The 3 A’s to Shape Up Your Pay-Per-Click Account for Summer

With the weather growing warm (or closer to boiling if you are located in Texas like we are), it is a sign a new season is just around the corner. To mark this change, now is a good time to take a few steps to optimize your PPC account and marketing efforts.

1. Audit Keywords

It is easy to continually add new keywords to your account whenever you come across them. However, sometimes this can expand your keyword lists so much that your ads are no longer as relevant as they could be. To remedy this, go through the keywords in each of your ad groups, pulling out any groups of keywords that are related to each other to create additional ad groups with new, targeted ads. This will help to improve your quality scores, which Google uses to determine the CPC and ranking of your ad in search results.

2. Avoid Endless Testing

While A/B testing is vital to optimizing your account, many times these tests can go on with no end date in sight. It is important to clean out the lower-performing aspects of these tests if they have ran for a significant amount of time. Once you understand the results, you can take the top performers and conduct further tests to continually improve the effectiveness of your account.

3. Activate New Features

Are you using all of the  features that are available? Google, for instance, recently introduced Enhanced Campaigns, an update to AdWords that includes several new features such as targeted bid adjustments, ad group-based ad extensions and improved conversion reporting. If you haven’t migrated your campaigns, you have until July 22 to do so before Google automatically migrates them.

It is important to stay on top of changes such as these and implement them where appropriate. Not only will this decrease the chance of your account being automatically upgraded before you are ready, utilizing these new features sets your account apart from that of your competitors and usually increases the likelihood of someone clicking on your ad.

Staying Fit

Remember that PPC marketing is not a “set it and forget it” tactic. With constant updates and new competitors entering the game, it is key to continually optimize your account to get the most out of your investment.

Need help with your PPC campaign or to optimize your PPC account? Contact Launch today. And be sure to like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to stay up to date with the latest B2B marketing trends.