When you want to increase your conversion rate, you can make use of Google Ads. If you are planning to make use of Google Ads, there are a few things you should be aware of. Thorough knowledge of this platform will help you improve conversion rate while decreasing the overall budget for the job.
So, let’s get started on how and where you should invest your effort.
Measuring Success in your Google Ad Campaigns
1. Cost Per Click
By definition, the cost per click is an interesting paid advertising strategy. This is where business advertising has to pay a small fee for every click made. This means, when a potential customer clicks on your Google Ad, you need to make a payment. A number of factors can impact the cost per click. This strategy is effective because it shows that a customer is interested in the services or products offered by the business.
2. Cost Per Acquisition
Cost per acquisition favors businesses. In fact, this was once a sought out method for advertising on the internet. As suggested by its name, cost per acquisition depends on the number of customers gained by a business from the ad. It depends on the total amount of money invested by the business too! When the number of customers acquired through the Google Ad increases, you will be inclined to pay more.
3. Click-Through Rate
A lot of people feel confused about click through rates. When you want to increase your conversion rate, your Google Ad should receive more clicks. With more clicks, at least a few visitors would convert to customers. When you want to make use of Click Through Rate, you should be aware of where your business lies at the moment. What is your present CTR? If you don’t know, you have to study more about it. Once you figure out the current CTR value, you will be able to make improvements.
Every year, many companies prepare and release reports on how much the click-through rate should be for a business. Try to compare your Google Ads CTR with these reports. If your CTR value is lesser than average recordings. You need to work harder. At all times, try to meet and exceed the CTR value in the reports. Even as you cross the average value, you should only work towards higher CTRs. Never let a “bigger” figure stop you from working.
The question of how to increase your CTR will always be present. Here are a few points to help you:
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Your Google Ad groups should be cleaned periodically.
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You must make use of the address searcher’s actual intent.
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Try to make your ad more emotional, and interesting. The ad should focus on the customer’s primary and emotional aspects
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You should increase the overall size of your Google Ad. There are multiple extensions and tools to help you with this.
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When it comes to search ads and display Google Ads, always pick the search ads.
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Conversion doesn’t happen with harsh, strong works. Instead, let the customer make the choice. Most of the time, customers admire businesses that let them decide. This is why your Google Ad should have quotes like getting a call!
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Your Google Ad must have plenty of keywords. With more keywords, your ad will definitely shine.
These are seven proven and powerful techniques that can help in increasing your CTR. Often, CTR is used as a vanity metric. The golden rules behind CTR keep changing time after time. This means you should also keep yourself up to date with the most recent CTR strategies.
4. Google Ads Conversion rate
Finally, you have conversion rates to measure the success of your Google Ad. Now, the conversion rate is nothing but the percentage of successful conversions. It depends on the number of clicks made on your Google Ad, and how many of them turned into successful customers.
Calculating Conversion Rate
A lot of businesses tend to rely on conversion rate, for identifying the actual success of their Google Ads. Well, this is definitely a smart move.
So, let’s understand this with an example. Imagine nearly 1000 people clicked on your Google Ad. And, 500 of these clicks turned into a successful business. Let’s understand the conversion rate formula. Here, the conversion rate is 500/1000, which is nothing but 0.5 or 50%! When the conversion rate increases, your business is likely to see more customers.
Most marketing teams work hard to increase this rate.
Tracking Conversion Rate
Here are a few techniques you can use to track your conversion rate:
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Google Ads Conversion Tracking App: Easiest & Fastest installation of your Google Ads/AdWords conversion pixel. Get your conversion pixel active in 2 easy clicks. Incorrect implementation of AdWords Tracking can result in missed sales, wrong sale value, etc. This may make optimizing campaigns hard. We create the AdWords conversion pixel and automatically install it at checkout. You don’t have to change any theme files or do manual changes.
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Google AdWords and Analytics: This is one of the most commonly used methods for tracking conversion rates. These are two powerful tools with huge volumes of data. On filtering and focusing on specific data sets, you will gain insight into what and how the conversion rate came into place.
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Heatmaps: Apart from Google Tools, you can use heatmaps to understand more about the clicks to your site through Google Ads. These maps identify areas that performed well and those that didn’t.
Ideally, you can make use of Google Analytics to see the performance of your Google Ads. Set Up an Analytics Account to get this going.
Google Ads Conversion rate Optimization
Google Ads Optimization can be categorized into two sections: Pre-click and post-click optimization. Let’s understand more about the concepts behind these optimization strategies.
Pre-Click Optimization
1. The headline and Description Optimization
The question of how to make people click and land on your website through the Ad is very interesting. Customers always look for businesses with value. As a company, you must not think twice to speak about your values. Always attach your values to the ad, and don’t make any mistakes in this.
This will turn into a key selling attribute for your ad. The value has to be quoted in the subheading or main heading. If possible, include it in both places. After all, isn’t it the headline your customers will first see? Just like the old adage, first impressions are always the best ones – help your business with a perfect headline and description.
Here are a few points you should remember when you frame a headline/description:
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It should speak of how secure and safe your business is.
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Focus on the customer’s psychological needs. You must use terms that portray belongingness, and esteem needs.
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All customers look for businesses that can satisfy their needs. This is why your headline should speak of “Self-actualization”.
In order to increase the rate of conversion, you must be able to find a headline along with descriptions that meet at least two of these requirements.
2. Quality Score
Google Ads are carefully tracked by Google. This means every ad that points to your business should be of good quality. Google takes time and assigns a quality score to each Google Ad. And, if your Google Ad is of high quality, your score is bound to be high. In simpler terms, this is a technical assessment for your advertisement.
It helps in understanding the actual value and impact of your Ad. In the long run, this score will help you communicate with your customers. A lot of studies are done to understand how useful the Google Ad Quality Score is. And, all these studies have stressed the importance of a bigger score.
When the score is high, the cost per click will reduce drastically. This means you don’t need to invest lots of time and money in building a Google Ad. The Ad would do the trick. Some experts claim that the cost can be reduced by nearly a half with a quality score of 10!
When you are tight on budget, but if you need more conversion – you must stick to quality. This is a magical technique for better conversion rates. With high-quality Ads, the cost of building your Google Ads will reduce.
Now, how can you boost your Google Ad Quality Score? There are three important aspects of your Google Ad. One, your landing page makes a big difference. Two, the CTR is extremely important for higher quality scores. Three, your ad needs to be highly relevant. When you want to boost your quality score, all these three aspects of your Google Ad should be taken into consideration.
3. Keyword, selection – Up the Race!
Are you struggling to gain more customers through Google Ads? If yes, your business might be going through a targeting problem. Google Ads are effective only when they reach interested customers. Your ads should be focused on user intentions. Without understanding what your customer intentions are, the entire process will become futile.
Judge your customers with these questions:
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Are they aiming to buy a new product?
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Are they looking for suggestions?
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What are they planning to sell?
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Are they focusing on gaining more knowledge about a domain?
Finding answers to these questions will indirectly help you understand more about the customer. And, the moment you are aware of what the customer wants, many important things will fall into place.
Customers always focus on branded keyword hunts. These searches are focused on a specific brand. So, how will this kind of search increase your conversion rate?
To make use of branded keyword searches in your Google Ads effort, you must exploit through “Competitor targeting.” This is a tactic used by numerous businesses around the world. When a customer searches for a specific brand, you can choose to display your Ads. This means the customer is likely to come across your business too.
Often, this technique is equivalent to stealing the customers of another brand. One might wonder if this is the right thing to do. Well, the answer to this question depends on how efficient your competitor targeting methods are. And, if you have already invested in these techniques, Google Ads will be a bonus to your effort.
Post Click Optimization
1. Landing Page
The landing page of your website is worth a million dollars. As mentioned previously, this is responsible for building that first impression, which can last for a very long time. When you design a landing page, ensure that it meets with the purpose of your business. Above all, the landing page should be as simple as possible. Load it with high-quality content that is precise and relevant to your business.
2. Page Loading Speed
The page loading speed is frequently underestimated. Often, developers and businesses tend to feature high-quality content on their websites. This increases the amount of time required for the website to load. Well, this wouldn’t prove to be useful when you are keen on conversion rate optimization.
Always stick to quality content, which can be loaded easily. For example, you can always choose JPEG images over PNG. After all, JPEG offers quality and smaller image sizes. These are smart decisions that can change the overall performance of your website.
3. Responsiveness
The focus on responsive websites has grown by leaps and bounds. Nowadays, it would be difficult to launch a business without a responsive website. So, what is responsiveness all about?
By definition, responsive websites are designed to load on both desktop and mobile devices without any hassles or tussles. The view would get rendered perfectly. And, the time required to render would be minimum. In the long run, responsive websites are going to become a priority for all businesses.
This is mainly because 85% of online users rely on their mobile devices to surf the internet, and make purchases. If you want to stay connected with these customers, you need to build responsive websites.
4. Match with Landing Page
Now, this is an important point for increasing your Google Ads conversion rate. All your advertisements should be aligned with the official website’s landing page.
Firstly, people raise questions on what the landing page should be. If you are advertising a product, the landing page must lead to this product. In a best-case scenario, you must not ask the customer to make more than a “one” click. Their only click should be in the advertisement. This is what experts consider as a message match.
For instance, if your primary goal is to make a customer sign-up for your services, the “Sign up” text in your Google Ad should direct to the “Sign Up” page. You must not redirect the client to any other location. A mismatch in the ad content and landing page can be frustrating. Most of the time, customers move away to different websites when there is a mismatch. This is why you should work ahead of time, and ensure that all the links are redirected correctly.
The moment you take care of the landing page, everything else will fall in place. The rate of conversion can be increased by nearly 200% when you focus on this strategy.
5. Call to Action (CTA)
Firstly, you should be aware of how to handle the CTAs. For increasing your Google Ads conversion rates, you must improve your overall CTA. This is what gives life and value to your advertisements. For potential customers to click your ad, and visit your website – it has to be compelling enough. If the ad is not compelling, no one will be interested in trying your business. After all, there are hundreds, if not thousands of other brands to get the work done. Most businesses struggle to witness conversions without CTAs.
So, how do CTAs appear? What kind of phrases should you use in your CTA?
When you are planning to introduce CTAs in the description of your ad, you need to use common phrases like shop, get, and buy. These are common, and familiar words. Never confuse your customers with difficult jargon. For example, words like discover and click will be a total waste of your money.
The best way to find a CTA for your business is trial and error. What works for one industry may not be apt for you. This is why you should keep trying multiple CTAs before a choice starts to work for you.
6. Visuals
Text-based content plays a vital role in any website. Meanwhile, it would be great to introduce visuals too. Just like every other element on your website, the visuals must be of high quality too!
7. Live Chat
When you are interested in higher conversion rates, it would be important to let your customers connect with your sales teams. This is one of the places where live chat comes into the picture. What live chat does to a business is very exciting.
Firstly, it acts as a channel that customers can use to connect with businesses in real-time. Secondly, live chat helps the business understand what their customers are really looking for. These are two important kinds of interactions, which can help you build better businesses, marketing strategies, and use Google Ads wisely.
8. A/B Test
How often do you change the design of your landing page? If you want to become a leader in this industry, you must not change the landing page very often. Instead, try to optimize the content on your landing page. Optimization of the landing page is important because this would be your first point of contact with the customer. And, you are expected to make a good impression.
To understand the importance of this point, you must try the following exercise:
Ask someone who knows you, but doesn’t know your business to click on the Ad. As they arrive at the landing page, see how their expressions change. This change in expression can tell you many things about the landing page. If they are happy and excited – then your landing page is likely to boost conversion rates. However, if they are confused and lost – you may need to optimize the landing page better.
This is a simple test that can help you decide on the effectiveness of your site!
Conclusion
On the whole, increasing your conversion rate with Google Ads industry benchmarks is a smart move. However, you need to focus on multiple aspects of your ad for better results. Always ensure that your Google Ad is up to date, and loaded with elements that can make an impact. Whether it is the landing page, or the links, or the description – keep the Google Ad creative and optimized.
Author’s bio:
Salil Panikkaveettil is the Co-Founder and CEO of AdNabu. He obsessed about numbers, graphs, code, and hopes to build a yacht someday. You can connect with him on Twitter or LinkedIn.
