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Are you looking for a way to convert your leads into sales and revenue? PPC sales funnel is the answer!
PPC is a marketing channel on a digital platform that many businesses use to drive traffic and conversions from search engines such as Google. It’s a great tool to market your business and reach potential and existing customers.
This is where companies make online advertisements using a platform like Google Ads. Businesses pay for the platform every time someone clicks on it.
For instance, if you search for something on Google, you’ll see ads at the top of the results page related to your query. You can also see a product grid on the right of the page. These are also ads when a search has a commercial intent.
Consumers use search engines to find suppliers, sellers, and businesses that offer their needed products and services. Organizations are taking advantage of this as they can reach many potential customers using PPC.
Is Google Ads Funnel the Best PPC Strategy?
The Google Ads funnel is a marketing strategy that uses a combination of campaigns to guide potential customers on their buying journey. Its main goal is to attract strangers, generate interest and demand, nurture the prospects to search for your products and services, and convert them into sales.
It’s also a great platform to increase your outcome-based selling, as the tool helps your target audience’s needs.
PPC is considered the most effective advertising platform for many companies that want to generate leads and sales. It’s a way to achieve direct response marketing where you can drive people to take action and convert them into paying customers.
What You Need to Consider Before Starting Google Ads Strategy
Before making Google Ads strategies, you may need to consider three components: budget, advertising network, and keyword search.
Budget
It costs $1 to $2 per click, but it can go as high as $55 for some industries. Establishing your budget for the strategy is critical as you could pay more than your allocated funds if you’re not careful.
It’s best to allocate the budget for each stage depending on its importance. Remember that the higher the budget is, the bigger the ROI could be.
Advertising Network
Google Ads offers four types of advertising networks, each designed for different purposes with a varying cost-per-click.
It has Search Ads, Display Ads, Shopping Ads, and Video Ads. Search and Shopping Ads are the ones you see on the top and right sides of the result page. Display Ads are shown on various websites, while Video Ads run on YouTube and other websites.
Keyword Search
Creating content for your target audience is vital. Remember, they’ll use specific words to search for relevant content for their needs.
Using keyword search tools like Semrush, Ahrefs, and Google’s Keyword Planner can help you use the right keywords. The higher the search volume is, the better for your content.
When you make content, make sure it is unique. You can use anti-plagiarism tools such as Copyscape to ensure uniqueness and SpyFu to check your competitors’ content and their target.
Nail Your Ads Strategy at Every Stage of the Funnel
Understanding the type of qualified leads you have is critical to creating an effective Google Ads funnel. In this process, you’ll need to identify which stage your leads are in.
Google Ads has three stages: Awareness, Consideration, and Decision. Understanding them is critical to converting your potential customers into sales.
Here are the details of each stage and effective strategies for your audience:
Awareness Stage: Optimal Campaign for Cold Audiences
Awareness is the first stage of the funnel. These people are either strangers or have little knowledge of your products and services. They are on their journey of discovering your organization.
Targeting your ideal audience at this stage can be very challenging as it’s a mix of people; some might not have specific intents and interests. However, you can still track them using their location, age group, demographics, and shared interests.
Since cold audiences are not aware of your products, services, or the company itself, this is a perfect opportunity to utilize advertisements to introduce the things you offer. You can use informational and educational content to increase the probability of getting potential customers.
Content for Cold Audiences
Creating content for cold audiences isn’t simple because you’re targeting people who are unaware of what your organization can offer.
Two of the most effective types of advertising you can use are our Display and Video Ads.
These ads are perfect for reaching your target audience, as when they read a blog related to your product and services, they’ll be able to see it. On the other hand, you can post informational YouTube ads to attract them.
For instance, you can create instructional videos that your target audience might find helpful. You might want not to focus much on branding as they are still unaware of their needs.
Bidding Strategies for Cold Audiences
Since they are at the top of the funnel, they are far from converting revenue. So, the main goal is to make them more aware of their problems and solutions while building the audience’s interest.
Keep in mind that the goals have relatively low chances for revenue, so it is best to restrict bids and fill your funnel at a low cost.
Manual CPC, Max Clicks, Max CPV, and Max Conversions are the best bidding strategies at this stage. Manual CPC is ideal if you want little control over bidding. On the other hand, Google will try to generate the most clicks possible with your daily budget with Max Clicks.
Max Conversions and Max CPV are available for Display Ads and Search Ads, respectively.
Consideration Stage: Optimal Campaign Type for the Warmed-up Audiences
Compared to the awareness stage, audiences at this stage have knowledge of your business and the products and services you offer. However, that doesn’t mean you don’t need to nurture them.
These individuals are potential buyers with ideas about their problems and solutions. They can also be people who have visited your website or contacted your company but haven’t made a purchase yet.
Like the awareness stage, don’t be aggressive regarding your sales. Instead, you can utilize Google Ads to include forms in your ads to generate leads. This will help you nurture them as you have the means to send emails and promotional content.
What Content and Offer to Make For Warm Audiences
Search ads and Intent-based display ads are the ideal ones. You can also use shopping ads if you’re selling a product.
For intent-based content, you should avoid using general keywords; instead, use long-tail keywords. For instance, use “time tracking tool for sales representatives” instead of just using “time tracking tool”. This will help you find your target audience.
You can also offer discounts to encourage them to make the purchase.
One of the advantages of using Google Ads is its ability to create a custom segment audience. You’ll be able to target people depending on their interests and recent searches.
Bidding Strategies for Warmed-up Audiences
The primary goal at this stage is to have the visitors take action and make a purchase.
Since they are much more likely to be converted, you can bid higher and pay to increase traffic. However, don’t put in too much, as not all of them are ready to make a purchase.
At this stage, Enhanced CPC and Max Conversions are the highest-performing bids.
Google’s machine learning will adjust the bids automatically, depending on the possibility of conversion when using enhanced CPC. You’ll be able to have granular control and benefit from Google’s bidding signals.
On the other hand, Max Conversions sets your bids automatically to help you get conversions depending on your daily budget.
Decision Stage: Generate Conversions
The funnel’s end is the decision stage, where your potential customers are ready to purchase. They already know what they need and what to buy from you.
At this stage, you must become assertive with your ad and be able to pitch your best offer. This means you need to ensure they’d be converted and get revenue.
You have to clear any doubts or last-minute changes before the transaction happens.
Best Offer for a Conversion
This includes search campaigns, remarketing campaigns, and high-intent search ads.
During the first stage, it’s perfect to use branded keywords because they already have a clear idea about your products and services. They don’t need brand awareness anymore, but it’ll build your branding as the competition will become tougher.
Creating a Google Ads remarketing strategy is also great for encouraging interested people back to your website. You can offer exclusive discounts and promos such as free shipping or discounted subscription service.
Bidding Strategies
This is an action stage, which means you need to bid higher to ensure the conversion. So, it’s best to use automated bidding strategies: Target CPA for lead gen and Target ROAS for e-commerce.
Target CPA adjusts bids automatically to help you get many conversions at your target cost-per-action. For example, if you set a Target CPA of $50, Google Ads will automatically place your bids and get conversions at that amount or below.
Target ROAS lets you bid on a target return on ad spend. It maximizes the percentage based on the return you expect from the marketing.
To Sum Up
The Google Ads funnel is the most efficient PPC strategy, allowing you to maximize the ROI of your marketing campaigns.
As long as you understand the stage your audience is in, you’ll be able to bid well and spend your budget on campaigns that generate revenue. You have to make sure that you create a strategy at each stage.
Creating a Google Ads funnel strategy can be tricky, but once you’ve learned how to utilize it, you’ll be able to increase your conversion and retention rates.
