If you are just starting with advertising on Google or have been running ads for some time now but have a small monthly budget, this blog post is for you. I will be sharing some quick yet useful Google Adwords optimization tips that will help you get the most value from your investment.
Let’s get started!
1. Run Only the Most Relevant and Specific Keywords
Since you have a small budget, you must spend it on keywords that have more chances to convert at a higher rate.
While you can definitely reach a bigger audience with generic keywords, they almost always convert at low rates and high CPAs. It is mainly because they are more informational in nature, have low commercial/transactional intent, and have high search volumes.
On the other hand, specific keywords describe something in greater detail. They usually have lower search volume than generic keywords but have more potential to generate conversions. Long tail keywords make great specific keywords.
Example:
Generic keyword: user generated content (informational in nature) | Specific keyword: user generated content platform (commercial in nature)
So stick with more specific keywords rather than generic ones when you have a small budget.
2. Consider Running Only Phrase and Exact Matches
Similar to generic keywords, broad match keywords can prove to be costly. If you are just starting with Google Ads with a small budget, go with phrase and exact matches as the traffic they generate is usually more relevant. Broad match, on the other hand, may attract irrelevant traffic.
If you really want to run broad match keywords, run modified broad match (format: +marketing +automation +platform) as it provides more control than broad match.
3. Have a Custom Ad Schedule
Having a custom ad schedule instead of running your ads all day can really help when you have a small budget. For example, if you are a B2B company, running your ads from 8am to 8pm only on weekdays maybe a good idea.
Similarly, if you receive less inquiries or orders on any particular day(s) of the week or during a particular time period, you can reduce your bids or even consider pausing your ads at those times.
4. Use a Dedicated Landing Page
Not having a landing page while having a small budget will drain your money. A landing page is designed especially to generate leads.
You should never point your ads to your homepage or any internal website page if it doesn’t have an offer relevant to the visitor, relevant messaging and content, a lead gen form, and a proper CTA. A landing page, on the other hand, has all these things.
5. Add Negative Keywords
Irrelevant keywords can eat your budget. The way to stop your ads from appearing on irrelevant keywords is adding them as negative keywords. If you are on a small budget, you must spend time on adding negative keywords.
You should add negative keywords right when you launch a campaign. You can find them while doing your initial keyword research.
Additionally, you should add negative keywords regularly while running the campaigns. You can find them in search terms report. While Google has started hiding search terms data, it still shows somewhere around 30% – 60% of total search terms.
6. Run Remarketing Campaigns
Remarketing campaigns are used to target people who have already visited your website earlier. To run remarketing campaigns, you have to first create audiences in Google Ads or Google Analytics.
Remarketing campaigns always have lower CPCs compared to search campaigns and that’s what makes them worth trying. If you have a small budget, remarketing campaigns can help you generate clicks and leads at much lower costs.
7. Stick to Manual Bidding
Google has been pushing its automated bidding methods and it really appeals to people who are managing their campaigns themselves. Maximize clicks, maximize conversions, target CPA, target ROAS are all automated bidding methods. All these methods are useful only when you have a lot of accurate historical performance data.
The more data you have, the better it will be for Google’s systems to decide when and where your ad should be shown and what your bid should be at the auction time.
If your campaigns are not old enough (at least a year; the more the better) and don’t have accurate historical data, automated bidding methods are not right for you. Manual bidding, on the other hand, provides more control which is what you want when you have a small budget.
It is important to optimize your campaigns smartly when you have a small budget. Otherwise you will end up losing money. Following the above explained Google Adwords optimization tips will definitely help you make your campaigns profitable.