Digital Marketing Institute, Digital Marketing Course and Digital Marketing Training
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
1 2 3 4 [LECTURER NOTES] You will have already had your lecture on SEO, which gives you a good idea of the context behind Search as a whole. You will have an in-depth lecture on Analytics later in this course, but this lecture will touch briefly on Analytics in the context of PPC. 5 6 [LECTURER NOTES] All eyeballs, or ‘impressions’ of your ad are free. However the goal of PPC is to drive traffic to your site – so it’s in your best interest to generate as many clicks as possible within your budget. This is why this revenue model works for search engines. 7 [LECTURER NOTES] This is Irish data – however this could be universally applicable. 8 [LECTURER NOTES] Irish research data. [RESOURCES] IAB/Amárach. 9 [LECTURER NOTES] What is the difference between SEM & SEO? SEO impacts the organic/ natural listings on the Search Engine Results Page. SEM (Search Engine Marketing/Paid Search/PPC) impacts the sponsored listing areas on the SERP. Both SEO & SEM are about getting more visibility on and traffic from the search engines. 10 [LECTURER NOTES] It is important to consider your Search Engine Marketing strategy in the context of the entire search engine – so both SEO and PPC. This will allow you to develop a more comprehensive search strategy and make decisions that result in the best outcome for your business. Which leads us to the strategic considerations – using PPC to fill in gaps where organic search is weak, increase (or double) your visibility across both paid and organic search for certain terms, or have immediate visibility while you wait for the results of your SEO work to come to fruition. Without looking at your strategy in the context of the entire search engine, you can’t make these strategic decisions. 11 [LECTURER NOTES] It is important to consider your Search Engine Marketing strategy in the context of the entire search engine – so both SEO and PPC. This will allow you to develop a more comprehensive search strategy and make decisions that result in the best outcome for your business. Which leads us to the strategic considerations – using PPC to fill in gaps where organic search is weak, increase (or double) your visibility across both paid and organic search for certain terms, or have immediate visibility while you wait for the results of your SEO work to come to fruition. Without looking at your strategy in the context of the entire search engine, you can’t make these strategic decisions. 12 [LECTURER NOTES] Point out that PPC ads are placed to the right with some ads achieving ‘premium position’ and sitting above organic listings. Generally, the higher a listing appears on the search results page, the more clicks it receives. Few users go beyond the first page. 13 [LECTURER NOTES] Google have the largest share of the search engine market in Ireland (2014 data). With this in mind, we will focus on their advertising platform, Google AdWords, for the remainder of the lecture. However the basic principles of Search Engine Marketing are universally applicable, so the foundations of your learning will be relevant, regardless of the search engine! [CUSTOMIZATION] The above uses Ireland as an example. 14 [LECTURER NOTES] Or more like – common acronyms. There are a lot of them in PPC! Pay Per Click, Paid Search and Search Engine Marketing – these terms are used to refer to PPC and all mean relatively the same thing. If we are to be specific about any differences between these three terms, we would say that: Search Engine Marketing – comprises of both SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and PPC (Pay Per Click). Paid Search – the process of placing advertising on search engine results pages. PPC (Pay Per Click) – includes Paid Search plus other websites within the search engine’s advertising network, e.g. websites on the Google Display Network or Bing/ Yahoo Network. However – you will see seasoned practitioners (including myself) using all of these terms interchangeably, and they are all equally correct – some are more general while others get quite specific. Cost Per Click – the amount you paid for a click on your ad. Click Through Rate – the rate at which users who have seen your ad, go ahead to click on it. It is calculated by expressing clicks divided by impressions, as a percentage, e.g. 100 impressions and 10 clicks = 10% Click Through Rate. Google AdWords is the most popular PPC tool, used to create and manage campaigns running on Google Search and the Google Display Network. Bing and Yahoo have partnered to serve all advertising campaigns for both search engines and their Display networks from one management center. If you are familiar with using Google AdWords, and understand the fundamental principles of search engine marketing, then it should be straightforward to migrate what you know to Bing and Yahoo. 15 [LECTURER NOTES] Or more like – common acronyms. There are a lot of them in PPC! Pay per click, paid search and search engine marketing – these terms are used to refer to PPC and all mean relatively the same thing. If we are to be specific about any differences between these three terms, we would say that: Search engine marketing – comprises of both SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and PPC (Pay Per Click) Paid Search – the process of placing advertising on Search Engine Results Pages PPC (Pay Per Click) – includes Paid Search plus other websites within the search engine’s advertising network, e.g. websites on the Google Display Network or Bing/Yahoo Network. However – you will see seasoned practitioners (including myself) using all of these terms interchangeably, and they are all equally correct – some are more general while others get quite specific. Cost Per Click – the amount you paid for a click on your ad. Click Through Rate – the rate at which users who have seen your ad, go ahead to click on it. It is calculated by expressing clicks divided by impressions, as a percentage, e.g. 100 impressions and 10 clicks = 10% click through rate. Google AdWords is the most popular PPC tool, used to create and manage campaigns running on Google Search and the Google Display Network. Bing and Yahoo have partnered to serve all advertising campaigns for both search engines and their Display Networks from one management center. If you are familiar with using Google AdWords, and understand the fundamental principles of Search Engine Marketing, then it should be straightforward to migrate what you know to Bing and Yahoo. 16 17 18 [LECTURER NOTES] Intent & Qualified Visitors – users are actively searching for the product/ service you offer. They are actively putting their hand up and saying ‘I want this product/ service’ – you just need to be there at the right time with your ad. Relevance – Your product or service needs to be relevant to what users are searching for. If a user is searching for red shoes, don’t serve them an ad that says you sell dresses. Timing – is everything. It’s about reaching users at the moment they need the product you offer. For example, a search for ‘burst pipe’ is the perfect time for a plumber to reach that audience with their services. Cost effective - You decide the maximum amount you’re willing to pay for a click, and how much you want to spend on your campaign. Accountability – everything is measured and transparent. You can see the number of times your ad was shown, the number of clicks on that ad, and for what search term the click was generated on… and so much more! Control - Paid Search allows you to control what keywords you bid on, and also what message you put in front of users when they search on that keyword. It is this level of control that makes PPC an accessible channel for all businesses, regardless of the size or the budget. 19 [LECTURER NOTES] Google employ a policy of fairness, and work on the premise that all advertisers should have an opportunity to be in the top position on the Search Engine Results Page – not just those with big budgets. It is out of this that the ad rank formula was developed – a formula which rewards the most relevant advertisers, that create and optimize their PPC campaigns in line with Google best practices, rather than those that spend the most money. 20 [LECTURER NOTES] The makeup of Quality Score – easily known as the ‘relevancy score’. Quality Score decides the final Cost Per Click and ad rank of your ad, so it’s important to consider it when creating and optimizing your campaigns. Quality Score is always assigned at the keyword level – hence why you see the keyword in the middle of the chart. CTR – high click-through rates indicate that users find the ad relevant to the keyword they searched for. This is a positive signal to Google so it will assign a higher quality score to those with a good CTR. Creative – is the ad copy relevant to they search term the user typed in? Does the headline, description line and URL match what they are looking for? Search query– how competitive is the landscape for this particular search query? Does it see a high search volume? Are there a high number of advertisers bidding on it? If a query is particularly ‘unpopular’ or has been seen to ‘perform poorly’ on Google historically (ads with a low CTR, low search volume), it tends to be assigned a lower quality score initially. Your own account performance later overrides that Quality Score. Landing page – how relevant is the landing page to the ad the user saw, and the search term they entered? Does it load quickly? Is it easy to navigate? Ad group – the historical performance of the ad group (and even campaign or account) that your keyword is in has an effect on performance.