When setting up a search marketing campaign the focus is often on establishing keyword lists and ad copy, but one key metric is often either forgotten about or misunderstood. Even those who are new to search marketing understand that your quality score is important, but many don’t know why. Even fewer people really understand how quality scores are determined.

You can find your quality score in your keywords tab on either your Google Adwords or Bing Ads account. Quality scores range from 1/10 to 10/10. The ideal score is obviously a 10/10, but anything above an 8 and you’ve got a strong campaign. When determining your quality score Google’s algorithm reviews your ad copy, landing page, and potential click through rate in relation to your keyword. Let’s look at each one of these elements separately.

Ad Copy

Your ad copy is the text you use when setting up your ads. Everything from your title to your display URL should relate to your ad group/keyword. It’s important to write ad copy that is engaging and has a clear call to action, but it’s also important to include keywords to improve quality score. One way to do this is by using dynamic keyword insertion. You can use dynamic keyword insertion in your ad title and/or ad copy. In Google Adwords this is achieved by using the following parameter {Keyword: text}. Google won’t allow you to simply put {Keyword} because in some cases the keyword contains too many characters to fit within the line of text. This is especially the case when your ad group contains keywords with phrase match. Example: Let’s say you have an SEO business, and your bidding on “SEO services”. A sample ad could look like:

{Keyword: Improve Ranking} 

Get More Out of Your SEO! 

Increase Traffic & Leads Today.

Instead of putting {Keyword: SEO Services} I used “improve ranking” because if the keyword is “Need SEO” or similar terms, the text won’t make sense or read well to the consumer. Bing Ads also allows you to use dynamic keyword insertion, but unlike Google they will allow you to use just {KeyWord}.

Landing Page

Your landing page is whichever page you have chosen for your ads to lead to. Many small businesses use their main website as their landing page. There is nothing necessarily wrong with this practice, but it can often be difficult to improve your quality score when you can’t edit the landing page text per ad group/keyword. In addition, if you are working on improving your SEO ranking, PPC can impact your SEO. When determining SEO ranking, Google will factor in bounce rates and length of sessions. Historically, PPC visitors bounce at a higher rate and spend less time on a page. This can negatively affect your SEO.Instead, companies will use services like Marketo to generate landing pages specific to ad campaigns. You can add “no-follow” to these links, so that your main website is not affected by traffic from these campaigns. If Marketo or similar services are too expensive, you can create and manage your own landing pages by using WordPress & website templates.If separate landing pages aren’t an option, hope is not lost. You can improve your quality score by updating your on page content, headers, and meta data to reflect your keywords.

Click Through Rate

Oh the dreaded click through rate, the most complicated of SEM optimization. Most marketers underestimate the importance of the click through rate, and how much it impacts quality score. Google Adwords is a revenue stream first and foremost. The goal is to display ads higher on a page, that have a higher likelihood of being clicked. More clicks means more spend, and Google likes that.

How do you make your ads more clickable? That’s the million dollar question. By creating keyword lists that are highly relevant to your product/services you can increase your click through rate. You can also help your chances by writing engaging ad copy that stands out from your competitors. Your click through rate can improve over time, based on ad performance.

Adwords may initially deduce that interest in your ad may be low, but if you have a good ratio of impressions to clicks you can improve your CTR and your quality score effectively.

Why are quality scores important?

Your quality score is used by Google & Bing to determine how much you pay per click. Since your goal is to pay as little as possible for a keyword, and lower your CPA (cost per lead), quality score is important. In addition to effecting prices, your quality score also determines how often your ad is shown and where it falls on the page.

As mentioned earlier, if you have a low quality score Adwords will determine that your ad is less likely to result in clicks. Therefore no matter how high you may bid, a competitor with a better quality score could beat you every time.

Keywords with quality scores below a 3/10 are often not shown, which decreases your potential for growth and market share. If your goal is to increase traffic to your site and sales, lack of clicks is deadly to the success of your campaigns.

At I Dream of SEO our goal is to help you create highly effective search marketing campaigns that will result in more leads for your business and highly targeted traffic to your site. Build your brand, expand company reach, and earn trust from hundreds of visitors a day.

Contact us today & start marketing online.- See more at: http://www.idreamofseo.com/quality-score-what-it-is-why-it-matters

What’s Wrong With My Landing Page?

“Your landing page is amazing, it’s perfect in every way. There’s nothing you need to change about your pay per click landing page,” is something no SEM expert said (or should say) ever.

Hi, I’m your pay per click advertiser and I’m here to aggravate you all the way to the bank.

I’ve managed pay per click marketing campaigns for small to large businesses in verticals ranging from finance to arboriculture. I won’t say I’ve seen it all, but I’ve seen a lot of it. I know a little bit about what it takes to create a winning landing page, and it might not be (and probably isn’t) what you’re currently using.

Why you messing with my landing page?

When you hand over the PPC reigns to a professional it must come with trust. You must trust that we know what we’re doing and that we have your best interest at heart. After all, you’re not very likely to renew with us if we can’t expand your reach and increase your ROI.

Yet, we often see push back when it comes to editing your landing page. Your landing page is the page your customers land on when they click on a pay per click ad. It can be a page of your website, or a page specifically designed for a pay per click campaign.

Quality Score, what is it and why does it matter?

The first thing we suggest is creating a separate landing page for your marketing campaigns, with no-follow URLs so we keep your search engine optimization chugging along without hiccups from PPC traffic.

Besides keeping your SEO happy, custom landing pages help you achieve your PPC goals. A winning landing page is:

• Easy to navigate
• Provides useful relevant information
• Keeps it simple
• Has few external links
• Is SIMPLE
• Has FEW external links

See where I’m going with this?

The Fewer Links the Better

You’re paying for clicks to your website, why provide the visitor with ways to click away? Imagine throwing money out the window. Not something you’re interested in? Keep links to a minimum on your landing page.

Keep Your Landing Page Simple

If your store offers a variety of products, it’s best to create product groups and then design a page around these groupings. This way we can create a custom ad group for this product type and send visitors to a page where they can shop for exactly what they’re looking for. If you have a sports equipment business for example, you could group your landing pages by product types. You could have one page for camping equipment, one for water sports, etc.

By keeping navigation and your page simple, you improve user experience and make it easier for visitors to turn into customers. Make it easy for your visitors to make a purchase by making the path to the shopping cart quick and easy.

As your PPC experts, I Dream of SEO can help you design a winning landing page. We’ll optimize your existing landing pages, or create brand new ones for you. We work to create campaigns optimized for your landing pages, to increase conversions and help you achieve a high ROI.

Contact us today for a free landing page audit and Pay Per Click management quote.

What to do about declining social ad support

If you’re not new to social ads, you’ve probably noticed a decline in ad support.

First, Facebook removed your ability to call in. Next, it disabled the chat function – the chat function made it possible for you to reach out to a Facebook representative who could answer your questions, and help you troubleshoot your account. Now your only course of action is to submit a support ticket to receive an email or phone call response in 24 hours.

Twitter historically offered better ad support, with an account representative and support option. However, Twitter has also disabled the chat function and for the most part eliminated your ability to submit support tickets.

The industry has shifted to a “help forum” model, where advertisers must hunt for the answers to their questions by browsing through countless “help” articles.

While eliminating ad support may reduce the employee count, and the bottom line, it does make it very difficult for new advertisers to build strong, successful campaigns on social platforms.

Experienced social ad campaign managers are more important than ever before.

Do I Really Need to Boost My Posts?

Yes. Whenever I suggest Facebook boosting to a client I’m met with trepidation. “Facebook advertising hasn’t really worked for us in the past,” is often the first response I get. I’m then faced with a Mount Everest sized up-hill battle.

Understanding Facebook

Many of my clients use Facebook on a daily basis, utilizing many of the same features that make it so difficult for advertisers or businesses to grow engagement and traffic.

Facebook makes it very easy for potential clients and prospective fans to avoid your posts. For example, a person likes your page, and you think “Yay, I’ve got a captive audience for all my posts. They’ll see every promotion, contest, campaign and sale I promote.”

Unfortunately that’s not how it works.

If I like a page, but never engage with its posts, Facebook will soon remove it from my newsfeed. Why would Facebook do this? I’m essentially telling Facebook, that while I “liked” that page, I’m not really interested in receiving updates. If I like, I can visit that page when I want, but Facebook won’t busy my feed with constant updates.

Wait what? So you’re telling me that I’ve been acquiring fans for nothing?

Not entirely, but sort of.

If your posts aren’t earning engagement (likes, shares, comments) then it’s highly likely that your “fans” aren’t really seeing your posts. Besides the fact that Facebook naturally hides posts that aren’t engaged with, users also have the option to “hide” your posts from their feed, or “unfollow” your posts.

What Can I do?

Here’s where Facebook boosting comes in. Yes, it is convenient that Facebook buries your posts, only to provide you with a way to pay to have your posts viewed, but whoever said Facebook wasn’t in it for the money?

The fact of the matter is, that if you want engagement, and you’re not a well established brand, you’re going to need to do a little boosting in order to spark engagement on your page.

The good news is that once users start engaging with your page, they will start to receive your updates naturally. You’d also be surprised at how far a small budget will go when it comes to engagement.

Measuring Success

As with any marketing campaign, it’s important to track performance. While engagement looks nice on your page, it has to lead to actual conversions in order to show a return on investment. Track traffic from Facebook with Google Analytics, and monitor how many leads/sales your boosting generates.

Will you start boosting? Have you seen success with boosting posts? Contact I Dream of SEO for help managing your social ad campaigns.

Don’t miss out on Q4 opportunities in 2016

Jingle Bells, Facebook sells — thanks to campaigns created by you. It may be the first week of fall, but it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas for digital marketers. The holiday season is one of the biggest times of year for retailers, accounting for as much as 30 percent of annual sales, according to the National Retail Federation. Facebook and Instagram report increased usage starting in early October and lasting until New Year’s Eve, making this time period the prime time for Facebook marketing.

One in three people said they purchased an item from a local business based on an advertisement they saw on Facebook, with 47 percent of consumers starting holiday shopping by Halloween, according to a 2015 G/O Digital study.

Kill it for your company this Christmas with these on-point Facebook marketing tips.

Identify Key Audience Segments

Decide which audience segments you want to reach during the holidays and determine the best ways to target them. Use the audience insights tab in Facebook to learn more about your page and campaign audience. Find demographic, location and interest data on your best customers. Facebook also provides data on your audience’s purchase patterns, which you can use to personalize your online ad campaigns.

Optimize for Mobile

Optimizing your holiday campaigns for mobile should be your priority in 2016. This past holiday season in the US, the share of online purchases that were made on mobile and visible to Facebook increased 33% compared to the 2014 holiday season, according to research from Facebook IQ. Optimizing for mobile means creating engaging online ads and building landing pages that are responsive to screen size. Test ad creative and landing pages in the months leading up to the holidays to determine which creatives perform best on mobile devices.

Creative Refresh

When it comes to creative, Facebook recommends featuring your best-selling products to your audience segments in order to illustrate key selling points and build interest. Twitter says advertisers should create at least three to five ads for a/b testing before launching any online marketing campaign. Data shows that ad creatives start experiencing fatigue around 8-10 days after campaigns launch. This means that, to get ahead of ad fatigue, advertisers should swap out ad creative every week and a half or so in order to maintain optimal campaign performance.

Conduct A/B Tests for Social Ads

Track and measure ad performance by placing a Facebook pixel on your landing pages. Use Facebook reporting to determine which creatives are performing best and which are under performing based on conversion data. Generate a variety of ads that utilize the data you’ve gathered to avoid ad fatigue. Rotate ads evenly to create a fair and true comparison. According to Facebook best practices, visual formats that drawattention work best, such as video, carousel or canvas ads that create an immersive experience.

Create Urgency

Facebook says that advertisers should create a sense of urgency in order to drive sales during the busy holiday season. To boost conversions, promote limited time offers, timely promotions, and free or discounted shipping deadlines. If planning to launch a Black Friday or Cyber Monday campaign, use your ad creative to establish a sense of urgency.

Meeting sales goals can be challenging on social media without strategic planning. Put our Facebook holiday marketing strategies in place, and Jingle Bell Rock this holiday marketing season.