Making paid ad campaigns work for your business
In 2014, Google became the first company to rent the world's largest and most expensive digital billboard in Times Square.
The billboard, stretching eight storeys high was estimated to cost $2.5m to hire for four weeks.
It seems kind of strange to think that Google, the largest search engine, and in effect, largest online advertising space felt the need to pay for advertising.
I guess you could say there's always merit in using a paid ad campaign, even for Google!
Which leads me to this week's blog topic - The benefits of using a paid ad campaign to drive traffic to your blog or website.
You don't need research to tell you that most of us prefer to click on organic results online, be honest, you scroll down past the ads and look straight for the organic results. So does this mean we should ignore utilising a paid for approach? Definitely not.
Search engine advertising is a great way to boost your site or blog if it isn't ranking as high as you'd like through organic search. This may be because it is still relatively new, or perhaps you haven't nailed your SEO yet. If the latter is the case why not read Why is SEO Important for Businesses in the Fitness Industry
One of the benefits of using a paid campaign is it is a lot faster.
It can take anywhere between two weeks to a couple of months for you to rank organically, whereas paid search can go live within 15 minutes to half an hour. If you have a particular offer on gym memberships that is going live and you want to drive traffic, this is the best way to achieve that traffic in a short space of time.
Paid for advertising can allow you to:
Reach a larger audience
Target ideal customers
Drive leads and conversions, as discussed above
A caveat for all of this though, it is not just a case of throwing cash at some advertising, and hey presto, conversions.
Within a paid for ad campaign research is required - what are your potential clients/customers looking for when searching fitness online?
Research will allow you to bid on the correct keywords, allowing your business to hit the top of the SERP page, something that if left to organic means could take months and maybe years.
- Select the right keywords
- Have keywords put into well organised campaigns and ad groups
- Set up Pay Per Click landing pages that are optimised for conversions
We mentioned PPC above, every time our ad is clicked, sending
a potential customer to our website, you have to
pay the search engine a fee. Don't let this stop you though, when Pay Per Click is used properly, this fee is
trivial because the visit is worth more
than what we pay for it (we have led
people to a conversion or sale).
Paid ad campaigns through the likes of Google Ads means any business can have a fair shot at attracting new leads and potential conversions, without the eyewatering price of a billboard in Times Square!
Remember, paid for ad campaigns can be incredibly useful for driving people to your site, but it won't magically create demand, that's all down to you, ensuring your fitness offering is on point and fit (pardon the pun) for purpose.
Ciara G
Ciara, who doesn’t love a good pun. Fit for purpose really does sums up Google Ads as it is easy to throw cash at the concept and think it will pay off. It does require an investment and should be used along with SEO. It is easy to see how people would this is a replacement for SEO. As you said Google Ads will work best if you put into practice the learnings from SEO. As Google showed when they bought the Ad space in Times Square, they knew that you need a comprehensive strategy. It really worked as part of their overall marketing strategy as they are the number one search engine in the world and control the flow of information worldwide. Which makes sense that now they are the number one platform on online paid ads.
ReplyDeletePaid ads and SEO go hand in hand - it is well and good to pump money into paid ads but as mentioned, there's no point if you don't know how to do it properly, would be like throwing cash into the wind. I find even though paid ads aren't very trustworthy, they still bring attention to your brand and creating awareness of who you are and what you do is important - it is then up to the company to ensure that people are drawn in and stay through their organic content. You get what you put into it.
ReplyDeleteCiara, I really did enjoy reading this blog post! I do think you hit the nail on the head insofar as paid ads do not automatically mean conversations. there still is work to be put in in relation to researching keywords. I also agree it is a faster option than SEO, but I do not think paid ads alone will get your business where you want it to be. I will definitely check out your SEO blog post to find out more. The Google billboard in Times Square was also interesting to know, 2.5 million for a months advertising is definitely eye watering.
ReplyDeleteGreat blog post, Ciara! I didn't know that Google rented a largest ad space in Times Square. As you said, you wouldn't expect a company so popular that they've even managed to make the action of using their site into common verb would need to pay to advertise. But if they do, we all do. Great call out on the need for research to be done for paid ads to be effective. While we'd all love to just throw money at a paid ad, you're absolutely right in that it needs to be thought through, the right audience needs to be targeted and with the right message. You hit the nail on the head - paid ads and SEO go hand in hand and will have your business fit in no time. I love a good pun.
ReplyDeleteCiara, I definitely agree that SEO and paid ads coincide. What’s the point of spending money on ads if you haven’t implemented SEO on your website? You can’t have one without the other! Research is an important aspect of paid advertising, to find out the most relevant keywords for your ad to reach your target audience. Interesting to read that Google spent over 5m on traditional advertising on a billboard. Google's paid advertising revenue resulted in $45 billion for 2014, compared to 2021 their paid ads revenue was $177 billion in 2021. So, it just goes to show paid ads have become more popular.
ReplyDeletegreat post
ReplyDeletegreat tips and some excellent takeaways and food for thought.
Caitriona