Ad Extensions

Google offers several ways to add value or information to search adverts. These are referred to as Ad Extensions. For a search advertiser, the Ad Extensions offer a way to get additional information into a search advert without affecting standard advert copy limits.

AdWords currently offers seven text Ad Extensions:

1.  Location Extensions

Location extensions allow you to add location information and maps to your advert. To use the extensions, you can either insert your address manually or link your AdWords account to your Google+ Local (www.google.com/local) account.

2.  Call Extensions

The call extension allows you to display a local phone number in a line below the standard text advert. This is particularly effective in mobile ads, where the user can click and call directly from their phone.

3.  Social Extensions

The social extension indicates how many Google+ users have +1ed or followed the brand. This provides added social relevance on search results and is also a contributor to ad quality score.

4.  Seller Ratings
Google will match the domain used in the advert to review sites and display rating information together with your text ad. This is very useful if you have excellent ratings!

5.  Sitelinks

Sitelinks allow you to display up to six additional links, each with a unique destination URL, with your advert. Each link is limited to 35 characters. Sitelinks allow you to direct users to more relevant areas of your website, all from one advert. They are suitable for advertising on more general or branded keywords.

6.  Offer Extensions

By linking your AdWords account to your Google Merchant Center account and supplying a product feed, you are able to include product images in your search adverts when available. This is particularly useful for eCommerce advertisers.

7.  Image Extensions

At the time of writing, these are still in beta, with only a few advertisers allowed to use them. These allow images in ads to extend, so that advertisers can promote products through an image directly from the ad itself.

Display URL

Search ads allow you to include a display URL. The URL shown is not necessarily the URL that the user will click through to – the display URL (what is shown on the advert) actually directs to the destination URL (what the actual URL of the page is). The display URL is sometimes also called a vanity URL.

The display URL must be the same domain as the destination URL. Google will show only one advert per domain.

The page that the user is taken to is called the landing page, which can be any page on your website, not necessarily the home page. The aim should be to send users to a web page that is as specific to their search, and the PPC advert, as possible. This is known as deep-linking.

 Landing pages

Search advertising is not just about creating adverts and bidding for keywords. The process continues once a user has clicked on your advert. The page that the user reaches by clicking on an advert is called a landing page – either an existing page on your website, or a new custom-built page for the campaign at hand (useful if you are running a competition or special offer).

Landing pages can make or break an advertising campaign. Poorly executed PPC campaigns will send all users to the home page of a website. Campaigns that convert will make sure that users land on a page that is relevant to their search with a very visible Call to Action. The aim is to keep the user as focused on the goal – conversion – as possible. Sending users to the home page gives them too many other options to choose from.

For example, if someone searched for ‘Canon EOS 450D’, a poorly run campaign would send that user to www.canon.co.uk. 

A better campaign would have the user clicking through to www.canon.co.uk/For_
Home/Product_Finder/Cameras/Digital_SLR/EOS_450D/index.asp.
Landing pages also indicate relevance to the search engine, which can increase
the Quality Score of the advert, and in turn lower the cost per click (CPC) of the
keyword. Adding keyword-rich pages to the website can also have SEO benefits.
PPC campaigns often have thousands of keywords, which can mean that you will
have a lot of landing pages to build. Creating dynamic landing pages means that
with a simple script, unique keyword-rich landing pages can be created for every
search. The script will take the keyword that the searcher has used, and insert it
in predefined places on the landing page. The user will then be landing on a page
that is highly relevant to their search.

Writing effective copy

For most PPC adverts, the advert copy is the only tool available to attract attention, convey a message and entice action. This is why writing effective advert copy is such an important skill for search advertising.

People who are searching for something usually have a specific intent – they are looking for information, guidance, comparisons, tools, or solutions to their problems. It’s important to understand why somebody would look for your brand or product – and what keywords they would use to find it – when crafting your search ads. Look at the considerations for choosing keywords that are covered in the Search Engine Optimisationchapter – these often overlap.

 Use compelling and well-crafted Calls to Actionso that users know what to do and what to expect: ‘try now’, ‘sign up now’, ‘buy now’.

Many advertisers test offers in the advert copy, such as a discount or limited- time voucher. Product or service benefits make for good advert copy, such as free shipping, secure shopping or fast delivery.

If you are running many ads at once, it can be quite a lot of work to create unique copy for each one. Dynamic keyword insertion (inserting the search keyword dynamically into the advert copy that appears) or using the keyword in the advert copy can help. Dynamic keyword insertion takes the keyword in your campaign that matches with the user search query and inserts it into the ad automatically. This way, the ad looks more relevant to the user than a generic ad. The search engine will mark words that match the search term in bold, making the advert stand out a little bit more.

The downside of using dynamic keyword insertion is that you have less control over when an ad is shown to a user, and the results may not be as good as with a standard SEM campaign. The goal is to generate as many clicks as possible, but sometimes the advertiser is better off with fewer, high-quality clicks that generate actual sales.

The long tail

Moz, a respected SEO blog, asserts that 70% of searches on the web are unique (Moz, 2012). This means that the sum of searches that are unique is higher than the sum of non-unique searches. Looking a little more closely at search terms will show a small number of high-volume searches, and then a large number of lower volume searches stretching out to those unique searches.

This is sometimes referred to as the long tail of search. Discovering these low-volume, niche search terms can do wonders for a search advertising campaign. Generally there is not much competition for these search terms, and the search term itself is very much targeted, so it will likely be cheaper to bid on and may yield a high conversion rate. While long-tail phrases are generally cheaper and lead to a higher rate of conversions, you will need to use a much larger number of them to make up for the lower traffic volume that they generate.

 Also consider that search engine users may be at various stages of the buying cycle, and it could be worthwhile to craft a long-tail keyword strategy targeting those who are at the end of the buying cycle and know specifically what they are looking for.

For example, if you sell cameras, targeting the term ‘camera’ may not bring in much targeted traffic (since someone searching for ‘camera’ may be looking for information, pictures, price comparisons, or even something completely unrelated). But someone looking for ‘buy Canon DSLR camera in London’ has a clear intention in mind and could be a great target for advertising.