Common PPC mistakes that can burn you out

In trying to get their businesses in front of their target audience through pay-per-click advertising, businesses, especially startups and small businesses, don’t follow the governing rules of PPC advertising. In the end, they would burn through their budget and cluelessly wonder where they missed it.

Done correctly, pay-per-click can deliver exceptional ROI; on the other hand, it can tear you apart faster than a man drowning in quicksand, and you may end up hating it forever. To protect yourself against this, follow these basic rules:

1. Write advertising texts that do not convert

From a PPC perspective, an ad text consists of a title and a description.

On the Google search page, for example, the title is the text that appears in blue, while the description is the small block of text that follows. Unless he’s a copywriter with solid years of experience converting sales copy, he’s bound to have a hard time creating and engaging copy. Don’t get discouraged, it’s all part of the game.

When writing ad copy:

• Use personal pronouns like “you” generously.

• Less of you and more of them: Telling visitors that you are the best at something is self-sabotage.

• Hit your pain point. Someone who types “acne” into the search box is probably looking for relief: convince them that you can help.

• End with a CTA (call to action): “visit”, “find out”, etc. are good examples

2. Do not specify negative keywords

Negative keywords are keywords that you don’t want your ads to appear for. Let’s say you sold shoes in, say, Orleans, and one of your keywords is “shoes for sale in Orleans.” If a searcher queries Google with, for example, the keyword “kids shoes for sale in Orleans,” your ad will appear immediately, further burning your budget. Since you don’t sell children’s shoes, set “boy” or “kids” as a negative keyword.

Getting the idea?

3. Using the wrong kind of keywords

People who search with search engines do so for two reasons: to find useful information and to find the right product to buy. For this, the keywords are of two types; informational and commercial keywords. “how to fix a broken hammer” is a good example of an informational keyword. “Best web host”, on the other hand, is an example of business keywords.

Unless you want to drive traffic to your website for the sake of it, the informational keyword is perfectly fine. Otherwise, do what is necessary.

4. Don’t remove underperforming keywords

Even seasoned marketers often load their campaigns with keywords that don’t work. However, these are keywords that bring in traffic, but the wrong kind of traffic, or just don’t perform at all. If efficiency means anything to you, remove these keywords.

5. Not specifying keyword matches

Not all search engines will use the exact words you defined as keywords when searching for your products and services. To avoid missing out on these leads, Google AdWords, for example, uses keyword matching to capture these leads.

It is important that you correctly specify the correct keyword matches.

Conclusion

There you have it: 5 tips to help you avoid falling into the traps others fall into. Remember, putting into practice, not just reading and sharing is what matters.