Manage Your Advertising To Get More Traffic

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A common complaint of internet marketers is that paid advertising doesn't work. Their response is to cut back or even eliminate paid advertising and focus on SEO.

Cutting back is usually a mistake. What's proven to be more effective is to manage your advertising better. An active management program can often lower pay-per-click costs while increasing click-through traffic. The real goal is to improve the Return on Investment (ROI) to make the advertising pay for itself. Once you get control of your advertising, you can actually expand it for even more traffic. Trying to grow it without a good process in place can lead to the loss of time and money.

How to Manage a Paid Search Campaign Effectively

At RA Murphy & Company, the advertising management service we provide to clients employs a step by step process. The general approach is outlined below.

Phase 1. Campaign Planning and Research

The first step we take is to work with the client to determine the goals for the campaign. Then we assess what the current situation is. It's crucial to have measurable objectives and know the starting point to be able to plan the work that will need to be done. The goals also provide a way to forecast revenue and make it possible to budget how much can be spent on advertising and the related management services.

Next we perform keyword research. We analyze both which keywords to use and the costs. The best paid search keywords for your business may not be the same ones discovered for organic search optimization. We use tools specific to paid search to develop keyword lists for this kind of advertising.

Your advertising needs to focus on those phrases that will generate the right kind of clicks. Most often that means you want to attract the attention of and send buyers to your site. But not always. Some campaigns are intended to start a relationship with prospects, or to simply generate leads for other kinds of follow up. The exact keywords used will therefore be a product of the original goals.

Finally, we put all the pieces together and develop a project plan. We have to use the right keywords to attract the right traffic and do it within the budget.

Phase 2. Campaign Setup

After Planning is done, several steps need to be completed before the advertising campaign can be implemented.

First, an account is setup for the client with each search engine or ad network being used. The campaigns and keyword groups have to be organized and setup to meet the requirements of the search engine or network. Google, for example, divides an account into Campaigns, Keyword Groups, and Ads.

Next, one or more ads have to be written for each of the keyword groups. Since formats can vary from one advertising vehicle to another, variations of these ads may need to be developed.

Next, landing pages need to be designed and their copy written. Depending on the campaign goals, there may be associated technical work done related to the landing pages. For example, if the goal is to capture email addresses in order to build a list, then an autoresponder campaign needs to be set up.

Finally, Analytics service or software has to be setup to track the advertising campaign. The type and depth of tracking will depend on the overall campaign goals. We use analytics that provide detail information for our monitoring and also higher level reporting that gives the client a picture of what's happening in their campaign.

Phase 3. Implementation and Testing

Once everything is in place, implementation can take place. Generally, we follow a phased in approach, starting with the parts of the campaign most like to generate the most traffic quickly and then keep adding to the mix during a 30 to 60 day period.

Testing is a major part of implementation. We develop alternative ads and landing pages and use "A-B Testing" to determine which ads and pages are the most effective.

During this period we monitor results closely. It's often necessary to modify the initial maximum bids on keyword groups as we see which are the most productive and what positions they're showing at. Competitors often make changes to their own programs at this time, requiring further adjustments.

Ultimately by the end of the implementation period, the advertising campaign should be in place and generating the type and quality of traffic needed to meet the original goals.

Phase 4. Continuous Improvement

Successful implementation sets the baseline for performance. Once complete then we begin a period of ongoing campaign management. Here the objective is to make the kinds of continuous improvements that incrementally improve the return on investment. Also we monitor to insure that new competitors or search engine changes don't negatively impact our results.

We provide regular Analytics reports to the client so they're always informed of performance, costs and issues.

Typical Fees and Costs for Pay for Performance Advertising Campaigns

The cost of a paid search advertising campaign can run from a few dollars a day to tens of thousands. We typically work with small to medium enterprises (SMEs). Below are some very general guidelines for budgeting and an idea about management fees.

The percent of revenue spent on advertising varies by industry, by the degree of difficulty involved in reaching prospects, and by the size of profit margins. Generally, allocations for advertising and promotion will run between 5% and 20% of total revenues. A brick and mortar retailer might put less into advertising because they depend on foot traffic in a mall to bring most of their customers in and because they spend so much on the rent for the location. Direct marketers may spend up to half of their revenue on marketing costs, especially if they're selling a high margin product like information or software.

To develop a tentative budget, start with a ten percent allocation. If you work by yourself selling products online and your revenues are $120,000 per year, try budgeting $12,000 a year for your advertising spend. That's $1,000 per month, of course. Unless you sell insurance or some other extremely competitive product, a thousand a month will buy a lot of clicks.

You may want to manage a program like that yourself, outsourcing just the copywriting or other technical parts like design, etc.

We offer a program for small businesses and would be happy to handle a campaign like this for you also. We perform all planning, research, copywriting and design, and ad campaign management and analytics reporting.

For accounts that budget up to $3,000 per month on advertising, we charge a fixed fee of $750 a month during the planning and implementation phases. The bigger the budget, up to $3,000, the longer this period because more work is involved. There's a one month minimum, and three month maximum.

After implementation is complete, Continuous Improvement Management and Reporting is a flat fee $375 per month.

For companies budgeting more than $5,000 per month on advertising, we provide our services on a percentage basis: 15% of the monthly spend.

For more information about our services or to discuss the problems you're experiencing with paid search advertising, contact RA Murphy & Company.