Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising delivers unmatched returns for those mastering this high-ROI digital marketing channel. However, newcomers often stumble out the gates, wasting ad budgets on poorly optimized campaigns doomed to fail.
This definitive guide is your roadmap to PPC success, revealing insider techniques to configure search campaigns, craft compelling ads, track conversion metrics, and operate profitably at scale. We distil actionable recommendations, whether launching your first campaign or seeking to expand into social and mobile channels.
Follow our templated blueprint for achieving remarkable efficiency in managing paid search and display initiatives. Finally, come ready to gain clarity on previously cryptic PPC acronyms and concepts. Or simply refresh forgotten fundamentals now, leveraging the latest 2023 features.
By the end, our frameworks, templates, and expert analysis equips growing brands to generate qualified web traffic, calls, leads, and sales with consistent positive ROI across channels like Google Ads. Let the game-changing digital marketing results begin.
Digital advertising is a rapidly growing, constantly evolving industry. In the era of fast internet and emerging apps, maintaining a high online presence is an absolute necessity. Pay-per-click advertising could be your key to excellent visibility and results.
The spike in online advertising comes from its advanced targeting technology and lower price tag. These days, companies are given more control over their ads and can choose exactly where, when, and to whom the ad is displayed. This makes it much easier to communicate effectively with the intended customer and obtain real results.
Table of Contents
What is Pay Per Click Advertising?
Essentially, pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is a way to buy and boost clicks to your website or blog rather than earning those visits organically.
These ads are strategically placed across the web and designed to attract and engage new, relevant visitors.
Pay-per-click is unique as it involves a cost each time an ad is clicked. Rather than splurging on a billboard and hoping it gets traction – PPC is results-focused, meaning you only pay for the success your ad achieves.
Pay-per-click has been a game changer since it entered the advertising world. Ever wonder how search engines make money? Believe it or not, pay-per-click makes up 99% of Google’s revenue, making it almost the sole provider of Google’s income. Selling vacant spots on search engines, websites, and social media platforms has been pegged as one of the most innovative digital marketing methods to date.
Types of Pay Per Click Advertising
With PPC being such a revolution – it is no surprise that this advertising method has been adapted to suit multiple platforms. While these sites and tactics are distinct in their own right – they all aim towards the same goal: to generate more clicks.
As such, there are many avenues you can explore with pay-per-click advertising:
We will delve into each of these so that you can decide which option is best for you.
Search Advertising
If you are an avid internet user, you will have encountered pay-per-click search ads before.They are an extremely popular ad option, and the most common type of search ad is scattered across Google.
The way it works is that when you search for something, you’ll notice the ads at the top and bottom of the organic results. They are identifiable by their small ‘Ad’ tag in bold.
This is what they typically look like:
PPC ads are always labelled to distinguish them from organic results—an example of search advertising.
By entering the auction to have your business’s ad shown on the results page, you can advertise at the prime time when people search for your product or service. You can create your pay-per-click ad through Google’s AdWords interface, where you can also find help with keyword research and audience targeting.
This form of PPC advertising is a proven method of returning results, plus it saves significant time by bypassing organic rankings that take a long time to earn.
Display Advertising
Display advertising shows your ad across all Google partner websites across the internet.
This differs from search advertising, as you can target specific types of people to see your ads. For example, you can select your target audience or choose people who have previously visited websites similar to yours. You can even handpick relevant industry websites to showcase your ad and appeal to viewers.
As shown at the very top and sides of this example, this is what display advertising looks like:
Ads on an ordinary website are known as display advertising. (Image Credit: belfastlive.co.uk)
Want to know more? Check out our article on display advertising for even more information.
Social Media Advertising
If you want to target people on a social platform, you can do so via Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. You can place your ad directly into your target audience’s newsfeed or social inboxes.
What’s handy is that social media advertising gives the advertiser much control. Any business can use these ads – no matter how big or small your social media following is. You can also be as selective or sharing as you like. One day, you could set up an ad directing people to your website. You could encourage people to fill out lead generation forms the next day.
The main challenge is creating clickable content in a saturated environment. You will compete against personal status updates and other businesses wanting attention. To capture interest, it is key that your imagery and wording are creative, clear and concise, like below:
Successful PPC ads on social media are all about grabbing users’ attention.
Read our complete guide on social media advertising to learn more.
Remarketing
Ever noticed certain products you browse end up following you wherever you go online? That’s called remarketing.
This is a highly effective method of PPC advertising as it retargets people who have already shown a genuine interest in your product or service.
This convenient method could convince the prospective customer to convert and make a purchase by reminding them of this interest.
Here’s a clever example of retargeting from ASOS:
Retargeting means using audience data from one channel to target ads at users on another.
Sequential Marketing
Sequential marketing is similar to retargeting, except with longer staying power.
Instead of just retargeting people in the immediate or short term, you create a longer-term campaign that shows a previous visitor different content as time passes.
This is useful for rolling campaigns, informing people about a series of offers, or telling them a story. It can also be highly beneficial for targeting different audiences and testing messages.
Usually, this method incorporates a ‘we miss you’ or ‘this would look good in your basket’ hook message after you have left a site for some time – similar to the ASOS messaging above. These can pop up on social media sites and other websites.
Google Shopping
This is a highly effective PPC advertising option if you have an ecommerce website.
Often, when you Google something, a series of ready-to-shop products will become available on the search engine results page. They typically look like a carousel, showcasing products related to the searcher’s intent as well as accompanying prices like the example below:
PPC advertising is a particularly popular strategy for ecommerce brands.
This maximises convenience for the customer on their search journey, heightening the chances of the ad being clicked on.
Pay-per-click advertising—no matter the method—is a win-win situation. The search engine or website makes a profit from advertisers renting ad space, advertisers get a more efficient method to display their products/services, and customers find what they are looking for more easily.
Tips on best practices for PPC budgeting and calculating ROI:
Budgeting Approaches
Manual CPM: Manually set a daily budget based on volume and CPM targets
Automated bidding: Let Google algorithms optimize bids to utilization within the overall budget
Portfolio level: Allocate the budget evenly or strategically across campaigns
ROI Calculation
Establish conversion tracking for key goals
Factor in conversion value – email signups, e-commerce orders, etc
Compare ad cost to revenue/value generated
Target a minimum 3-5X ROI for a profitable paid search
Cost Control Techniques
Set daily caps by campaign to align with targets
Use date-based budget scheduling for adjusting over time
Enable bid strategies like ROAS, and CPA to optimize for efficiency
**Ongoing Optimization
Measure product/service profit margins
Identify the highest converting keywords to guide investments
Eliminate low-performing keywords eating budget
Allow 1-2 months to gauge true ROI potential and fine-tune budgets to optimal levels per campaign. Continual optimization helps control CPC prices while boosting conversion rates over time.
Tips for conducting effective keyword research for pay-per-click ads:
Seed Keywords
Identify 2-3 core product or service terms to start
Keyword Groupings
Organize into ad groups around buying stages – broad, top of funnel, product-specific, etc.
Search Volume Filtering
Prioritize keywords with sufficient search volume for visibility
Competition Filtering
Factor in cost per click and ad competition ranking difficulty
Add non-converting terms and irrelevant queries as negatives
Ongoing Expansion
Continually add closely related keywords around those converting well
Blending seed terms with search query mining surfaces the commercial search phrases with qualified traffic potential. Group similar keywords while initially filtering out high-competition terms to contain costs. Expand pockets that deliver converting users over time.
Is Pay Per Click the Wave of the Future?
Advertisers are constantly developing new ideas to showcase their products/services. The wheels of the marketing cart are continually turning; it is a never-ending field of resources to reap.
While it is unlikely that pay-per-click advertising is the be-all and end-all method of marketing, right now, it is one of the best and most cost-effective ways to get your product out there because so many people are online.
Chances are that pay-per-click will continue to evolve with the times, providing new insights that we can’t even imagine exist yet but will probably not be able to live without in the future.
This begs the question: is pay-per-click the perfect advertising method? Realistically, everything has its good and bad sides.
The Good
PPC Is Performance Oriented
As a performance-oriented advertising method, pay-per-click matches the intention of the searcher as well as the objectives of the advertiser. The advertiser only pays if their ad is clicked on, making it cost-efficient and more straightforward to communicate with the potential customer.
The More You Know, The Better
Information is a crucial asset; if you know the market, you can control it. All types of pay-per-click advertising provide extremely useful information for the business, including how many people clicked the ad, how many clicks led to actual sales, what time of day the ad was clicked the most, and the locations of individuals who clicked the ad.
The information provided is of great use to advertisers and would significantly aid in future campaigns.
You Can Localise PPC Ads
One of the most dominant advantages is the ability to choose where the pay-per-click ad appears. If a business runs its operations somewhere in Europe, ads for the company appearing in South America would cost money if people clicked on them without being converted to actual sales. A company can choose the ads to be displayed in the areas where the expected target market would be.
It Boosts Your Online Presence
As stated before, a business’s online presence is crucial. Pay-per-click advertising ensures that your website is targeted and accessible to viewers, helping maintain and grow its online visibility.
The more your business’s name becomes familiar to an audience, the more likely people will click, especially if their first conversion experience is positive and exceeds expectations.
The Bad
Click Fraud
Some website publishers fraudulently use automated scripts to generate clicks on the ads posted to their web pages. These clicks exhaust the advertiser’s marketing budget, and the clicks would never lead to an actual sale since it is a bot doing the clicking.
This happens mostly when advertisers display their PPC ads on disreputable websites. These websites might be related to the product or service the company is trying to sell. Therefore, choosing distinguished and well-known websites with proven track records is advised.
Not Every Click Is a Sale
In a perfect world, one click would be equal to one sale. Unfortunately, this is not true; some may click the ad just to window shop, others might click out of curiosity, and many would click the ad multiple times just to browse without buying anything. This, of course, costs the advertiser money that does not convert into actual sales.
Increase In Keyword Prices
The more popular a keyword is, the higher its price. With the bidding system, a click could cost as much as $100. For example, a country has four telecommunication companies. In an auction between the four companies, each company would seek the bid for the keyword ‘best telecommunication company’, leading to a steep increase in the price of the keyword.
The Risk of Piggybacking
A father giving his child a piggyback ride sounds like a good time for the family. Unfortunately, in the digital marketing world – it is something else entirely. Piggybacking is an unethical practice some companies use to steal customers from their competitors.
This can be achieved when a company uses the competitor’s name as a keyword. When someone is searching for a competitor’s company, the first hit would be the piggybacker, which could potentially steal clients.
Latest mobile and social PPC advertising trends to cover:
Mobile PPC
Mobile PPC spending to surpass desktop, now over 60 percent of total
Mobile-first landing page experience critical for conversions
Expand into app traffic via app install/re-engagement campaigns
YouTube Ads
Video Discovery and Brand Lift emerging ad formats on YouTube
Bumper Machine feeds short video ads in Stories content
Lifetime value (LTV) – Long-term customer value beyond the initial sale
Attribution – Full conversion cycle passenger
ROI – Ultimate profitability indicator
Regularly tracking those core metrics enables assessing what messaging, keywords and landing pages resonate best with audiences and deliver outcomes tied to campaign objectives.
Why PPC Is Dominating the Digital Marketing Scene
Pay-per-click ads were hailed as a revolutionary digital marketing tool. The fact that you only pay when someone clicks your ad helps cut unnecessary advertising costs for advertisers and increase online visibility simultaneously.
With PPC ad campaigns, everyone wins. The advertiser on a budget, the consumers who find what they are looking for faster, and the search engines or sites that make most of their revenue from pay-per-click ads.
When it comes to digital advertising, pay-per-click is easily among the top methods for marketing your product or service online.
Pay Per Click Advertising FAQ
Frequently Asked PPC Advertising Questions:
Q: How much should I budget for PPC ads?
A: Start with $100-500 per month minimum while tracking ROI on keywords.
Q: Which landing page works best for PPC traffic?
A: Dedicated PPC landing pages aligned with ad content and offer the best conversion.
Q: Does pay per click advertising require constant management?
A: Expect at least weekly optimization check-ins to maintain accounts.
Q: Is Google Ads the only PPC platform available?
A: Beyond Google, options include Bing Ads, Amazon Sponsored Products, and increasingly social platforms.
Pay Per Click Advertising Conclusion
Mastering PPC advertising delivers unmatched returns when executed strategically over spraying and praying budget. As with any complex marketing skill, nuances exist around optimizing daily management and extracting full value.
But our guide breaks down key concepts, metrics, ad formats, and platform capabilities, explaining exactly how savvy brands position campaigns for sustainable success. Now familiar with core PPC building blocks, new practitioners can progress confidently forward, avoiding pitfalls.
The primer covered here unlocks the door to a world of qualified traffic, lead generation muscle and trackable sales bound to propel any growing organization. Just be sure to expand skills as the pay-per-click landscape warrants continually.
If you haven’t explored pay-per-click advertising as an option, there could be real benefits for your company waiting to be found. At ProfileTree, we offer extensive digital training services, including PPC training. If you are interested in learning more, contact us here.
In this article, we will break down the question, "What is media buying?"! Whenever you browse the internet, you may stumble upon messages labelled with sponsored...
Digital marketing and information technology have emerged as some of the most in-demand skill sets in today’s economy, offering promising opportunities for growth and advancement. As...
Think about the last product, restaurant, or service provider you searched for online. You probably visited their website or one of their social media accounts. But...
