‘I’ve used Google AdWords before and it was a waste of money’. This is something we hear almost every time a new client comes in. We’ve heard all the horror stories, and we’ve cleaned up the messes that have been left by people who aren’t sure how to run a profitable PPC campaign.

And the truth is: yes. Google Adwords will waste your money – if you aren’t working to an informed, strategised plan of action.

It’s far too common for individuals, or even inexperienced digital marketers, to misuse Google Adwords. Unfortunately, this will lead to you wasting money on clicks that aren’t ever going to result in a conversion because they’re incorrectly targeted and poorly implemented.

You’ve not done the research

All too often, we see accounts that are delivering ads to nationwide, or even worldwide locations. They are targeting the wrong range of keywords, and have opted for a broad match on the ones they’ve chosen. These basic mistakes show that even the most fundamental level of research hasn’t been completed, and therefore your advert is being set up to fail. If you’re not sure about your audience, there’s no way that you can deliver them an advert that they’re likely to click on. It’s as simple as that.

You’re not using all of the features on offer

Adwords has a whole host of options for you to use that can help you build a set of higher converting ads. Ad Groups are a vastly underused feature, as are extensions. Advanced location targeted is hidden by default, and it’s even possible to set up your adwords account with ‘Standard’ features, which removes many of the options before you’ve even begun. When you’re using none of these features, you’re automatically at a disadvantage.

You’re sending them to your homepage

Your ads are getting clicks because your audience are interested in the information in the ad copy. Simply sending them to a homepage doesn’t retain this interest – it gives them an overwhelming amount of information, none of which is directly related to what they were looking for. A dedicated landing page which is tailored to your ad, and the offer you’re using, will help you keep that interest and direct it towards a conversion.

You’re not interpreting the data

With Google Adwords, you get an incredible insight into the way your ad is performing. Another far too common mistake is simply setting an ad to run and leaving it. You should be monitoring the data you’re getting and applying that knowledge to make improvements to each ad individually. This data is the closest thing you have to direct audience feedback, so you should be paying close attention to it.

You’re not dedicating daily time to it

Managing an Adwords account is a full time job. It requires regular check-ins to make sure that you’re not spending on a keyword you shouldn’t be or targeting an audience you hadn’t thought to exclude yet. Most people already have a full time job to be doing, so that’s where we come in. It’s not just about the expert knowledge that we’re applying – it’s also about the regular time that we dedicate to making sure that your account is doing as well as it can.

The best advice we can give to those who believe that Adwords is a waste of money is to let us have a professional look at your account. We offer a free PPC health check that can flag up the areas that you might be neglecting. It’s obligation free, but we welcome the opportunity to take an underperforming PPC account and show doubters just how successful it can be with the right management.

Join the list of Zinc clients who are happy to be proven wrong about Adwords – talk to our team today.

This creative insight was written by:

Caitlin Burns

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