We’re big believers in the power of pay-per-click (PPC) advertising to boost brand visibility and to connect with consumers. We’re hardly the only digital marketing agency to think so. With that said, we understand that Google AdWords can be difficult for the PPC novice to understand, let alone optimize. That can be frustrating: we talk to many small business owners who believe AdWords can work for them, but they’re just not sure how.

Because of some of the frustrations associated with AdWords, it is common for small business owners to dive in head-first, find that the platform doesn’t deliver the desired results, and then quit. What you should know is that, if AdWords isn’t doing what you had hoped it would, there is a reason for that. Troubleshooting your AdWords experience is the first step toward putting a truly effective strategy into place.

Lack of Strategy

Actually, that’s one of the most common reasons why AdWords comes up short—because there’s no real strategy in place to guide it. We see it all the time: An AdWords novice gets excited by the prospect of PPC and starts buying up keywords all over the place, with no real rhyme or reason to it.

These AdWords users are effectively trying to build something without a blueprint. To succeed in AdWords, you’ve got to know, first and foremost, who your searchers are; from there, you can ascertain what search terms they are most likely to use, and which ones offer the clearest opportunity for your business. All of this requires forethought and strategy, and if your AdWords experience has disappointed, it may simply be that you haven’t put in enough strategizing on the front end.

Short-Tail Focus

Speaking of keywords, there’s another common reason why marketers quit AdWords, it is that they’ve focused wholly on the wrong keywords—specifically, on only short-tail search terms. The problem with short-tail terms is simple: Generally speaking, they just aren’t as profitable or as effective as longer terms.

When we talk about short-tail terms, we’re talking about the search terms that are broad and general—terms like hair replacement. These terms come with high risk and low odds of conversion, because you are essentially competing with every other hair replacement online.

Meanwhile, a long-tail search term like most affordable hair replacement Charlotte NC will offer lower risk and much higher odds of conversion, precisely because it is narrower, more specific. These are the terms you will generally want to focus your AdWords bidding on, especially when you are just getting started.

Bad Landing Pages

When you set up an AdWords campaign, you obviously want people to click on your ads and wind up on your website—but more than that, you want your website to convert them into paying customers. To do this, your ads should direct leads to highly targeted landing pages, where the sole mission is to convert.

One reason AdWords endeavors can fail is that the marketer doesn’t create landing pages, but instead sends traffic to a generic page without any calls-to-action—a big error. Just having a landing page doesn’t necessarily solve the problem, though; to make a conversion, the landing page has to be highly targeted, without overwhelming the user with too much information or too many options. Having a clear summary of benefits and a strong call to action are essential to landing page success.

No Retargeting

Here’s something else to consider: Most AdWords campaigns get a conversion rate between half a percentage point and five percent. Even if you’re at the upper end of that range, you’re still getting a lot of clicks that aren’t converting right away. One way to salvage some of those is through retargeting, yet many AdWords users neglect this important tool.

Retargeting essentially allows you to have ads “follow” a potential lead across Google, Facebook, and other websites; it’s a technique so powerful that even Amazon.com uses it liberally. For companies with a lot of specific product SKUS, in particular, retargeting is a key component of a successful AdWords campaign.

What About the Competition?

When AdWords starts generating fewer conversions than it used to, the temptation is to blame it on the platform itself; a decreased conversion rate isn’t necessarily Google’s fault, though, nor is it necessarily yours. The real issue might be that your competitors have surpassed you, plain and simple.

What if your competitors are using AdWords to promote a superior product? A more attractive price? A stronger statement of value? All of these factors could mean that your competitor’s AdWords campaign takes off while yours stalls.

That’s why it is important to keep tabs not just on your own endeavors, but also on what kinds of ads your competitors are running. It may also be helpful to use customer feedback surveys to determine the ways in which you could be improving your own offers.

Part of the Whole

One more note that we’ll make is that any PPC initiative should be considered in light of your broader marketing plan, and should work harmoniously with SEO, content marketing, and other channels. In other words, one final reason why your AdWords efforts may not be working is that they’re not part of an integrated marketing strategy.

Our team at enCOMPASS can help you address any of these issues, and that last one in particular. We would love to speak with you about the different ways in which an integrated marketing plan can benefit your business. Start the conversation by reaching out to the enCOMPASS team today.