What is Google Ad-Words?

When I was first requested to run Google Ad-Words campaigns 2 years ago, I was having the same question in my mind. It was my first job, and I had joined for Market Research. Google Ads was a concept that appeared totally new.

I know…now it’s everywhere – Digital Marketing is now taught as a subject in MBA programs.

Google AD-Words…Whaaaat?

My intention of writing this guide is to help un-experienced beginners who are just starting with Ad-Words. Believe me guys, even if you have learned all the theory, you’ll still need numerous rounds of testing different things to get Ad-Words right and even then, there’ll always be a room for perfection.

What is Google Ad-Words?

To give you the basic definition, Google Ad-Words is an online paid advertising service established by Google to support marketers reach their customers rapidly.

When someone searches on Google with a specific term, say ‘Travel Packages’, Google would pitch a list of searches for you. But if you look carefully, you will notice that the top and the bottom results are usually ads.

  

But how did Google come to know which ads to display?

Types of Ads in Google Ad-Words

Now, let us look at each of these ad types in detail.

A) Search ads

When a user searches on Google, the list of ads that appear above the organic listing are called search ads.  For example, when a user searches for “travel packages”, the search results will look like this: -

The ones marked “Ad” are ads.  

Google studies several factors before determining which ad to display first, as well as the sequence of ads that follow. Let’s take a brief look at them: -

Significant Factors in Search Ads

1.   Targeting: - Your ads will be shown in the geography that you select (you can go as exact as the ZIP code)

2.  Search Term and keyword: - What is being searched for by the user + the keyword that you optimize the ad for.

3.   Ad Copy Relevance: - Ads that appear for a precise search term should be relevant. A search for jobs should not throw results for hotels.

4.  Landing Page Experience: - How appropriate is the landing page to what the searcher wanted? Did he get what he was looking for?

5.   Conversion Rate: - This is measured by relevance, landing page quality, and experience.

6.    Bids: - If 2 advertisers have perfect ads and landing pages, the higher bid will get preferable over the lower one.

We Can Also Run Following Ads in Search Network Also.

1.  Call-Only Ads: - This ad is available only on call permitted mobile devices. After clicking on the ad, instead of taking you to your website, it makes a call directly.

2.  Dynamic Ads: - This ad type is best for businesses who have a good website, because the content of the ad and landing pages are taken dynamically from the website. They are very alike to text ads, excluding that no keywords are elaborated here. e.g.: - a training institute is running dynamic search ads. A user searches for “java courses”. Google displays a list of ads. But dynamic ads would automatically substitute the ad headline with “java course” and the ad text with the relevant website content and landing page”.

3.    Mobile App Promotion: - These ads are appropriate for businesses with mobile applications. The goal of this ad is to inspire users to download your app or take a wanted action within the app.

Note: - All these ads are accessible in the search network. Except for call-only ads, others are available in display and video campaigns also. The ideas are same, but the platforms are different.

B) Display ads

Have you ever noticed them? While you are reading a post or viewing a video on a website, you see ads in a lot of different places on the page, and in different sizes. These are display ads.

Here the searcher is not obviously looking for what is ad offers. But, based on a number of factors like keywords, audience interest, managed placements etc., Google chooses to show them to you. These display ads only appear on advertising-supported websites.

Below are some of the targeting principles, based on which Google chooses the websites to place the banner ads.

1.   Keywords: - The ads are presented based on the keywords that they are optimized for. Let’s say the keyword for the ad is “Social Media Marketing”, then Google would choose websites that have content on the same.

2.   Placements: - They are nothing but the websites on which you want your ad to appear. Like: - if you want to show your ad only on education related websites, then look for advertising supported education sites and add them to your targeting.

3.    Re-marketing: - This helps you re-join with your existing website visitors. You can mark the visitors who have come to your website but have not taken any of the action.

4.    Topic: - There are specific topics in Ad-Words, under which all websites are clustered. It will be easier for the advertisers to select topics related to the businesses. For example, websites related to hotels will be listed under the topic ‘travel.’

C) Shopping Ads

If you are a retailer, this campaign type would make more intelligence for you. This ad type increases traffic to your website and helps in producing quality leads as well as growing your conversions.

Below is an example of how shopping ads appear on the search network.

Requirements for Running Shopping Ads: -

1.    Setup an account with Google Merchant Center (It is a platform that helps retailers to upload all their product listings in a specific format).

2.    Create an account with Google Ad-Words & connect them together.

3.    Submit updated product data every 30 days to Google Merchant Center.

Since both are linked together, shopping ad takes all the product particulars from Google Merchant Center, matches the search query and shows appropriate ads to the user.

D) Video Ads

This ad type lets the advertisers to run video ads on YouTube & other Google Display Networks.

3 Chief Benefits of Running Video Ads are: -

1.    Better Targeting: - It has demographic, location, attention, keyword and device targeting which helps you grasp the right audience on YouTube and Google Display Network.

2.    More Reach: - From January 2017, YouTube is the 3^rd most visited website and has more than 30 million visitors every day. These ads are also available on Google Display Network. This means that you have access to a broader audience.

3.    Measurable: - Unlike advertising on TV, YouTube ads let you know all the necessary metrics like: - views, view rate, clicks, reach and frequency, engagement, performance etc.  

Example: - video ad from Grammarly

E) Universal App Campaign

This ad campaign is best for businesses with a mobile application. The advertiser can promote the mobile app across search, play store, display & you-tube. Ad-Words uses ad text concepts right from your app store programs. All you need to provide some text, a budget and a starting bid. Also, don’t forget to set languages and positions for the ad. 

Financial institution, KCB group, used Universal App Campaign to increase awareness about KCB mobile banking app.

Conclusion

So, now you know what is Google Ad-Words, and the types of ads that are accessible for you to run. My next post will give you compact reasons that why to start with Google ads right away and to expand your ROI using them. For any query you can always ask in comment section below.