Today a couple of members of our PPC Team, more specifically: Evaldas Balcius and Lewis Austin set off to London to attend the Google Engage for Agencies event. All in all it was a really insightful meeting that helped to outline the importance of Google’s latest and greatest developments.

Enhanced Campaigns

A major focus and point of interest for the agencies was the infamous enhanced campaigns. The main benefit of enhanced campaigns was driven by context. This means that a difference in context will result in a difference in behaviour, so to make the most of these moments, we need to be able to provide content that will encourage the user to convert.

Taking the example of Niamh Mahon; if I have a pizza restaurant and someone is searching for “pizza”, on a mobile device whilst in a 1 mile radius of my store at 7PM. It is a pretty safe bet to assume that the searcher is going home and would like to grab a pizza on the way back. This context means that the searcher is very interested in making a purchase as soon as possible. As a business, it is these moments in time that are invaluable to my business and to making a sale. Based on these behaviours, I can use enhanced campaigns to set bid adjustments for: mobile devices, location and even time of day.

YouTube

We were then brought up to speed with YouTube, not so much the stats as we all know that YouTube is the giant in video sharing networks. More so about the advertising opportunities that YouTube can offer. One interesting feature available is road blocking, this is similar to sponsoring a channel, so your ad will show for the majority of a selected channels’ videos. By doing this, you can display your message to an audience who you deem to have an interest in your product. Another good point to remember is that you won’t be charged for your ad if a viewer clicks the skip button on your ad, which will save you a lot of money and, give you 5 seconds of free exposure.

Mobile Devices

The last presentation was an eye opener of how we as consumers use different devices and methods to search. It was interesting to see that you can use Google accounts to have all of your browsing data accessible across all of your devices. This means that if I was in a shop and saw a pair of sneakers that I really liked, but wasn’t 100% about the price, I could run a search using the barcode and compare online prices to what is in store. If I feel that the high tops are a little cheaper online, I could go home and open up my laptop, load up chrome and continue where I left off on my mobile.

I think that we can take a lot away from Google Engage this year, in terms of future developments and how our target market is predicted to evolve technologically in years to come.

Before you all run off to research more about enhanced campaigns; here is a quick snapshot of Google Engage for Agencies this year, our Evaldas Balcius is in there somewhere, can you see him?

According to a recent Google study in partnership with Nielsen, three out of four mobile searches trigger follow up actions. These could be actions such as further research, a store visit, phone call, purchase or word-of-mouth sharing. On average, mobile search will trigger at least two follow up actions.

77% of mobile searches occur at home or at work, while 17% are on the go. Shopping queries are twice as likely to occur in store.

Taking these statistics into consideration, it is important to be aware of the impact of mobile search to your business. 55% of conversions such as a store visit, phone call or purchase happen within an hour, so the information and usability you provide mobile users is extremely valuable.

With these statistics in mind, your mobile site usability is incredibly important. Customers need to be able to find the information they need quickly and easily on a smartphone so they are aware if you supply what they need.

By making sure you have a mobile website or a website compatible with mobiles you have a hugely beneficial advantage when it comes to converting searches and website visits into conversions and sales.

You also need to think about integrating mobile search into your PPC and natural SEO campaigns, so you are visible to mobile searchers. The recent launch of Google’s Advanced Campaigns allows for advertisers to focus campaigns depending on the device and locations of potential customers – meaning that you could focus your mobile search campaigns on the most valuable customers.

Mobile search is now more important than ever, and it is becoming increasingly vital to make sure you’re website is integrate.

The PPC landscape is continually changing as Google introduces new features and settings and advertisers become more experienced with getting the most out of pay per click campaigns. In light of this SEO Positive has noticed three important pay per click trends.

1.       Cross device browsing

Mobile traffic is ever increasing as more people purchase smartphones and tablets spending additional time browsing the internet on the go. However, figures also show that conversion rates are lower on smartphones and more effective on desktops and tablets. A study on Econsultancy showed that the average conversion rate on desktops and tablets was 3.7 % and just 1.9 % for mobile. Mobile is still important and therefore it is worth investing some time and effort in it to reach audiences, even if they do return via desktop or tablet to make the purchase. Smart AdWords users are investing in enhanced campaigns which show the amount of traffic from each platform which gives insight into consumer’s behaviour.

2.       Mobile and Enhanced Campaigns   

As described above, enhanced and mobile devices are Google’s new tool for businesses. Cheaper than desktop and tablet cost per click, Google are encouraging business to invest time and effort into mobile, claiming that this is the year of the mobile. Mobile campaigns also have less competition that desktop which in turn should mean a higher chance of reaching customers.

3.       Google Shopping  

Since their launch in the last 2 years, Product Listing Ads have made a major impact on many ecommerce clients with most drawing significant proportion of sales from them. After its changes were implemented and all listings were free, many businesses have had to rethink of ways to draw customers in. This has produced higher quality natural listings and higher paid pay per click campaigns. In short, the change demonstrates that webmasters should not rely on one aspect of advertising alone.

Google did explain when the enhanced campaigns were rolled out, that the call extensions feature would make using phone numbers in ad text a thing of the past. It looks like today is the day.

It seems as though ads that are posted as of today will be disapproved if they have phone numbers in them, however I think that ad text that has been approved in the past will remain safe, or that’s what I’m hoping for.

For those that have posted ads and are still waiting for approval, if they contain a phone number, then they are likely to be disapproved just like mine, so you might as well save yourself even more waiting time and submit some close variants.

PPC Managers and AdWords users will now have to think of another call to action to use. The phone number insertion method looked great and in some cases actually received calls. If you were extra sneaky, you would have managed to utilise a number along with call extensions, which showed your number twice, obviously this is what Google is trying to avoid.

It seems as though we will have to go back to “call us now” and our other all time favourites.

On the fateful day of March 11th , Google released an article about the up and coming access update to Google Analytics. This means that now you can grant access based on property level, as well as the previous situation of profile and account level. Also there are now three different three different levels of account access: view, edit and manage users.

This update is definitely one that will be welcomed with open arms. From an agency point of view, Analytics is about to become a lot more convenient. Previously it was often the case where a client would grant access to the whole account and sometimes clients will have multiple domains which are irrelevant to the services you are providing. This means that your profile list in GA becomes colossal; hopefully this update will help to tidy things up. With regards to the access levels, it looks like some of the inspiration for this has been taken from AdWords. This is a useful feature because now agencies can replicate account access structure into their Analytics.

Businesses will also find benefit from these updates. Data can be a very important thing and a lot of people are not so enthusiastic about simply handing over this information. Now businesses have more control over their data and who can access it.

Google has said that the update will be rolled out over the next few weeks, so some people will be getting this sooner rather than later. However, there is no need to panic about account access levels as if you are currently an admin, you will be upgraded to have full rights.

New research by Bunnyfoot has revealed that 40% of consumers are unaware that Google Adwords are adverts. 41 out of 100 individuals did not know that the champagne coloured box was paid-for adverts and instead believed they were the most authoritative links – highlighting that many consumers are unaware of the difference between paid and organic search listings.

81% of users clicked on Google Adwords listings as opposed to natural rankings, proving that PPC could be a valuable investment for businesses.

According to previous research from 2011 by Group M UK and Nielsen – women are more likely to click on paid search links. It also showed that the older someone is, the more likely it is that they will click an ad, with the most prevalent group over the age of 55.

This new research should make marketers aware that there are consumers on the internet that aren’t aware that adwords are ads and begin to consider it as an addition to their search campaign. The obvious benefit of PPC is that you’ll likely see much quicker results and you’ll find yourself on the front page as soon as it’s all set up.

For businesses that want quick results, PPC could be the answer and is a great option if you have the budget and resources to support it. Yet if you can no longer pay for PPC, you’ll disappear from the front page.

However, natural search is hugely valuable and with the right kind of campaign can show impressive work over weeks or months as well as maintaining a high ranking if done well. You’ll also attract visitors that avoid search engine ads.

Whether you choose to focus on one campaign or both, working on a search campaign is vital to remain ahead of the competition.

Since its launch in 2000, AdWords has made a big impression and proven to be one of the most effective advertising tools on the internet. Google’s revenue for 2012 from AdWords alone was $42.5 billion American dollars, an indication of how popular the device is. The short text based adverts consisting of one headline of 25 characters and two additional text lines of 35 characters each are said to reach at least 81 percent of users on search results. Findings like this prove just how important PPC is and how significant it is to get it right. In light of this a new software has been launched which allows PPC to be determined by the weather.

The new WeatherFIT is a cloud based software program that controls your adverts so that they are displayed depending on the weather. The unique platform delivers AdWords adverts based on real time localised climate conditions. The program allows users to set up various campaigns based on various weather conditions. For instance if it is raining in Liverpool, you could have your campaign running for an umbrella company, however, if it is sunny in London your campaign would not run in the Capital. The software is programmed so that adverts will only show if they meet the weather criteria you have set.

Furthermore weather sensitivity analysis by the Met Office allows you to see first- hand the impact of weather on your sales in the past. It is possible to use this knowledge on a real time basis for your PPC strategy giving you the highest amount of potential customers at any relevant time and as a result makes your campaign as cost effective as possible.

Enhanced campaigns are a fairly new update, about a month old, for Google AdWords. There are some great new features available once you upgrade such as: location targeting and sitelinks. But to get all these great features, you must upgrade to enhanced campaigns.

So how do you go about upgrading? Well, the first step would be to identify whether or not you need to upgrade. If you go into your campaign, you should have a pop up box telling you to get started.

Once you click through you get a lovely new pop up box that explains all of the new features waiting for you in enhanced campaigns.

The next page you’re taken to will ask you to select your mobile bid adjustment. Bear in mind that the “recommended” percentage is based on what other people in your industry have done, so unless you have historical data to base your adjustment on, it is probably safer to stick with the recommended amount.

Just like that, you’ve upgraded.to enhanced. There are loads of great new features available, but we will be releasing a sequel to this tutorial that will outlines the new features and how you can make the most of them.

According to Knotice, 41% of all emails are opened using a mobile device. The search volume conducted on a smartphone doubles almost every month and to top it all off, 25% of UK purchases are made using a mobile device. Those are some hard facts and to a marketer or business, should emphasise how important mobile optimisation is.

For those of you who don’t spend every waking minute following Google’s every move, Google AdWords released a huge update called enhanced campaigns. There are some advantages to be gained from this such as improved site links, but the main focus on this is to target mobiles. By making all ads display in the mobile search results, it ties the hands of businesses and agencies using AdWords. Now they must create a mobile friendly landing page, or suffer a loss at the hands of an increased bounce rate and much lower conversion rate.

It is safe to say that all the top dogs are barking about mobile. All the stats are available and there is the evidence to prove its ROI.

Let’s think about this for a second though, Google does encourage businesses to “think like their customers”. Cast your mind back to when you last whipped out your smart phone and looked for information, be it pizza, a bakery or a fact to prove that you do know what you’re talking about in the pub. You scroll through the results and find something promising and chances are if you’re not on EE and in London, you’ll be waiting a while but that’s ok because you want to see this page.

As the page finally loads next to a new day dawning, you have to navigate your way through a huge website with tiny text and elements of flash. To get any good content, you have to pinch your phone being careful not to mis-click and lose all your hard work, and then if you finally find what you are after, you click the link and your thumb or finger is “too” big, so you’re sent off to another page and the journey begins again!

From a business point of view, if a mobile user is browsing on their phone and clicks through to your site, chance are that they are pretty engaged and interested in converting. All you have to do is make it as easy as possible for them to find what they want.