Ecommerce Pay Per Click Strategies To Maximize Sales
As the arena of online shopping grows to become more crowded than ever, successful eCommerce pay per click strategies have become critical to the success of most businesses. This increasing competition makes it necessary to run dynamic PPC campaigns that help websites to convert. Anyone can set up Google & Facebook Ads, but very few can do it right. What follows is a winning PPC strategy guide for eCommerce sites.
Before The Ads: Steps To Take To Help A Website Convert
- Optimize The Website For Positive User Experience
- User experience is key to the success of any eCommerce business. Potential customers don't want to sit through long load times, messy presentation, and bad navigation. The goal is for people who find the website to stay there and make a purchase.
- Optimize photos for quick load times. We all love high-quality images and videos, but if content takes too long to load once the site is opened, users are going to click away. If Photoshop isn’t an option, one can resize images on sites like TinyPNG or Squoosh, they are viable options for resizing photos without losing image quality.
- Make sure the website's presentation is clean and on point, and most importantly, easy to navigate. Potential customers don't want to be confused by poorly-designed site navigation. Make sure links are clear and easy to find.
- User experience is key to the success of any eCommerce business. Potential customers don't want to sit through long load times, messy presentation, and bad navigation. The goal is for people who find the website to stay there and make a purchase.
- Create A Call To Action on Every Page
- Call To Action (CTAs) are the most important part of any website. The goal is for people navigating a webpage to perform a specific action and putting a constant reminder in front of them is key to making that happen.
- Search Engine Optimization
- Create a symbiosis between website content and the Google Ads that have been launched. Make sure to use the proper keywords to rank for and direct ads to the proper pages. Nothing is a bigger turn-off than clicking on an ad for a product and finding information about something entirely different. Additionally, SEO will help a website rank on its own and allow that website to dominate the search engine results page (SERP).
- Optimize Individual Product Pages
- Most importantly, make product pages look immaculate and modern.
- Good product photography is also very important, ensure that the images of products should be very clear, clean, and well-optimized.
- Use the proper keywords in the product description.
- Write convincing copy to close the sale.
- Highlight the benefits of buying from the site, like online discounts, free shipping, etc.
- Optimize Sites for Mobile Users
- A whopping 61.9% of Google Ads clicks come from mobile devices (via enterpriseappstoday). Optimizing sites for mobile users isn't just an option, it's now a necessity.
Step 1: Finding The Relevant Keywords
Keyword research may seem like a daunting task, but it's the most important part of any eCommerce Pay Per Click Strategy. Thankfully, Google provides all the tools necessary to find the proper keywords for the marketing campaign.
Begin with Google Ads Keyword Planner. Keyword Planner is a powerful tool that uses Google's actual data to show monthly search volume and cost per click for specific keywords. This is an absolute must when setting up shopping campaigns. Keyword selection may seem intuitive at first, but one can quickly discover that the more specific they get the better. For example, "Tee Shirts" as a search string has a search volume of 1k-10, a very high level of competition, and a cost per click (CPC) of $5.13 on the high end. Aside from being a very generic keyword, it has a very high price tag.Focus on what are known as long-tail keywords. These are more descriptive search terms that are usually 3-5 words long. They are more in sync with user intent, as someone entering them knows exactly what they are looking for. Take the above example, if someone is looking for a "red white and black graphic tee shirt", they're searching for something specific that they want. As an added benefit, this search string only has a cost per click of $1.61 on the top end. They can get around 3-4 clicks for the price of one if the selected keyword was "tee shirts". Another great tool for Keyword research is Google Trends. It allows users to explore and analyze the most popular topics on Google by comparing searches and keywords. For example, over the last 12 months, "long sleeve shirts" and "graphic tees" have both seen a 50% rise in search queries. Take advantage of this knowledge when setting up product ads.
Focus on finding negative keywords that shouldn’t be ranked for. A good example of this is "Bulk" if selling individual items, don't waste ad spend on someone looking for bulk products. Another powerful tool for keyword research is Spyfu. This functions as a keyword research tool that lets users see what their competitors are doing and what keywords they are utilizing for their pay-per-click campaigns.
Step 2: Setting Up Ads
Once the keyword strategy has been decided on, it's time to set up Google PPC ads. The first step in this process is to define ad objectives, as an eCommerce business, the best option is to choose a "Sales Campaign".
The next step in setting up Google Ad is selecting a campaign type. There are a few different options that are viable.
For eCommerce businesses, we suggest using Shopping Performance Max Ads. The reason is that shopping ads will put products right in front of people looking for the exact product. To run Google Shopping Ads (as well as take advantage of free product listings), set up a Merchant Center account to get the products into Google.This is an example of Google Shopping Ads.
Performance Max Ads have seen a recent push by Google as the recommended ad type for eCommerce businesses. Google began automatically transferring existing Smart Shopping campaigns to Performance Max campaigns in July 2022. It functions as every type of Google ad in one.
Consider setting up a branding campaign, a competitor campaign, and a remarketing campaign.
- Branding Campaigns target keywords related to the brand. (Ex. brand name, part of the brand name, etc.)
- Competitor campaigns target keywords related to competitors. (Ex. Target, Walmart, & Amazon)
- Remarketing campaigns target people who have clicked on the site in the past.
These campaigns help to maximize search traffic through PPC ads and are tried and proven methods of advertising on the Google platform.
Step 3: Set A budget
Once the keyword list and what kind of ads will be running have been determined, it's time to figure out a marketing budget. The rule of thumb is to multiply the cost per click (CPC) by 30.4 (the average number of days in the month) to get a daily bid budget.
Step 4: Determine The Target Audience
One key to getting more sales is to pick the right target audience as part of an eCommerce PPC strategy. Find audiences particular to the niche and set their location, age, interests, and other demographics as well. This is an example of a target audience for a sports supplement eCommerce business.
Step 5: After The Ads – Using Google Analytics for Dynamic Performance
The job is not finished once the ad is launched – that's only the beginning! A key part of eCommerce pay per click strategy should be ad maintenance using Google Analytics. This powerful tool allows users to see the real data behind their campaigns.
- What demographics are clicking ads?
- Where are they?
- What pages are they going to?
- Where are they exiting the website?
- Where are they coming from?
- What are the click-through rates?
- What is the Google PPC ad's conversion rate?
These analytics allow users to adjust their target audience accordingly until they find their ideal audience and reach their marketing goals. The key to a successful PPC ad campaign is that it's dynamic and reactive. Find what's working and what isn't using Google Analytics and adjust. Google Analytics Snapshot at a glance.
Social Media eCommerce Pay Per Click Strategy
Most Social Media platforms allow for PPC advertising. This includes Facebook, Instagram, and Tik Tok, which are currently the three most popular. However, we find Facebook & Instagram to be the platforms recommended for businesses to start with.We recommend creating a sales campaign to sell key products directly from social media ads. Sales ads will look like this Instagram.
Set up demographics specific to the brand’s target audience with interests in its niche. Make sure to target the following:
- People that have engaged with Instagram and Facebook accounts
- People that have visited the website in the last x days
- Social media followers
- Custom audience with email subscribers
Once one has defined the target audience interest, age, and behaviors, the ad will begin to display across Facebook & Instagram in a variety of placements to those more likely to engage with it. Sales ads will look like this on Facebook.
Let Pacific54 Create a Dynamic eCommerce Pay Per Click Strategy!
Pacific54 is an aggressive digital marketing agency with a team of PPC experts to help ads convert. We will get businesses more online sales through our dynamic digital marketing campaigns and reactive approach to analytics. Our results speak for themselves. We are an official Google Partner with experience in a wide variety of digital marketing channels. From PPC to content marketing, and social media marketing, Pacific54 handles everything needed for an online business to grow. Let's talk. Contact us today.
