The Paid Search Podcast | A Weekly Podcast About Google Ads and Online Marketing

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Chris Schaeffer - https://www.chrisschaeffer.com/
Jason Rothman - https://rothmanppc.com/

Show Notes:
Leaky campaigns waste money and can be difficult to identify. In this episode, Chris and Jason are giving you 8 ways to check for leaks in your PPC campaign.

(6:59) What is a "leaky" campaign vs. a bad campaign?

(9:50) #1. Broad keywords 

(15:11) #2. Search partners + Google search

(22:39) #3. Display network + Google search

(26:23) #4. A large number of clicks on sitelinks

(33:20) #5. Get directions and get details clicks

(38:54) #6. Automated extensions (sitelinks)

(40:35) #7. Call extension outside of business hours

(43:20) #8. Dynamic search ads

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Adventures by A Himitsu https://soundcloud.com/a-himitsu
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Jason Rothman - https://rothmanppc.com/
Chris Schaeffer - https://www.chrisschaeffer.com/

Show Notes:
In our last episode, we talked about how the loosening of match types has changed our approach to the way we select keywords and concluded that longtail keywords are on the way out. This week we’re defining longtail keywords, why we used them, why they’re “dead,” and why we’ve replaced them with “full context” keywords. Chris also breaks down several match-type agnostic examples that help explain the concept for a wide variety of industries. 

(4:11) What is a longtail keyword?

Keywords that are 3+ words in length that go beyond an action term plus a core term; super low volume, highly niched keywords

(9:18) Why did we use longtail keywords used?

Word to word targeting used to be possible

(12:07) Why are longtail keywords dead?

With the loosening of match types, now we have to match idea to idea/topic to topic/theme to theme; search results are more individualized based on other data

(16:42) What is a “full context keyword”?

3 or more words that express a complete thought that define the search firmly in the search funnel

Examples by industry –

(24:17) Medical technology
(27:41) E-commerce
(33:00) Rentals
(37:57) Furniture
(45:42) Home services
(47:57) Travel 

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Adventures by A Himitsu https://soundcloud.com/a-himitsu
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Please support our sponsors because they make the show possible!
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Chris Schaeffer - https://www.chrisschaeffer.com/
Jason Rothman - https://rothmanppc.com/

Show Notes:
Running a successful Google Ads campaign continues to become more and more complex. In this episode, the guys are answering some simple and essential questions to help you slow down, simplify your thinking, and achieve your goal. 

(9:08) What do you want - leads or sales? Who has those leads?

Consider the person who needs the product/service your company is offering. Think about what device they might be using and what kind of frame of mind they’re in when searching. It's not about the person, it’s about how they’re searching. Think about the individual, not the group demographics. 

(13:06) How do we get in front of that person?

Consider the searcher's concerns in the keywords/search terms as well as the ad copy. Responsive ads are coming in June 2022 which will offer quick feedback on the quality of your ad copy (determined by AI)  but may affect your ability to connect with the individual on an emotional level. A poor rating might mean your ad isn't served as often, but you can trust the data to see if it’s effective. 

(29:20) Are my keywords and search terms getting results? 
Are they matching my “get in front of the person” goals or taking me off that path? This is a constant adjustment and an ongoing improvement process. Modify by using full context keywords or negative keywords.

(41:41) Am I getting good conversion rates? 
“Good” is a relative term.  It depends on the industry you're in and who you’re selling to. You can’t base the success of a Google Ads campaign solely on the conversion rate. If they’re not converting, it usually comes down to the presentation of the product or service on the website. 

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 Show Notes:
This week the guys are tackling more of your Google Ads questions regarding the staffing and recruiting industry, finding value in a campaign that doesn't track conversions, the usefulness of the ad preview tool, the impact of pausing a campaign, and what to do if your conversion rate is showing over 100%.
 
(3:47) Q: Could you talk about the staffing and recruiting industry? It seems like a different beast with more targeting restrictions and high CPCs. 

A: It’s a unique industry because of the intensity by which people search. High volume, high response, and a lot of competitors mean you have the unique opportunity to try a lot of experiments. Drill down on what job you offer specifically.

(12:42) Q: My client is not able to track conversions. Would you accept clients who have this setup? How do you judge success? How do you know what to optimize? 

A: It’s not as big of a problem as it seems. The campaign will never be as good as it would if you had the tracking/conversion data, but it’s still a good value for marketing money because of search terms, CPC, and keywords. You can judge success on many other secondary factors.

(19:24) Q: Do you think the ad preview tool is useful for clients to see their own ads without affecting search results? 

A: It’s usually a last resort to a client who doesn’t see their ad. Because we’re working with a digital product, we have to work with the numbers we see. 

(25:48) Q: Will stopping my ads have a negative impact on a campaign and/or account level due to a build-up of negative history on the days the ads aren’t running? Ideally, we would like to run our ads every day but sometimes we aren’t able to due to budget and cash flow problems.

A: There is not a negative impact on a campaign just because you pause it, but there is a momentum shift. You’re not being hurt, but you’re not getting the benefit of the momentum. The second part of the question is a budget consumption issue. Someone is overstepping the budget and not appropriately distributing it across a month.

(31:39) Q: We’re an eCommerce site only tracking sales as conversions, but are seeing a 500% conversion rate on one click/keyword. Can you convert more than once from one click or is this a bug?

A: This is a conversion tracking issue. Go to search terms and search by conversion rate then look at the conversion count setting – change it from “every” to “one”. It could also be an issue with the conversion tracking code placement.

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Adventures by A Himitsu https://soundcloud.com/a-himitsu
 Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0
 Free Download / Stream: http://bit.ly/2Pj0MtT
 Music released by Argofox https://youtu.be/8BXNwnxaVQE
 Music promoted by Audio Library https://youtu.be/MkNeIUgNPQ8 

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 Show Notes:
Two things happen when you launch a Google Ads campaign – either you get too much traffic or not enough traffic. In this episode, we're giving actionable steps that you can take whether you’re getting too much or too little that will help you tease out what’s causing the issue and fix your campaign. We also discuss search news about new site link design testing.

(5:06) Google Ads With Larger Sitelinks Block Design Also

(8:59) Too much traffic is typically caused by either a keyword quality issue, an auction issue (location and time), or a position and CPC issue (bidding too much)

(11:20) Are one or more keywords literally driving all your traffic? 
Break them out into their own campaign to cap them (if automated), lower bids on them (if manual), or pause them if they’re no good.

(14:39) Are your search terms garbage? 
What keywords are bad search terms coming from? Are you running broad or loose phrase? Or did you miss the mark on your targeting and you’re not in the right spot in the funnel? 

(20:44) Are you running on too many auctions? 
Too big with your location and time settings? Feel free to get choosier – better location, better times

(21:17) Bidding too much? Budget being spent way too fast? 
Check absolute top percent and top percent and see if you can lower bids and still spend your full budget (but get more clicks overall).

(26:16) - Not enough auctions? 
Are your location and time settings reasonable?

(28:47) Are you bidding too low? 
Check absolute top percent, top percent, and impression share lost due to ad rank.

(31:00) Are your keywords too tight? 
Check search volume for your area in the keyword planner. Are you only using exact match? Are your keywords super long-tail (4 or more words)? 

(36:52) Final tips
For both problems, experiment with one change for a day or two and see if it helps. Sometimes it will take multiple days to solve. Plan on this being your first 30-45 days.

Remember, you can run multiple campaigns playing around with these changes and options and see if any of the campaigns perform better.

Ramp-up is real. Maybe it’s not low volume and it’s just ramp up or watch out maybe you’ll be in ramp-up for a week then all of the sudden you’ll start getting a ton of bad traffic and too much traffic will be your issue.

Search News:
Google Ads With Larger Sitelinks Block Design Also  - https://www.seroundtable.com/google-larger-sitelinks-block-design-on-google-ads-32189.html

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First 100 Episodes - https://paidsearchpodcast.com/archive/   

Adventures by A Himitsu https://soundcloud.com/a-himitsu
 Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0
 Free Download / Stream: http://bit.ly/2Pj0MtT
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Please support our sponsors because they make the show possible!
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Chris Schaeffer - https://www.chrisschaeffer.com/
Jason Rothman - https://rothmanppc.com/

Show Notes:
“Limited by budget” is a bid strategy status that's used when your average daily budget is lower than the recommended amount. But what if you’ve already maxed out your budget? In this episode, we’re discussing different strategies to make your traffic better by being more selective about the traffic you get. Remember, the goal is profitability and then growth. Shrink your campaign, get an awesome ROAS, then increase spend as much as you can.

(4:14) “If the market is bigger than your budget, then you have the ability to be more selective about what traffic you get inside of that market.” – Jason

(6:51) Review search terms for low quality coming from high volume and loose keywords

“It can be hard for a client to understand that even if they like a keyword and it makes sense for their business, there’s a difference between something making sense and it being a good keyword or an appropriate keyword vs. understanding we’re limited by budget and focusing on great keyword.”  – Jason

(10:40) Possibly prune lower performing ad groups 

“It’s such a joy to see clear metrics ad group to ad group. Pruning gives attention to what matters most.” - Chris

(13:30) Segment partners data

If you’re not aware of Search Partners, look it up. It might be eating up some of the budget you don’t need to be spending.

(16:17) Device performance

It’s as important as pausing an ad group or an unproductive keyword. Adjustments will depend on the type of business. 

(19:23) Review location settings

Consider layering cities, zip codes, neighborhoods, and counties with radius.

(22:20) Review the schedule 

Are you 24/7 or not? Not all times are of equal value.

(29:00) Age demographics

“It’s always the last thing I go to. I have no proof of how old the user actually is.” – Chris

(33:42) Income demographics

Make changes only after you have a significant amount of data to prove a certain demographic is showing high profitability and you’re severely limited by budget.

(35:47) Consider targeting specific audiences (based on observation data)

“If the observation shows great volume and conversion rate on the audience, it’s not that risky to target only that audience plus the keyword.” - Chris

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First 100 Episodes - https://paidsearchpodcast.com/archive/   

Adventures by A Himitsu https://soundcloud.com/a-himitsu
 Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0
 Free Download / Stream: http://bit.ly/2Pj0MtT
 Music released by Argofox https://youtu.be/8BXNwnxaVQE
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Please support our sponsors because they make the show possible!
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Jason Rothman - https://rothmanppc.com/
Chris Schaeffer - https://www.chrisschaeffer.com/

Show Notes:
This week we're doing a deep dive to help simplify a topic that affects everything you do inside Google Ads - conversions and conversion tracking. We discuss what generated the idea to do the episode, why conversion tracking is so important, what we’re seeing with our clients, ways to track conversions, and conversion settings. 

(5:04) What comes to mind when you think of conversion tracking? 

"It's the #1 missed simple thing in Google Ads. You set it once, then it provides data for the rest of your account." – Chris
"As good as you are at Google Ads, you’ll always be better if you can get more conversion data." – Jason

(9:18) Ways to track conversions

Website calls, call extension, website forms, sales

(12:40) Should I be tracking soft conversions such as newsletter signups, views of contact page, time on site, etc.?

"No, those things don’t matter.  I don’t care about things that don’t’ generate revenue or aren’t a significant action for the client. They’re of interest, but not value-driven." – Chris

(20:48) Setting conversions up inside google ads account

The settings you choose will play out in the columns on the conversation actions page under "measurement." 

(21:49) In the count column, should I use "count one conversion for conversion" or "count every conversion"?

"If you are an e-commerce advertiser, you can go with "count every conversion" because every conversion is a purchase. If you’re doing anything outside of e-commerce, go with "count one conversion" because every action is derived from an individual and that individual is one opportunity." – Chris

(24:46) "Include in conversions" – the most misunderstood column

"This is a trigger to determine if it’s a hard sale or soft lead. If you uncheck 'include in conversions,' it no longer tracks in the 'conversions' column; it moves the tracking 'all conversions' column." - Chris

(29:16) Click through conversion window

The window can be set up to 90 days, but 30 days is standard. Extending the conversion window allows someone who previously clicked on your ad without converting to return (even organically) and act, then attribute the conversion to the original click. 

(34:50) Tag assistant and tracking a thank you page vs. clicks on a button

"I do use Tag Assist in Chrome. I like it but it’s just a starting point to let you know if you're having a big problem." - Jason

It's much easier to track thank you pages. A thank you page conversion occurs when someone fills out a form and goes to a thank you page that contains the conversion code. When they see that thank you page, the client gets a conversion. "Clicks on a button" conversions occur when a user clicks the button to submit a form.

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First 100 Episodes - https://paidsearchpodcast.com/archive/   

Adventures by A Himitsu https://soundcloud.com/a-himitsu
 Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0
 Free Download / Stream: http://bit.ly/2Pj0MtT
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Please support our sponsors because they make the show possible!
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Chris Schaeffer - https://www.chrisschaeffer.com/
Jason Rothman - https://rothmanppc.com/

Show Notes:
Change is coming. Expanded Text Ads are phasing out next year and being replaced with responsive search ads. In this episode, we’re getting you up to date on the latest news and explaining what responsive search ads are and the performance we’ve seen from them. We’ll also do some higher-level thinking about the possibilities of responsive search ads. 

(3:47) News – Expanded text ads are phasing out in June of 2022

(8:26) What are responsive ads? 

“It’s basically you adding a bunch of information to a bunch of blank lines (headlines, descriptions, URL) about what your business does and why someone should click on your ad and Google picks the best one for that one auction.” – Chris

(16:11) What is pinning? 

“It’s a compromise on Google’s behalf. Without pinning we would have no control. It’s a small ability to make decisions in a system that would otherwise be completely optimized based on Google’s algorithm.” - Chris

(23:50) What is ad strength?

Ad strength is measured according to 4 categories to optimize headlines – add more headlines, include popular keywords in your headlines, make your headlines more unique, or make your descriptions more unique.

(29:11) Our insights on responsive search ads

“If an ad group has 100 impressions and you have a responsive search ad in there and 2 or 3 expanded text ads, I would bet the responsive ad would get about 90% of those impressions.” - Jason

(32:28) Strong click through and conversion rates

“Simply the fact that it gives you feedback on your ad copy and rotates it out leads to better click-through rates. - Chris

(36:01) Jason’s idea for themed responsive ads 

Themes would include categories like pricing, reputational, etc. that would allow you to see what connects best with search users. 

Search News:
Making it easier to show the right message on Search - https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/11031467

About responsive search ads - https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/7684791

We need your help! Please help us grow the show:
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First 100 Episodes - https://paidsearchpodcast.com/archive/   

Adventures by A Himitsu https://soundcloud.com/a-himitsu
 Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0
 Free Download / Stream: http://bit.ly/2Pj0MtT
 Music released by Argofox https://youtu.be/8BXNwnxaVQE
 Music promoted by Audio Library https://youtu.be/MkNeIUgNPQ8 

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Please support our sponsors because they make the show possible!
Get Opteo for free for two months - https://opteo.com/psp2     

Jason Rothman - https://rothmanppc.com/
Chris Schaeffer - https://www.chrisschaeffer.com/

Show Notes:
In this episode, the guys are answering some questions from listeners about close variants, geo keywords, seeing your clients' ads in the search engine, optimizing for first-page bids, and audience campaigns. 

(2:57) Q: If Google is already showing my ads for close variants of a keyword, what's the benefit of adding it as a keyword inside an ad group?

A: The reason I like to add keywords and not just rely on close variants is that I like the opportunity to make decisions for myself about if this is important to me. There are special opportunities you can take on.  - Chris

(8:16) Q: If I'm targeting a specific location and my service keywords are triggering for anyone searching that search term from my chosen location, is there any benefit in adding geo keywords? 

A: 100% yes, you should add geo keywords as their own keywords. - Jason

(11:22) Q: I've been having issues getting client ads to show up. I know it's a bad idea to search for client ads, but there are times when I want to physically test something with tracking or just see an ad. 

A: Use the Ad Preview and Diagnosis tool. It simulates a Google result for keywords in specific locations. - Chris
I look at my Google Ads account and through the data, I can see what’s happening. - Jason

(24:19) Q: I'm only using manual CPC in my campaigns when I see a keyword that is below the first-page bid, I wonder if I should optimize my keywords to be on the first page or not. 

A: The idea of a first-page bid is a misunderstood concept.  It just means you’re below the standard for the first-page keyword, so expect lower traffic than if you bid more. I never think about 1st page or 2nd page, I just look at the data.  - Jason

(33:40) Q: We were talking with an agency that creates a new campaign for every audience. I would love your input on the pros and cons of doing this. 

A: That is tremendously complex and there are no pros to doing it that way. I have nothing good to share about it. - Chris

(38:13) Q: If one of our distributors pays for Google PPC against similar or exact keywords we ourselves are paying for to drive traffic to our website, does that hurt more than it benefits us?

A: Having another advertiser in the auction hurts you, but there will be other products similar to yours out there, so seeing your product through a distributor's ad still gives you double the chance of selling.  - Jason

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Send us your questions here - https://paidsearchpodcast.com/contact-us/   
 
First 100 Episodes - https://paidsearchpodcast.com/archive/   

Adventures by A Himitsu https://soundcloud.com/a-himitsu
 Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0
 Free Download / Stream: http://bit.ly/2Pj0MtT
 Music released by Argofox https://youtu.be/8BXNwnxaVQE
 Music promoted by Audio Library https://youtu.be/MkNeIUgNPQ8 

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Please support our sponsors because they make the show possible!
Get Opteo for free for two months - https://opteo.com/psp2     

Chris Schaeffer - https://www.chrisschaeffer.com/
Jason Rothman - https://rothmanppc.com/

Show Notes:
In this episode, the guys are addressing the polarizing topic of running brand campaigns in Google Ads covering both how to do it right as well as common problems that can fuel false success metrics.

Defining a brand campaign (3:07)
When you have someone searching for your company name (or anything exclusive to your company) and you have a keyword that targets it specifically and directs them to your website. It’s designed to capture the people looking for you. The advantage is that you control the messaging.  - Chris

When competitors are bidding on your brand name (6:42)
Seeing a competitor positioned above you in organic results is the only justification for bidding on your own brand. The purpose of a brand campaign is to protect your company name. – Chris
Just because you don’t see someone out there when you do a search, it doesn’t mean no one is targeting your brand name or no one will start. So there might be a benefit to having a brand campaign going to get ahead. – Jason

Analyzing ROAS/Cost per lead with and without brand leads (10:49)
This is typically the biggest abuse we see, whether it's intentional or not. When you have a blend of brand searches inside your marketing search campaign, it loses its integrity by blending the value of a brand search with a non-brand. 

Allowing brand keywords to show in sales/lead gen search campaign (21:49)
Mixing data is the biggest mistake you can make whether it's out of neglect or ignorance. Doing it wrong is ignoring what kind of traffic you're getting, how the keywords are reacting, and what the ecosystem looks like inside the search term report. To keep your data accurate, add your band name as negative keywords to your main search campaigns and run it as its own campaign.

We need your help! Please help us grow the show:
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Send us your questions here - https://paidsearchpodcast.com/contact-us/   
 
First 100 Episodes - https://paidsearchpodcast.com/archive/   

Adventures by A Himitsu https://soundcloud.com/a-himitsu
 Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0
 Free Download / Stream: http://bit.ly/2Pj0MtT
 Music released by Argofox https://youtu.be/8BXNwnxaVQE
 Music promoted by Audio Library https://youtu.be/MkNeIUgNPQ8 

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