Earlier this year, Google had over 272 million visitors in the US. With this kind of reach, the chances of users seeing and possibly clicking on a Google ad are high. So if you’re planning to spend on paid advertising, you’ll get your money’s worth on Google Ads—that is, if you do things right.
Other businesses will be doing the same thing. To stay ahead of the competition, you’ll need a Google Ads strategy that maximizes its built-in tools and features, like natural language search, smart bidding, responsive search ads, and customer match.
Natural Language Search
With search engines becoming more intuitive, people have changed how they use them. Over the past few years, Google has found a rise in personalized searches that are more conversational and specific to the user’s intent. For instance, instead of just searching for “best gaming laptop,” users now say “what gaming laptop should I buy,” “should I buy a gaming laptop,” and “best gaming laptop for me.”
Here’s why:
- Voice search has been reported to account for 20% of Google search traffic on mobile. When vocalizing search queries, people most likely use conversational language instead of short keywords.
- Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers (BERT) is a model that Google uses to provide relevant results for longer search queries. With this, Google Search can now understand the nuances of conversational searches. Instead of processing the search word-by-word in order, Google will read it in its full context.
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As consumers become more conversational with their searches, marketers need to optimize their Google Ads strategy for Natural Language Search (NLS). Consider building a keyword list of both long-tail and short-tail keywords with more natural phrases that might be of interest to your customers.
When Kiehl’s saw an increase in search interest for skin care, they optimized their Google Search strategy by including non-branded keywords, such as “toner for oily skin.” They found that non-branded keywords got 5X more search interest than branded keywords with “Kiehl’s.” By incorporating this strategy, Kiehl’s search campaign resulted in a 20% increase in website traffic and a 27% increase in online sales.
Pro Tip #
With Google incorporating NLS, ads with long-tail keywords relevant to the searcher’s query rank higher than those with repeated short-tail keywords.
Smart Bidding
Google Ads uses a bidding system where you can set a bid amount you’re willing to spend for a click on your ad. Smart Bidding is an automated bid strategy that uses advanced machine learning, which has the following benefits:
- Its machine learning algorithms take into account a wider range of parameters than when computed manually by a person or a team. With the data gathered, you can make more accurate predictions about your bidding strategy.
- It has auction-time bidding that factors various identifiable user attributes. You can adjust your bids based on the device they’re using, their physical location, language preferences, browser, operating system, and more.
- It offers performance reporting tools to give you insight into your strengths and areas of improvement. For instance, Smart Bidding can send alerts and notifications to flag conversion issues and also provide steps on how to fix them.
When creating a campaign on Google Ads, you can choose from several bid strategies suited for different advertising goals and campaigns.
| Smart Bidding Strategy | Goals |
|---|---|
| Target cost per action (CPA) | Increase conversions while targeting a specific CPA |
| Target return on ad spend (ROAS) | Increase conversion value based on your target ROA |
| Maximize Conversions | Increase conversion within your specified budget without a target CPA. Google automatically sets the most valuable bid while spending within your budget. |
| Maximize Conversion Value | Increase conversion value within your specified budget without a target ROA. Google will adjust its spending to maximize conversion value while staying within your average daily budget. |
FishingBooker ran a series of tests to see the effectiveness of Smart Bidding in helping them manage their growing account. They found that taking a manual approach in executing their marketing campaigns takes too much time and, consequently, leads to lower conversion rates.
Initially, they had manually delivered their marketing messages according to keywords, customer location, and the type of device their customers used. After the tests, they found that Smart Bidding resulted in significant improvements beyond faster processes: a 49% increase in ROAS, a 65% increase in profit for selected campaigns, and a 44% increase in conversion rates.
Pro Tip #
Use data exclusion to prevent conversion tracking issues. It ignores all data gathered on dates when you’ve encountered tagging issues and website outages.
Responsive Search Ads
Responsive search ads (RSA) help a brand reach its target customers by matching its ads to its prospects’ search terms. By entering multiple headlines and descriptions, Google Ads will automatically create ad combinations and show the most relevant ones depending on a user’s search query. For instance, it may put particular texts in your ad in bold.
RSA provides the following benefits:
- They automatically tailor your headline and descriptions to match your customers’ attributes, such as their physical location, locations of interest, age range, and gender
- Using multiple headlines and descriptions helps you reach more prospects and compete in more auctions.
- Google Ads automatically shows the headline and description combinations that are most relevant to your customers.
- Your ads can adapt to various device widths.
To connect with your target audience, you need to adapt to users’ interests and search queries. Enfagrow A+ used RSAs to achieve this. Google’s machine-learning algorithms automatically created ad variations that helped the brand provide information relevant to their customer base’s queries. This resulted in a 50% higher click-through rate while lowering their cost per click by 34%.
Pro Tip #
The more headlines, the more options Google Ads has for creating ad variations. You can do this by highlighting your product benefits, including your shipping and returns information, or using a different call to action (CTA).
Customer Match
Customer match builds an audience list based on the customer information you’ve gathered. With this, you can build a paid search campaign that targets your existing customers or similar audiences. When your customer match segment signs in to their Google account, they can see your ads whenever they browse on YouTube, Google, Search, and Display. Here’s how you can grow your business with Customer Match:
- Market and cross-sell other products or services to your existing customers
- Create ads specifically designed to move prospects down the sales funnel
- Helps you connect with your customers and manage them without relying on cookies
- Find and acquire new customers similar to your existing ones
As a large children’s clothing retailer, The Children’s Place utilized Customer Match to reach more customers and increase conversions while also improving cost efficiency.
The Children’s Place wanted to reach parents who hadn’t visited their website since purchasing from them in the previous year. For the back-to-school season, they used Customer Match alongside their tailored non-brand campaigns. Upon targeting that particular customer segment, they then adjusted their bids with a core message of helping parents find the right back-to-school outfits for their kids.
As a result, the brand saw the following improvements:
- 287% higher ROI
- 40% decrease in cost-per-click (CPC)
- 237% increase in click-through rate (CTR)
- 153% increase in conversion rate (CVR)
Moving forward, The Children’s Place plans to incorporate Customer Match into their next back-to-school campaign for other customer segments, such as credit card holders, recent purchasers, and their “Best Customers.”
Pro Tip #
To create a large list size, upload all available information in the right format. This includes email addresses, mobile devices, phone numbers, and physical addresses.
Google has the reach and authority to help improve your paid strategy. Use the Google Ads best practices above and adjust your strategy as you go. Adding the help of Magic, you can have all the right tools and talent to optimize your Google Ads campaign while being cost-effective.
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