Pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns have become a cornerstone strategy for businesses looking to drive qualified traffic, increase conversions, and achieve a high return on investment (ROI). And Google Ads is often the go-to PPC platform for small business owners and digital marketers. However, while Google provides a robust platform with powerful tools, it’s crucial to approach its PPC optimization recommendations and automated account suggestions with caution.
This blog post will explore why you should not trust Google to optimize your digital ad campaigns and provide actionable tips to enhance your PPC ads performance.
The Problem with Google’s Automated Suggestions
Google Ads offers automated recommendations designed to optimize your campaigns. These suggestions, often powered by artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms, can appear beneficial at first glance. However, they usually come with pitfalls leading to inflated ad spend and suboptimal campaign performance.
Google’s Recommendations Often Increase Your Budget
One glaring issue with Google’s suggestions is that they frequently involve increasing your budget. For instance, Google might recommend raising your daily ad spend or bidding higher on specific keywords to gain more impressions. While this may boost your visibility and traffic, it doesn’t guarantee more leads or a better return on investment (ROI).
Google’s AI Isn’t Perfect
Another concern is that Google’s advanced AI is not infallible. Its automation can misinterpret data, making ill-suited recommendations. Issues such as over-reliance on broad match keywords and automated bidding strategies like Maximize Conversion Value and Target ROAS (Return on Ad Spend) can lead to wasted budget and poor campaign performance if they are not set up correctly.
One of our clients had made that mistake. Google Ads suggested changing their already working strategy, which created new account performance problems. Usually, Target ROAS can be a great automated bidding strategy if each of your conversions is marked with the proper value of each lead. In the case of Urban Exhale Massage, it was not a good decision to accept the recommended bidding strategy changes—the wrong conversion values were set, and that’s why they overpaid for leads.
Gaming or deflating the value of your conversions won’t work either.
The other issue is that in their settings, they had allowed Google to make all suggested settings changes even if they ignored them. That can also get you in quite a bit of trouble.
Small Changes, Big Results: The Urban Exhale Case Study
Let’s take a closer look at how we worked with Urban Exhale Massage to reverse Google’s suggested changes and achieve remarkable performance improvements after only one month of professional optimization support.
The Challenge
Urban Exhale’s owner, Micah Haines, faced difficulty managing their Google Ads account, leading to a high cost per acquisition (CPA) and inefficient ad spend. They needed a strategic overhaul to optimize their campaigns for better performance.
Our Strategy
In just one month, JB Media Group conducted a full audit of the Google Ads account, identified ineffective keywords, and paused them. We also fixed the tag settings on conversions and changed the automated bidding strategy from the Google-suggested ROAS setting to the Target CPA option.
Tactics Employed
- Keyword Optimization: Cleaned up the keyword lists and removed ineffective keywords
- Conversion Value Adjustment: Adjusted the conversion value to reflect proper costs
- Bidding Strategy: Manually switched to a more appropriate and successful bidding strategy
Results
The results were nothing short of impressive:
- 63.16% Increase in Conversions
- 51.33% Reduction in CPAs
- 51.43% Increase in Conversion Rates
- $0.76 Decrease in Average Cost-per-click (CPC)
- 7.74% Increase in Clicks
- 4.40% Increase in Impressions
- 3.20% Increase in Click-through Rate (CTR)
- 20.59% Decrease in Ad Spend
By focusing on effective keyword management, strategic bid adjustments, and conversion optimization, Urban Exhale achieved more leads for a lower cost, all while spending less budget.
>> Read the full case study to learn more.
Proven Strategies for Effective PPC Campaigns
Instead of relying solely on Google’s automated suggestions, here are some proven strategies to effectively optimize your PPC campaigns for lead generation and conversions.
1. Add New Search Ads and Refine Ad Copy
Regularly updating and A/B testing your ad copy can significantly impact your campaign’s CTR and conversion rate. Craft compelling, relevant ads that resonate with your target audience.
2. Conduct Thorough Keyword Research
Use search engine optimization (SEO) tactics to find high-performing keywords and add them to your campaigns. Simultaneously, monitor irrelevant or underperforming search queries and include them as negative keywords to prevent wasted ad spend. Keep in mind: while broad match keywords can capture a wide audience, exact match keywords ensure your ads appear for highly relevant search queries, increasing your chances of conversion.
3. Optimize Your Landing Pages
Ensure your landing pages are optimized for conversions. A well-designed landing page with a clear call-to-action (CTA) can dramatically improve your conversion rate and lower your CPC. Design landing pages optimized for user experience and tailored to drive specific actions, such as filling out a form or making a purchase. Be sure to implement best practices for on-site SEO.
4. Prioritize Quality Score
A higher quality score can lead to lower CPC and better ad placements. Focus on relevant keywords and search terms, high-quality ad copy, and optimized landing pages to improve your quality score.
5. Focus on Conversion Metrics
Prioritize optimizing for conversions rather than clicks. Use bidding strategies like Target CPA or Maximize Conversions, and only use Target ROAS if you have e-commerce tracking or the absolute known value per lead. Utilize PPC tools like Google Analytics, Google Ads Keyword Planner, SEMrush, and Moz to gain deeper insights into your PPC performance and identify areas for improvement.
6. Implement Ad Extensions
Ad extensions, such as sitelink and call extensions, can enhance your ads’ visibility and provide additional opportunities for engagement, leading to higher CTR and better ad performance.
7. Set Up Conversions Tracking in GA4 with Google Tag Manager
Ideally, do this before you run any campaigns, especially anything that is paid. It might be intimidating to do alone, but you can always hire a web developer to complete this for you. It’s worth it because without tracking your data correctly, it will be like throwing darts in a room with the lights out.
8. Monitor Campaign Performance Regularly
Regularly review your campaign metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs), such as CTR, conversion rate, and CPA. Adjust your strategies based on performance data to continually optimize your campaigns.
9. Implement Remarketing
Remarketing allows you to target users who have previously interacted with your website but did not convert. This can significantly improve your conversion rate and lower your CPA.
Achieve Success with Optimized Google Ads Campaigns
While Google Ads provides a powerful platform for running PPC advertising campaigns, it’s crucial not to rely solely on their automated suggestions. By implementing proven optimization strategies, you can significantly improve your campaign performance, as demonstrated by the success of Urban Exhale Massage.
Remember, small changes can lead to big results. Focus on adding new ads, refining ad copy, conducting thorough keyword research, and optimizing for conversions to maximize your ROI.
Ready to take your PPC campaign optimization to the next level and find the right audience? Contact JB Media Group today to learn how we can help you achieve your digital marketing goals.
