Hi lovelies,

Internet marketers often ask the same questions about PPC. What price should they set for a successful PPC campaign? Which PPC platforms are the best to use? How should you measure the performance of PPC? What kind of PPC advertisement should you write?

These tips will help you get well on your way to running effective campaigns for your small business.

Start small
Unless you’re working with professional PPC services, it’s a better idea to start out small with your campaigns. Managing multiple adverts and budgets at the same time can be confusing, and it’s easy to spend a lot of money very quickly if you’re not careful.

Start out with one campaign on Google AdWords. This is one of the most popular platforms because it can get your business seen on the most used search engine in the world. It’s also much easier to track your analytics if you only have one campaign happening at once. As you get used to the way PPC works, you can add in some more campaigns.

Be specific
The PPC campaigns that are set up by small businesses who don’t have a lot of PPC experience often only use broad keywords as they think that these will increase their chances of reaching the most customers. In fact, this is a waste of time, and it also has a terrible ROI.

Be as specific as you can be with the keywords that you target with PPC campaigns. Instead of trying to have your ads be shown to people who have searched for “restaurants in Birmingham,” which will probably have a very high cost per click,  you should instead target people who search for “Thai restaurants in Birmingham.” This will cost you less to bid on, but will also make sure that the people who see your advert are actually looking for a restaurant, or other business, like yours.

Use strong language
This doesn’t mean offensive language. What it does mean is using language that will grab people’s attention.

Vague headlines get vague returns on investment, but strong headlines get strong results. If you’re not sure if your headline is good enough, ask someone else to take a look. If you can’t decide between two headlines, consider trying an A/B split test to determine which one works better.

Use geographic keywords
One of the best ways to maximize your PPC budget is to geo-target your ads and use language that works well for your area. For example, instead of just mentioning the city you’re in, mention specific neighborhoods. People from out of town might not know where they are but are these people a part of your demographic? 

Include clear calls to action
You want your PPC prospects to do something specific, so tell them exactly what that is. PPC ads often don’t have a clear call to action, which is pointless. One action is all you need. Your prospect won’t have to think about what to do next, because you’ve told them.