While creating a Google Ads account might seem like a task, let us tell you that Google Ads management is much more difficult. PPC campaign management is labour-intensive, and you need an army of campaign managers to execute it.
However, if you are running a small business, you can still run a campaign with the right guidance. For this, you will need to learn:
- Bidding strategies
- Ad copy optimization
- Campaign structure
- And more
Keep reading our article for a complete guide to managing your Google Ads campaigns.
Learn More: How Much Do Google Ads Cost In 2023?
Campaign Management with Google Ads: The Core Elements
Running a successful ad means setting up your Google Ads account and creating a stunning campaign. However, it is not as easy as it sounds.
To run a successful campaign, you must spend time:
- Evaluating ad performance
- Researching various keywords
- Switching up the ad copy and designs
- Testing key metrics
- And more
All of these elements will help you create a path for a successful campaign. You can run the campaign yourself or hire a PPC ads management agency for this purpose.
Keep reading to take a deep dive into Google Ads campaign management.
Are There Any Benefits to Google Ads Management?
Before you invest time and money in Google Ads, you might wonder if it is even worth it in the first place. Fortunately, these ads can benefit your business, as the platform will help your business with:
- Ad Reporting
- Managing your ad revenue
- Monetizing your mobile apps, website, and more
So, if you want a platform to help you run and manage ads, Google is a great choice. It claims over 91% of the global market share and helps businesses drive over 90% of paid search clicks on mobile devices.
How Does Google Ads Management Work?
The process of Google Ads management will help you understand how to leverage the platform to your benefit. Advertisers and businesses must work hard to ensure they get returns on their strategies.
Knowing how Google Ads management works is a good way to understand this. We have listed a complete breakdown of the inner workings of Google Ads management:
1. Advertisers Bid for Keywords
A big part of Google Ads is the bidding process. Various advertisers bid on keywords on Google that they want their ads to appear in the search results.
Remember that bidding can range between a few dollars and hundreds of dollars on one keyword. Because of this, setting a budget is crucial so you don’t overspend your ad budget.
There are various tools Google has introduced to help you set limits and stay within your monthly budget. You can pause or stop your ad spending at any time if you don’t have the budget.
2. Potential Customers Search for Keywords
Advertisers bid on keywords because customers search for them on Google. While advertisers are bidding, customers are conducting their daily searches.
Customers who conduct searches will see ads for the various services or products that align with their search intent. However, the results and order of ads they witness on the first page will depend on the ad rank.
3. Google Shows Potential Customer Ads
After the customers search for a specific keyword, Google provides results on the SERP for that keyword. These results are based on the concept of ad rank.
It takes the search engine only a few seconds to rank advertisers for that keyword. Google uses Quality Scores and ad rank to determine who will get the spots on the SERPs and in what order.
4. Customers Click on the Ads
Once the search results appear, the customers will click on appealing ads. Typically, customers click on ads that match their search intent in the best way possible.
Then, a customer may purchase something, return to the results, or take other action. They might not even do anything and just end the search.
The process is crucial to understand why you need to follow the best practices for Google Ads Management, which brings us to our next section.
Google Ads Campaign Management: 9 Best Practices to Follow
Now that you have an overview of Google Ads management and its benefits, there are some practices you can follow for campaign management.
Here are the top practices you can incorporate into your business for exceptional Google Ads management:
1. See How Your Current Google Ads Are Doing
Evaluating the performance of your current ads applies to businesses already running ads. Some important metrics to pay attention to when evaluating include the following:
- Conversions: These occur when your audience takes the action you want them to take through the ad.
- Clicks: A click is when someone views your ad and clicks it.
- Impressions: These occur each time your ad is displayed and viewed by someone on Google.
- CTR (click-through rates): It helps Google measure your ad relevance. High CTR means people see the ad, click it, and convert.
- And CPC: Cost per click is the money you must spend for one conversion or click.
Once you have these metrics, you will be in a much better position to determine whether you are on the right track for your next Google Ad.
2. Optimize the Structure of Your Google Adwords Account
While the first practice was for businesses already running Google Ads, our second point is for anyone beginning with Google Ads for the first time.
Before you launch your first Google Ad campaign, you must optimize the account structure. It describes how you will organize:
- Keywords
- Ad groups
- Campaigns
- And more
We recommend that you structure the account in this way: Account, Campaigns, Ad Groups, and Keywords.
Your team must build ad group sets for the campaign that coordinate with the topic or focus. Within these ad groups, you will target different keywords.
For example, your ad group for a footwear campaign can include sneakers, sandals, slippers, etc.
So, your sneaker ad group might be targeting various keywords such as:
- Casual sneakers
- Sneakers for women
- Sneakers for men
- Casual sneakers for athletes
All of these keywords will describe the product you are targeting. It is crucial to keep the ad groups and keywords similar as mismatching can reduce campaign performance, which leads to a low Quality Score by Google.
3. Research the PPC Strategies Your Competitors are using
Before launching your PPC campaign, you must see your competitors’ actions. After all, if their ads are doing well, it means they are doing something right, and you can learn from them.
However, this doesn’t mean you copy their Google Ads campaigns. Instead, use it for ideas, identify gaps, and decide how your ad can improve.
You can research competitors by:
- Investing in a third-party tool to understand the strategies of competitors
- Entering the keyword or search terms on Google and checking the top-performing ads
- Collaborating with a professional PPC agency or consultant to conduct a competitor analysis
Depending on your resources or budget, you can follow any of these research strategies for Google Ads management.
4. Set Your Targeting
It is time to set your ad targets based on the campaign’s objectives and target audience. You have to consider your ideal customer for the campaign, what they want, their interests, and other factors.
Let’s review some top targeting factors you must take into account before setting ad metrics:
- Intent: You must select keywords that match the search intent of the target audience
- Demographics: How you will target the audience based on gender, age, location, and devices
- Remarketing: Finding people to target who have interacted with your business in the past may not have led to conversions.
We recommend you consider all these factors when determining the ad targets. You must get inside your audience’s head to understand how and why they click and convert.
These targets must be clear beforehand to provide you with a clear direction for your campaign.
5. Optimize Your Landing Pages for the Ads
While the SERP only shows a portion of your Google Ads management strategy, the most important things occur beyond the SERPs. For example, your landing pages are a weapon in your Google Ads arsenal.
If your ad receives lots of clicks but doesn’t lead to conversions, then you might have to optimize your landing pages for conversions. Our PPC experts recommend you fix this as soon as possible; otherwise, Google will categorize your ad as low relevance and drop it lower.
Here are some page elements you can optimize for your landing page:
- Headline
- Page structure
- Button placement
- CTA
- What are you offering overall
- And more
A good way to understand whether your landing pages are working well is to conduct A/B testing, which brings us to our next point.
6. Conduct A/B Testing on Ad Design and Copy
When you create a landing page, you work on the design and copy of the page. If these elements are not optimized, they will hurt your Google Ads performance.
A/B testing involves creating two versions of a landing page or ad to determine which will perform better. Then, you can select the one that performs better on the SERPs.
Make sure whatever Google Ads campaign you run, you create a copy for each ad group. These will guarantee that your account doesn’t hit a halt.
7. Try to Add Negative Keywords
Negative keywords are ones that you don’t want to display your ad for. Now, you might wonder why this is a practice for Google Ads management.
When you post an ad, you let Google decide for you. So, you can use negative keywords, such as:
- Competitors
- Brand names
- And other keywords
you know will not lead to converted customers.
The process is simple.
If you want to add these keywords, you need to go to the Google Ads campaign manager.
Then, you can opt for keywords, negatives and then add the keywords you want to your ad group.
8. Optimize Your Bidding Strategy
Setting the initial bid may prove to be easy, but managing it can be a big pain. However, Google Ads gives you two options: manual or automated bidding.
Both these bidding methods have their advantages and disadvantages. For example, if you choose automated bidding, then it will enable Google to decide how much you will pay for one click based on these metrics:
- More visibility: The goal of this bidding strategy is to help your ad show as high on the page as possible.
- Higher site visits: You can optimize your ad based on the clicks if you want more visitors.
- Target ROAS: If you want a specific return on an ad spend, you can enable Google to pay what it thinks you should based on how you value every conversion.
- Better conversions: If you want to achieve this, you all have to target cost-per-action. You might have to pay more for one conversion, but it will also convert more visitors.
Automated bidding will figure all of these things out for you. However, if you opt for manual bidding, consider this yourself.
In the long run, manual bidding will provide you more control over how you want to place bids and what strategies you will use. This is why we recommend beginning with automated bidding till you perfect the art of manual bidding for your Google Ads management strategy.
9. Let Professional Google Ad Managers Handle PPC Campaigns
If these Google Ads management strategies are too overwhelming for you, you can always hire a PPC campaign management agency.
These professionals understand the workings of platforms, such as Google Adwords and Google AdSense, and can execute techniques that will give you the highest returns.
Otherwise, you can start the ad campaigns and see how well they do.
3 Common Google Ads Management Mistakes to Avoid
While it is important to know the best practices, it is just as important to know some mistakes people make the first time they run Google Ads.
Here are the top three common mistakes we urge you to avoid if you want to make the most of your Google Ads management practices:
Not Setting the Right Budget
The right budget will keep your spending in check so you don’t spend more than needed. For example, beginners who started Google Ads management should not spend more than $10 or $20 daily.
Such a budget will allow you to see how your ad is performing and what you can do to make it better. Initially, the objective is to gather important data for ad optimization.
Then, you can slowly increase your budget as you learn more about Google Ads management. Trial and error will also help you set clear budget guidelines in the future.
Not Optimizing Your Ad Copy
Your ad copy is the element that will make users want to click on your ad and take the actions needed. If you write good copy, you will easily convert users to do business with you.
While you can write the ad copy yourself, not everyone has the skills to write converting copy. In that case, you can always hire a copywriter to do the job for you.
Typically, PPC management companies already have copywriters. So, you don’t need to worry about whether your page will convert.
Copying Competitors
It can be tempting to do the same thing your competitors are doing to succeed, but it can be detrimental to your Google Ads management campaigns. You can take ideas and see what keywords they are ranking for, but adding unique elements to your campaign is crucial.
Google is not looking for the same ads over and over again. Instead, it seeks the unique element you can offer your potential customers.
So, conduct extensive research and then decide what strategy you will take for your campaign. Once you do, you will easily stay ahead of your competitors in the Google Ads management game.
FAQs
What are Google Ads Management Services?
Google Ads management services plan your PPC strategies using the Google Adwords platform to run campaigns, track KPIs, make changes, and more.
How much should I pay someone to manage my Google Ads?
The amount paid depends on the professional, what they offer, experience, your budget, and other factors. Everyone has a custom pricing that you can opt for.
How do I get to Google Ads Manager?
Visit admanager.google.com and enter your login details. You can sign up for the Ad Manager account if you don’t have an account.
Should I hire someone to manage my Google Ads?
If you don’t know where to begin your Google Ad campaigns, you can hire a professional with experience. These will increase your success chances and help you get the most out of your Google Ads campaigns.
What is white-label Google Ads management?
White-label Google Ads management is when you outsource the fulfillment of your agency’s Google Ads services to an experienced white-level partner. In this case, the partner does the work, and you sell the services as your own.
Final Thoughts
That was your complete guide to Google Ads management you can follow to ensure that you make high returns on your ad spend. Before you begin, it is crucial to conduct research and determine what strategy you will take.
If you would rather focus on running your business, you can hire a Google Ads management agency to do the work for you. These dedicated professionals will create converting campaigns that will maximize your ad spend.