Paid Search, also commonly known as Search Engine Marketing (SEM) or Pay-Per-Click (PPC), is a form of online advertising where you pay a certain amount to have your business website displayed on a search engine result page (SERP) when a user keys in specific keywords or phrases in the search engine.
One common tool that many professional marketers use is Google Ads. Google Ads allows marketers to pay to get their websites towards, or at the top of the Google Search Engine's rankings.
Paid Search can have many advantages for your business. Some of the more common benefits of Paid Search are:
- It is Cost Effective: Through Paid Search with Google Ads, your business is only charged on a per-click basis. This means that you will not be required to pay just because someone saw your ad for a few seconds, rather you will only be charged if your ad is engaged with (through clicks).
- Expanded Reach: Using Paid Search with Google Ads, you are not limited to your already existing customer base. Paid Search offers the advantage of targeting users that are not already familiar with your brand.
- Fulfills Business Goals: Paid Search is extremely helpful in fulfilling business goals such as lead generation, e-commerce sales, brand exposure, and more. By getting your website to the top of SERPs, these goals can naturally be met.
- Low Barrier to Entry: With SEO, lots of time and effort must be spent to get your websites to the top of SERPs organically. However, in Paid Search there is an opportunity for your businesses to hit great marks in a much shorter period of time.
Google Ads as a tool allows marketers to achieve these benefits and more. With the integration of Google Analytics involved, Google Ads allows us to make detailed insights into the effectiveness of our Paid Search.
There are three crucial aspects of Paid Search Advertising that every marketer should try to nail down. These include:
- Keywords: In order to run Paid Search, you must submit a list of keywords or search terms that your ad will be displayed on. Keywords are anything that a user enters into a search bar on a search engine like Google. Making sure you submit accurate and relevant keywords is extremely important for Paid Search Advertising.
- Ads: The next step towards producing effect Paid Search Advertising is making sure your ad is engaging and enticing towards your audience. Once a web user enters your linked keyword, your ad must then draw that user in and have them click on your website link.
- Landing Pages: Finally, once an internet user clicks on your Paid Search Ad, you must get them to convert in some way. This could be submitting a lead form, purchasing your product, or something else, but making sure that your landing page is engaging and has some sort of call to action is important.
At the end of the day, Paid Search Advertising stems down to how well you can manage these three aspects to boost conversions.
