Pay-Per-Click Advertising Archives

In News

Where Franchisors are Headed in the Marketing World

March 24, 2022 No Comments

People are wondering whether pay-per-click advertising is dying out.

In the marketing spend budgets of most franchisors, PPC – “pay-per-click” – advertising is a vital part of their overall digital strategy to enhance lead-generation efforts. To the untrained eye, and even a few of the trained ones, PPC can be a study in contradictions. Is it expensive? It can be. Is it effective? Some studies seem to indicate so. Is it a labour-intensive resource? Yes, unless you’re using a digital platform that manages the PPC on your behalf. Is that expensive? Well… you get the picture.

Two decades ago, the advent of Google AdWords began, introducing online ad campaigns where you only paid for consumer clicks. One of PPC’s early benefits was the ability to closely track and monitor the metrics that defined the campaign’s success rate in converting leads. It’s still much the same today, but the digital landscape has evolved quite considerably since the year 2000.

So where are franchisors headed with PPC in a post-pandemic world?

A competitive bid process means higher prices

The steady increase of brands participating in the PPC craze eventually led to a bid-based system for high-performing keywords. Competition to secure the best placement for your PPC ads has noticeably driven up the cost, but it hasn’t necessarily translated to increased conversion rates. Getting top-paid search placements (and results) has become a hotly contested process.

A short-sighted view

It’s been said that PPC ads give brands a great shot at a one-time customer — not exactly a great long-term acquisition strategy. B2B customers — such as franchisors looking to attract franchisees — often struggle to display the right content to reel in an interested candidate. Unlike consumer brands, the format and limitations of PPC ads offer limited opportunities to close an immediate sale.

Should franchisors ditch pay-per-click advertising altogether? Most digital advertising experts caution patience. For franchisors still engaged in the once tried-and-true PPC space, here are some post-pandemic trends to consider.

Automation to the rescue?

With as many intricate details and moving parts as a PPC, it should come as no surprise that digital ad campaigns might be better suited for automation. In an environment rife with data-driven decisions, AI, machine learning and algorithms seem to match up well with successful PPC campaign requirements. For the most part, most brands have left human marketers in charge of these automated smart programs, mainly to oversee the emotional factors of insight and strategy.

Integration means optimization

If marketing mixes were comparable to a basic cable lineup, PPC is still but one channel on the dial. And integrating paid ads to work in concert with other channels such as PR, SEO, social media and organic content development may prove to be a winning strategy. PPC isn’t supposed to be siloed and once these campaigns are integrated across the full spectrum of marketing options, a clearer ROI picture should emerge as to their effectiveness in the future.

In summary, PPC can still be a viable component of any brand’s digital marketing spend. Some studies reveal that people who click on PPC ads are twice as likely to make a purchase as an organic visitor to the site. When compared to the myriad of other marketing channels and their varying rates of effectiveness, any belief that PPC is dying out may still be up for a healthy debate.

By Jeff Cheatham

Jeff Cheatham is a regular contributor for Entrepreneur and the founder and CEO of Creative Content, a full-service copywriting and public relations firm. He’s based in Dallas and works with multiple B2B clients and over a dozen franchise brands to develop proprietary content campaigns for lead-generation and sales development programs. https://creativecontent-llc.com/

Sourced from Franchise 500

In News

How To Build A Digital Marketing Strategy For Businesses Targeting Growth In 2021

April 23, 2021 No Comments

By Valery Kurilov

2020 was a very challenging year for everyone, with Covid-19 causing the global economy to plummet. As a result, brick-and-mortar companies and businesses with a limited online presence had to seriously consider their digital marketing strategy.

However, many businesses jumped on the bandwagon without carefully planning out their strategy. So, they ended up blowing their budget on driving traffic through ads without first building a solid foundation—an optimized website.

Now is the time, more than ever, to master your digital marketing strategy to get your business in front of more eyes. But strap yourself in for a journey rather than a two-stop trip—digital marketing is not a one-off effort, but rather an ongoing objective that needs daily monitoring.

So, what steps should you take to get your digital marketing campaign off the ground?

1. Highly Optimized, Mobile-Friendly, Scalable Online Environment

I could’ve simply said that you need a website, but what you need is an online environment that is secure, has a clear structure and works fast.

Here are three vitally important things any modern website needs:

• Speed: Create a clear site structure so that people can quickly find what they need. And with Google confirming that Core Web Vitals will be ranking signals in May 2021, you must pay extra attention to how users experience the speed, responsiveness and visual stability of your site’s pages.

• Mobile-Friendliness: Desktop searches fell behind mobile back in 2017, with over 55% of global web traffic now falling on mobile devices. Moreover, mobile is no longer a growing trend, but the norm, especially in Asia, Africa and Latin America. If your website isn’t optimized for mobile, don’t even think about going online.

• Security: Web security is critical in preventing hackers and cyber-thieves from getting access to sensitive data, including that of your users. Without a proactive security strategy and an HTTPS connection, businesses risk the development of malware attacks and attacks on other sites, networks and so on.

Search engine optimization (SEO) isn’t easy, but it’s essential when it comes to digital marketing. Don’t think that a set-it-and-forget-it approach will work here. You need to be consistent so that potential customers can always find your website for relevant searches.

2. Get On Google My Business

Another way to help customers find you is through Google My Business (GMB).

Google My Business puts your details where potential customers can find them more easily. It also puts your business on Google Maps where it can be reviewed. This can also ensure your business is ranking on the map alongside other similar businesses, giving you a massive boost in visibility, thanks to the Google Local Pack. Optimizing a GMB account is trickier than it looks to begin with. But there are plenty of sources online that provide extensive guides on this topic.

3. Social Media Profiles And Activity

Besides being on Google, you need to actively engage your audience on social media. Think of the difference between eating at a chain restaurant or at a small local one. You never see chefs at restaurant chains, but at your local diner, if a chef talks to you, you find out more about the place and the ingredients used, and unless the food’s awful, you’re likely to spread the word and go back. As a small business, this is the approach you need to take on social networks: Actually talk to and engage with your customers.

Learn what social media platform is popular among your potential customers and get on it too. The most obvious option, Facebook, even has tools for promoting business pages to segmented audiences. If your clients use Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and Instagram, expand your presence there too. This is something business owners may need help with, as the most effective way to grow an audience on social media is to consistently create and publish interesting, engaging content.

And if your audience has migrated to newer platforms like TikTok or Clubhouse, try them out. The point is, follow your audience to attract the right traffic.

4. Figure Out What’s Right For Your Business: SEO Or PPC

Before making a decision, assess your financial capabilities and understand if you need to go for search engine optimization, pay-per-click advertising or both at the same time.

SEO and PPC are both digital marketing strategies that ultimately get your site to appear on Google page one. But to yield positive results, both strategies need a lot of expertise, tech knowledge and a marketing budget.

PPC is perfect for quick sales if you have a new website that isn’t performing well in organic search, if you think you have a great product/service and want to test it out or if you have reasonable profit margins.

On the flip side, SEO is what you need if you’re looking for long-term growth and can afford to invest in it, if you want to build up your brand over time or if you want to optimize your marketing costs.

Unlike with paid advertising, once you start ranking at the top of Google searches using SEO, you’ll start driving high-quality traffic to your business at no cost. In PPC, you won’t get any clicks if you don’t regularly fork over a small fortune.

Alternatively, you can choose to do SEO and PPC at the same time. This totally depends on your opportunities.

Everything covered here is fundamental to boosting your business’s online visibility. For businesses new to digital marketing, these steps may feel huge to begin with, but once you get the hang of it, it will seem as natural as wearing a seatbelt in a car. With the right set of tools—a well-optimized website, a Google My Business account, an active social media presence and constantly-published engaging content—you can drive web traffic, generate new sales and even get customers to fall in love with your brand.

Feature Image Credit: getty

By Valery Kurilov

Co-Founder & CEO at SE Ranking, Serial Investor, IT Entrepreneur with 10+ years of experience in marketing and software development. Read Valery Kurilov’s full executive profile here.

Sourced from Forbes

In News

How to Combine Outbound & Inbound Marketing [Examples & Ideas]

June 7, 2019 No Comments

By Mark Schmukler

All marketers do it differently. From in-house departments and big-box firms to HubSpot agencies and boutique operations, all marketers have the freedom to enact their own approach and execute their favorite tactics. New trends are constantly emerging in attempt to keep up with changing customer preferences, and as marketers, we have creative freedom to satisfy those demands in our own way.

In this inbound-obsessed era, it can seem like there’s no room for traditional “outbound” marketing. However, focusing all marketing dollars on inbound causes us to miss opportunities to make meaningful connections through traditional tactics. As a result, more marketers are employing an integrated marketing approach that combines inbound, through platforms like HubSpot, with outbound tactics.

Not sold yet? Let’s look at the advantages these tried-and-true outbound tactics bring to modern marketers, as well as how to execute them. Then, we’ll show you how these tactics integrate with inbound strategies to generate a higher return on marketing investment (ROMI).

1. Event Marketing

When it comes to event marketing, it’s a classic case of “you had to be there.” Special events and tradeshows occupy a specific marketing niche that new technologies and internet content simply can’t touch. The live demonstrations and in-person interactions of a tradeshow allow for a special kind of engagement where prospects can really get to know, and understand, what a company has to offer.

Tradeshows play an even larger role in B2B marketing, where businesses can connect with companies and establish a personal relationship with the decision-maker before a purchase. In fact, 46% of B2B marketers place tradeshows and events in their top sources of sales and marketing leads.

To be successful with event marketing, companies need:

design and marketing help so that their tradeshow materials (banners, business cards, leave-behinds and promotional items) look attractive, on-brand and cohesive
to frequently refresh their materials so they’re in-step with changes to brand appearance and contain up-to-date information
to develop new, engaging ways of obtaining leads, such as by having QR codes on tradeshow materials that allow prospects to use their own phones or tablets to open a lead-capture form
to follow up quickly with leads, ideally within 24 hours, while event momentum is still buzzing

Tradeshows are an outbound tactic that complements inbound marketing because it allows a sort of “in-person version of the inbound methodology” (attract, engage, delight):

prospects are attracted by a company’s booth because the materials are informative, on-brand and well-designed
prospects engage with the company’s representatives and find that they would like to sign up for an email list and learn more about the company
prospects are delighted when the company promptly reaches out and follows up with them using the contact information they exchanged at the tradeshow

2. Pay-Per-Click Advertising

Digital tactics are so thoroughly engrained in the modern marketing mindset that even the most inbound-obsessed marketers lump online display and pay-per-click (PPC) advertising in with their accepted set of tools, thinking of them as part of inbound.

In fact, because they’re paid advertisements meant to catch the attention of prospects, these ads are actually an outbound method, just with the inbound twist of being targeted towards certain prospects based upon keywords.

For success in pay-per-click and display advertising, companies need to:

bid on the right keywords in search engines so their PPC ads appear in relevant searches
use location, age and interests to target audiences
develop clear, concise copy for text ads so that the clicks they pay for come from interested leads who clicked with intention

Thanks to automated retargeting that finds prospects who didn’t convert to sales upon their last visit to the company’s website, targeting is easy with display ads, but display ads have a design component, which means companies need to get creative. These ads need to be compelling with a clear call-to-action and aesthetically pleasing while aligning with brand image and messaging.

PPC ads in particular tie in with inbound content marketing in a very important way. Promoting gated content through PPC search ads extends the reach of your content and brings form fills (lead conversions) that represent new opportunities to engage and delight.

3. Print Advertisements

Though print advertisements don’t generate a huge number of qualified leads, every lead has the potential to turn into a satisfied customer who then passes on the good word about your company. Print advertisements can be a great opportunity to combine important details with eye-catching design.

Print ads tend to share more detail than PPC or display ads that prospects might encounter and speak to what sets your company apart. That’s why companies need to place print advertisements in specialized publications like trade papers and industry journals. The beauty is, you can repurpose copy and creative from display ads for print advertisements and add more to make your print ads informative and detailed.

4. Outbound Emails

Email marketing tends to fall on both sides of the line between inbound and outbound. Inbound emails are those that are sent to prospects who have already indicated their interest in your company by filling out a form or chatting with a representative or chatbot on your website.

Outbound emails are those sent to contacts that didn’t fill out a form or otherwise directly submit their email address to your company; usually these contacts are obtained by purchasing a contact list.

Outbound email is important because email is the most widely-used and frequently-checked communication channel. Email has the most engagement of any communication channel, with almost all customers checking their inbox at least once per day.

So, whether inbound or outbound, companies need to create emails that:

are conversational and relevant
have compelling subject lines and preview text
create relationships with contacts by providing helpful, human content
introduce the company to the contact in a personal way
are as personalized as possible

Here’s an example email sent to a prospect who’s evaluating your product:

As with PPC ads, outbound emails area great way to share inbound content. They’re also a great way to promote tradeshows and events.

Wrapping Up: Take an Integrated Approach

Inbound may be at the forefront in marketing right now, but that doesn’t mean that outbound can’t play an important role. When you complement inbound content with outbound tactics, you’re leveraging the power of integrated marketing (you can find more on this in the Whitepaper: The Case for Integrated Marketing) and taking advantage of every opportunity available to build meaningful relationships, maximize brand exposure and gain marketing return on investment.

By Mark Schmukler

Mark Schmukler, CEO and Co-founder of Sagefrog Marketing Group, LLC, brings more than 30 years of global marketing and consulting experience to the agency, leveraging his B2B background to lead brand strategy and business development.Based in Doylestown, PA and Princeton, NJ, Sagefrog Marketing Group is a full-service B2B marketing agency with specialties in healthcare, technology and business services. Founded by Mark Schmukler and Suzanne Morris in 2002, Sagefrog’s mission is to accelerate client success through integrated marketing including branding, digital, public relations, social media and traditional services. Visit Sagefrog.com