusses strategies for improving PPC (pay-per-click) advertising through competitive intelligence, auditing competitors, and optimizing budgets. Key recommendations include conducting regular audits, focusing on high-performing keywords, and creating strong landing pages that convert users. The presenters encourage the use of tools and data analysis to enhance campaign performance and ROI.
How to Beat the Odds in AdWords with Competitive Intelligence
- 1. How to Beat the Odds in AdWords with Competitive Intelligence #PPCcompetition
- 2. Join the conversation on Twitter #PPCcompetition @SEMrush @WordStream #PPCcompetition
- 3. Today’s Presenters Navah Hopkins Customer Success Specialist, WordStream @navahf Michael Stricker Marketing Director, SEMrush @RadioMS Headshot #PPCcompetition
- 4. What is your PPC budget in 2015? a. Less than $999 per month b. $1,000 - $2,499 per month c. $2,500 - $9,999 per month d. $10,000 - $19,999 per month e. $20,000+ per month #PPCcompetition
- 5. How long does your average campaign run? a. Up to one month b. Up to three months c. Up to six months d. At least six months #PPCcompetition
- 6. Do you manage your own PPC? a. I direct the PPC manager b. I am the PPC manager c. I direct the PPC agency d. An automated platform manages my PPC #PPCcompetition
- 8. What does it take to pass a PPC audit? (and can I?)
- 9. Account Audits Benchmarking Success and Avoiding Set-Backs
- 10. Focused Analysis - Audit Campaigns Regularly! • Campaign Health • Ad Group Size and Focus • Keywords, Match-types, and Bidding #PPCcompetition
- 11. Audit Competitors – Early and Often! • SWOT Analysis • what to avoid • what to emulate • GOAL: Data-based decisions #PPCcompetition
- 12. Audit Competitors – Budget Allocation • Audit your Competitors, too! • SWOT Analysis • what to avoid • what to emulate • GOAL: Data-based decisions #PPCcompetition
- 13. Audit Competitors – Traffic VS Traffic Price • Audit your Competitors, too! • SWOT Analysis • what to avoid • what to emulate • GOAL: Data-based decisions #PPCcompetition
- 14. Audit Competitors – Keywords and Traffic Cost • Keywords and Traffic Cost Domains’ Total AdWords Keywords and Traffic Cost #PPCcompetition 0 200,000 400,000 600,000 800,000 1,000,000 1,200,000 1,400,000 1,600,000 1,800,000 Cars.com Edmunds.com AutoTrader.com CarGurus.com KBB.com Keywords Traffic Cost
- 15. • Traffic and Traffic Cost Competitor Domains’ Traffic and Cost for that Traffic #PPCcompetition 0 200,000 400,000 600,000 800,000 1,000,000 1,200,000 1,400,000 1,600,000 1,800,000 Cars.com Edmunds.com AutoTrader.com CarGurus.com KBB.com Traffic Traffic Cost Audit Competitors – Traffic and Traffic Cost
- 16. • Cost / Keyword and Cost / Traffic Competitors Cost / Keyword and Cost / Unit of Traffic #PPCcompetition Audit Competitors – Cost per Traffic Unit $0.00 $2.00 $4.00 $6.00 $8.00 $10.00 $12.00 $14.00 Cars.com Edmunds.com AutoTrader.com CarGurus.com KBB.com Cost/Keyword Cost/Unit of Traffic
- 17. How much time/money should I spend on PPC?
- 18. Time is Money Spend Both, Wisely
- 19. How Much Time Should I Spend on PPC? • How much time are you spending on PPC? • How much time is ideal? #PPCcompetition
- 20. How Much Time Should I Spend on PPC? • Save Time to Go Beyond AdWords Dashboard: • Prepare Reports • Check competition’s budgets and efficiencies • Total Spend • Spend per Keywords • Spend per Unit of Traffic • Research new Keywords that Work! #PPCcompetition
- 21. How Much Time Should I Spend on PPC? • Can I get good results with 20 minutes per day? #PPCcompetition
- 22. Spend Your Budget Wisely – Including Time! • 20 minute PPC work week = work smart, not hard • Know your industry and optimize for transactions • Leverage Targeting and Auto-bidding • Invest in a robust negative keyword list • Chase tail (long-tail that is!) #PPCcompetition
- 24. Where should my PPC focus be, and am I focused enough?
- 25. AdWords vs. Bing Which is For Me?
- 26. Is there a Place for Both? • Cons of AdWords-only approach? • Pros of an integrated approach? • Trade-offs? Time? Return? • How will you know when you need more network? #PPCcompetition
- 27. How do I generate action items from data?
- 29. How Do I Keep From Drowning in Data? • Think ROIs, KPIs (CPA) VS ‘noisy’ metrics • Automate data reports • Leverage competitor data Research Paid KWs that perform – for others! Save time, effort, money. Emulate winners; shun losers • Triple Witching ▲ Ads Traffic rising ▲ Ads Keywords rising ▼ while Ads Traffic Price falls • Cost / Keyword instead of number of Keywords • Cost / Traffic Unit (CPC) instead of bid rates #PPCcompetition
- 30. • Ad A • 2,423 Impressions • 453 clicks (1.4% CTR) • Average Position: 2.8 • Ad B • 36,223 Impressions • 760 clicks (2.1% CTR) • Average Position: 3.0 Pick the Winner #PPCcompetition
- 31. • • SEMrush new PLA Tool with rapid updates on popular items prices, images, appearance in SERPs. Metrics That Move You – Google Shopping #PPCcompetition
- 32. Metrics That Move You • Google Trends • The case of the disappearing skirt • The case of the changing lexicon • Extensions give you more real estate and more user interaction data #PPCcompetition
- 33. Turning Data into Action Items • Focus on transactional users VS aspirational users Go beyond “money words” to detect transactional intent with “buy” words. (See the Ebook for a list!) • ID winners; steal KWs; steal Ads text; counter offers; price check • High impressions + low CTR = Negative Keywords are needed! • CPA tinkering based on event and device trends #PPCcompetition
- 34. I got got the click – now what?
- 35. Highway to the Danger Zone When Landing Pages Don’t Convert
- 36. Bad-News Bears Landing Pages #PPCcompetition
- 37. Strong Landing Pages… Deliver on the ad’s promise. Adding keywords from the PPC campaign led to 144% increase in conversions for a marketing solutions company. Are conversion focused – across all devices! Mobile optimized landing pages led to 153% increase in conversions for Deluxe. Aren’t one size fits all. Companies with 40+ landing pages get 12X more leads than those with 5 or less. #PPCcompetition
- 38. Examples of Strong Landing Pages #PPCcompetition
- 40. Keep Learning! (It’s free!) EBook: How to Beat the Odds in AdWords with Competitive Intelligence Article: The Great Debate: Google AdWords vs. Bing Ads Infographic: Google AdWords Vs Yahoo Bing Network Infographic: 18 Mind-Blowing Landing Page Stats Worksheet: The 20- Minute PPC Work Week Checklist AdWords Performance Grader AdWords Landing Page Grader #PPCcompetition
- 41. Special Offers I would like… A. FREE 1-on-1 AdWords & Landing Page Audit B. WordStream Advisor: 20 Minute Work Week Demo C. SEMrush FREE Trial 30-Day Guru: http://bit.ly/Free30SEMrush D. I don’t need any help with my PPC #PPCcompetition
- 43. Questions? Headshot #PPCcompetition We’d love to hear from you! marketingteam@wordstream.com michael.stricker@semrush.com
Editor's Notes
- #23: 20 minute PPC work week is the result of working smart, not hard Know your industry and optimize for transactional users instead of high volume Leverage Targeting and Auto-bidding Invest in building out a robust negative keyword list, and don’t be afraid to chase tail (long-tail that is!)
- #27: Without Bing, you’re missing 15-30% of the market AdWords = more Impressions; higher CTR YBN = lower CPCs; lower CPMs; less competition for Ad Position On average, Yahoo! Bing Network’s cost per click is 50-70% less than Google AdWords and the impressions vary in cost from 76-90% less. 36% less competition on Yahoo! Bing than on Google AdWords. Bing has less historical data because of smaller sample size. AdWords delivered significantly higher impressions – especially in the Shopping & Classified retail category, where it displayed 1.6 times as many first SERP ad impressions as YBN (an incremental 7.3 ad million impressions) during the quarter.
- #32: Increasingly, E-com ad budgets are dedicated to PLAs - Walmart >70%; Rakuten (formerly Buy.com) >90% Frequently, higher CTR, Conversion Rates & Revenue per Transaction result
- #34: Are you paying for transactional users or aspirational users? How are you ensuring the best possible conversion? Know how to interpret search intent in the phrasing of searches. Go beyond “money words” to detect transactional intent with “buy” words. (See the Whitepaper for a list!) ID winners; steal KWs; steal Ads text; counter offers; price check High impressions + low CTR = Negative Keywords are needed! See what’s driving the highest volumes of Paid Traffic to your site. Block out the nonsense CPA tinkering based on event and device trends