Paid search and social media advertising have taken off in recent years, with 65% of small businesses engaging in PPC (pay-per-click) marketing. The most popular platforms for PPC marketing include Google Ads, Facebook and programmatic display campaigns. Each channel has its own set of ad copy considerations, and the most successful brands are the ones that find a balance between the channel’s copy best practices and crafting copy to target each specific segment of their audience.
In short, you need to craft the right message for the right audience in the right way for each campaign. Sounds simple enough, right? Here’s what to keep in mind before you put pen to paper (or fingertip to keyboard).
Know the Metrics to Track the Success of Your Copy Strategy
A good ad copy strategy is one that makes your company money. That’s obvious. Google Ads campaigns tend to earn an average revenue of $2 for every $1 spent. But multiple steps occur between a potential buyer seeing your ad and then processing their payment. Metrics such as click-through-rates and impressions also matter.
As you’re devising your copy strategy, you’ll want to keep your key performance indicators in mind so that you can modify and improve your ad copy with each campaign. Google, Facebook and other advertising platforms make it easy to track analytics such as the following:
- Impressions, or the number of people who see your ad
- Click-through-rates (CTR), or the number of people who click on the ad
- Cost-per-click, or how much you spend each time someone clicks
These first two statistics can be very revealing. If you’re not using the right keywords, you may experience low CTRs. Likewise, if you aren’t getting enough eyes on your ads, you may want to choose more frequently searched terms.
Money Matters: Tracking Conversion Rates
Ultimately, a successful copy strategy leads to conversions and then into sales on your website. It’s important to keep an eye on how much each conversion costs. Think about how much each sale costs in advertising dollars.
Are you using retargeting, enticing customers to click on ads more than once to drive them further down the sales funnel and land the sale? Retargeting can be an effective way to earn new customers, but it also means that each conversion costs more money, as you’re paying for multiple clicks. Keep your eye on the numbers and modify your ad copy and your strategy to improve your total conversion value using these tips.
Keep an Eye on Competitors’ Copy Strategy
Use all the tools at your disposal to create a successful copy strategy. Software such as Ahrefs can help you find the best keywords based on search engine results pages and your competitors’ ads.
Once you know the keywords your competitors are using, find the ones that are the best fit for your business. It’s best if you can find words with a moderate search volume but lower competition if you’re just starting to dabble in paid search advertising. If you’re going head-to-head with others in the same industry, you’ll need to make sure your ad copy stands out.
Every word matters when you’re trying to write ad copy that converts. But some words are more impactful than others in the short amount of time you have to gain someone’s attention.
Tweak Your Headlines for Greater Success
Your headline represents the single most important piece of copy in your ad. Including your keyword in the headline helps people know that you’re offering exactly what they searched for and may also help search engine results. But you also want to include your company’s value proposition in the headline.
Are you offering a 50% off deal? Do you offer more choices than competitors do? Do you offer the fastest delivery? Work your value proposition — or what sets you apart — into a short, snappy headline of just a few words that also includes your keyword. Make sure to try and test variants of headlines to see which resonate with your audience and boost your click-through-rate (CTR).
Include These Tactics in Your Ad Copy
Once you’ve pinned down the perfect headline, you need to create compelling ad copy that shows your audience you understand their needs and can solve their problem. The best way? Include the word “you” in your ad copy and focus on the benefits of your product.
Social proof is also a powerful way to entice people to click through and make a purchase. Show your audience how you’ve solved problems for people just like them. You can share some of the following:
- Testimonials from satisfied customers
- User-generated content
- Photos of customers
- Website reviews
- Quotes from media coverage
If you can share data or statistics, that’s preferable to simply making claims.
Leave PPC to the Pros for Better Results
Creating the appropriate copy strategy, writing effective ad copy, and executing it for best results requires highly specialized knowledge and established processes. Each ad campaign should start with an audit to determine your goals, where you are now, and what’s worked in the past.
It often helps to turn to a professional outsourced marketing team to assist with your ad copy strategy and PPC campaigns. Hawke Media can help with paid search, paid social, and more to help you boost your ROI. Find out more here with a free consultation.
Dawn Allcot is full-time freelance writer and content marketing specialist who frequently covers marketing, e-commerce, finance, real estate, and technology. She is also the owner and founder of GeekTravelGuide.net, a travel and lifestyle website.
Sources
Clutch.co- Small Business SEO in 2017: A Survey
Statista.com – Global market share of search engines 2010 – 2021
LinkedIn.com/Pulse – 2020 PPC Statistics
Volusion – 9 PPC Metrics You Absolutely Need to Track