Why You Aren’t Using Google Ads Properly
Having ads on Google is a great way to increase your website’s exposure, and if you do it right you can also see an increase in traffic as well as conversions. If your Google Ads aren’t fully optimised it can quickly become a waste of time and money.
No business wants to waste time and money, so it is important that you get it right, and have a full understanding of the things that could negatively impact your Google Ads. Creating effective and fully optimised Google Ads is so important that many big businesses have a team or dedicated resources put towards them.
So, to get the most bang for your buck with Google Ads you have to know what you are doing. If you are not an expert, that’s fine! There are many different places that you can outsource to, or you can study up and do your research to try and give Google Ads a crack yourself.
The platform itself is quite easy to use and navigate around. But remember that no matter what happens, Google is always happy to keep taking your money, so make sure your ads are as effective and optimised as they can be.
You want to ensure that this investment is worthwhile, because it can become quite costly and if you aren’t getting the desired conversions then it is very frustrating. But before you throw your hands in the air and just give up, make sure you understand the full story and are aware of anything that is potentially negatively impacting your ads.
If you aren’t too sure what could possibly be impacting your Google Ads in a negative way, then you have come to the right place! Have a read on below at some of the most common things that could be negatively impacting your Google Ads:
Not Being Involved Enough
Google Ads is certainly not a set and forget kind of thing. It requires constant research and tweaking of campaigns. A lot of the time you might even have a number of different campaigns going at the same time. With all these moving parts, you simply cannot afford to have a hands-off approach.
If you aren’t involved enough, it becomes easier to miss out on quick opportunities that may come and go in a flash. You may even find that your competitor jumped on board with the opportunity, but because you were too late you have missed the boat!
Due to the fact that Google Ads cost money, it becomes even more important that you are closely monitoring. Left unchecked you could end up racking in a huge Google Ads bill for limited or no extra conversions, all because of something quite simple.
Things can change quite quickly in this world so you need to keep your eyes peeled for opportunities or potential threats. By ensuring you are more involved in Google Ads (pretty much every day), then you won’t let anything slip through the cracks.
Limited Competitor Research
Just like in a number of different areas, it is vital to understand what your competitors are up to. By having a better understanding of what your competitors are doing in this space it provides you with more information to make better decisions about the type of keywords you are going to target, among other things.
If you and a lot of your competitors are all bidding for the same group of keywords, then it is almost certainly going to push up the cost per click (CPC) for those terms. You have to then make the judgement call to see whether it is worth spending that much money on those types of terms or if you should turn your attention to other terms.
You should be shining a bright light on your competitors to get a better understand on a number of different areas. How much they are spending is a perfect example of something you need to know. If that have massive budgets for Google Ads, and yours is quite small, it is probably not worth going out and competing with them for the major keywords, you’ll probably lose.
It is also important to know what is actually included in their ads. So get a better understanding of the type of information that’s included, do they have any add-ons like phone numbers etc. You should also try to find out the type of keywords they are currently targeting, it would paint a good picture of their overall Google Ads strategy.
Lack of Customisation
This is where an understanding of Google Ads and all its nooks and crannies is really important. You want to ensure your ads are fully customised to your individual needs. If you are just creating your Google Ads account, Google will set everything on default, it then becomes your job to tweak the settings as you see fit.
There is a whole stack of different settings to optimise. So, if you just starting out, it is important to take your time to understand every last one of those settings and think about how it applies to your individual situation and the best option of those available.
So, for example, if you are targeting a specific region in a country, it is important that you set that up properly. This would ensure that people only in your targeted region could see the ads.
You can see how if this was set up wrong, just how much money it could potentially waste, i.e. people who can click on your ad but don’t have the opportunity to actually make a transaction purely based on where they are located. This is just one example of many that will present themselves when setting up your Google Ads.
Not Seeing Big Picture
Google Ads is not going to be the only thing the business is doing to get the word out there. So, it is important to see the big picture and how all the different types of digital (and traditional) marketing can work together to achieve the goals set out for the business.
The perfect example is SEO and Google Ads; the two can work really well in unison together if you allow for it. Try to make sure that all the different wheels of digital marketing are working together, not just operating on their own.
It is important that you are consistent with your branding, messaging and everything else to not confuse the customer. Therefore, you need to work together with other areas of the business.
If you are a smaller business and all the digital marketing pretty much rests on your shoulders, then it certainly becomes a lot easier to keep things consistent. If you are able to get components working together, all your campaigns as a whole will be a lot more effective.
If in a larger business, this type of collaboration can become more complex. But it is important to highlight to all those involved just how important it is to ensure that all campaigns and strategies are aligned. It could be a good idea to showcase how much it will benefit them and their campaign, people tend to be more on board if they can see how it will make their own campaign better.
Trusting Previous Account Manager
If you are taking over the business’s Google Ads account from the previous manager, one of the worst things you can do is just assume that they had it all under control and fully optimised. Don’t just take this for granted; make sure you look for potential issues.
With Google Ads, because there are so many different moving parts, it is easy to forget something or set something up incorrectly. This is why, as the new account manager, you need to be on the ball and find these potential issues.
As well as this, there are a lot of different ways to optimise your Google Ads. It doesn’t mean that one is better than the other, just different opinions. So if you find that something is set up in a particular way, but you can see that it isn’t really providing the desired results, then change it up.
You can try some testing see what works and what doesn’t. Even if you have worked with the previous account manager and know them well, it is still important that you don’t take anything for granted, and look at all aspects of the Google Ads campaign, and question everything!
Lack of Audits
Things change, and quite quickly, in the world of Google Ads. Something that used to be considered best practice may not be anymore. Along with this, new features and aspects are being added to Google Ads, so if you don’t conduct regular audits, you could miss out on all this.
Audits are important to ensure you haven’t missed out on any potential opportunities or threats. Like when taking over the Google Ads account from a previous manager, you should question everything. Think about why things are set up the way they are and is there the potential to make it better.
You should also look to have someone else take a look at your campaigns as well (this person should have experience in Google Ads, so they know what they are looking for). A fresh set of eyes on your campaign is more likely to pick up on potential issues and question why things are done a certain way.
Focusing on Quality Score Only
Don’t get us wrong, the quality score is an important aspect to look at for your Google Ads, but it shouldn’t be the be all and end all. It is just one small part in a big campaign that you should look at.
So, don’t focus all of your time and energy trying to improve your quality score. If you are too focused on this, you may miss other key factors that are also important to focus your attention on. Try not to put all your eggs in one basket; it could actually be to your campaign’s detriment!
Google Ads can be tricky at the best of times, but you certainly need to ensure you are getting it right because you don’t want to be wasting resources. It is important that you are active in your Google Ads account, don’t set and forget. You need to also check in and see what your competitors are up to.
Always conduct audits and never trust the work of a previous account manager, because you never know what they might have missed! You should also look around Google Ads and each of the settings to get a good understanding of what should be applied to your business.
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