Finding Paid Search Zen in 2016

16 Steps to Finding Paid

Search Zen in 2016

@ebkendo

Author Profile

• 9 years in the Search industry

• Specialties

– PPC, SEO, Analytics, Social & Content Marketing

• Speaker

– MozCon

– SMX (Adv/East/West)

– PPC HeroCon

– Searchfest

– Marketing Profs

• Author

– All in One Web Marketing for Dummies

– Lynda.com

– ClickZ

– Search Engine WatchELIZABETH MARSTEN

Director of Paid Search

It’s the Year

of Mobile

@ebkendo

It’s the Year of Mobile

Over half of online traffic is on mobile devices now, how are far behind are mobile conversions?

• Mobile Bid Modifiers Take Centre Stage

– Time of day, day of week traffic is different than desktop

– Re-evaluate and change bids often

• Remarketing to Mobile Visitors

– Targeting mobile visitors across devices via programs like Facebook Dynamic Product Ads

• Some of You Will Still Just Have to Turn it Off

– Or really close to it

Facebook Dynamic

Product Ads:

Remarketing on Speed

@ebkendo

Facebook Dynamic Product Ads: Remarketing on Speed

Pre-requisites for a robust Facebook DPA program

• Need a product catalog feed to Facebook API specification

– As well as the Facebook Pixel

• Need a 3rd party OR a developer with skills

– In order to create and manage campaigns to the Facebook Ad

Management API

• Need some people to remarket to

– Traffic sources of direct, referral, organic or paid search

@ebkendo

Facebook Dynamic Product Ads

Best practices to implement

• Create and Modify Ad Units

– Depending on catalog size, you may need a lot of templates and copy

• View Through Conversions Count

• Seed Demographic Data from the Brand

– Create audiences within “all site visitors”

@ebkendo

Facebook Dynamic Product Ads

• Conversions exceed expectations

– 3x conversion rate of Google PLA

– ROAS of 1200%

– Timeframe: one month

• Right rail ads offer higher returns than Newsfeed and Mobile

• Returns are fairly equal between 24 hours and <10 days, so recency is not a major factor

What we’re seeing: home décor client

@ebkendo

Facebook Dynamic Product Ads

Does Facebook DPA Cannibalize PPC Sales?

• A little…

• For one client (major retailer, multiple verticals) we saw over the course of

3 months, 23% of Google AdWords PLA clicks go to Facebook instead

• 8% of Facebook conversions came from an Google AdWords assist

• Facebook “organic” accounted for 40% of the original referral

Say ”Yes” to

Accelerated

Budgets

@ebkendo

Say “Yes” to Accelerated Budgets

• Campaign A never reaches it’s daily budget, but converts well

– Change ad serving to accelerated

• Set that daily budget at a reasonable number, not one that will cause panic attacks

• Pair with Conversion Optimizer feature

Standard: ad serving is spread out the day based on daily budget

Accelerated: ad serving is set up for every eligible impression until budget is depleted.

Embrace Dynamic

Remarketing on

the Google

Display Network

@ebkendo

Embrace Dynamic Remarketing on the GDN

• Add dynamic parameters to your website

– Show visitors the products they added to cart, but did not buy on the GDN

• Set up feeds in the Business Data area for non-retail clients

• Use predefined audiences or build your own segments

• Use Conversion Optimizer for easier management

What it is: Highly targeted banner ads on the Google Display Network visible to previous site visitors

@ebkendo

Embrace Dynamic Remarketing on the GDN

https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/products/dynamic-creative-for-remarketing.html

@ebkendo

Embrace Dynamic Remarketing on the GDN

• Google case studies: ModCloth & Sierra

• Set Up Guide in AdWords

• Set Up Dynamic Feeds in AdWords

• My SMX East presentation

– If the client has Universal Analytics, you may not need additional code

Useful resources

Track Category

Conversion Rates

@ebkendo

Track Category Conversion Rates

For example:

• Conversion rate average is 2%

• Jackets & Blazers, gets only 5,000 clicks a month, but converts at 4%

• Turn up the bids/daily budget on Jackets & Blazers, get all of the conversions

possible.

– Volume might not be as impressive, but revenue is revenue.

Review conversion rates by category or product type. Sure, it may be lower volume, but

at 4%, let it ride!

RLSA for

Shopping

Campaigns

@ebkendo

Applying Remarketing Lists for Search Ads (RLSA) to Shopping Campaigns

• Build remarketing lists based on cart behavior, site behavior to show up in search results pages

• Second highest converting ad type after text / product listing ads (PLAs)

• Requires a tiny bit of code

Pair with Google Analytics and build audiences based on a myriad of metrics

@ebkendo

Applying Remarketing Lists for Search Ads (RLSA) to Shopping Campaigns

• GA Solutions Gallery: RLSA Packs

• Google AdWords Help Center

• My favorite RLSA articles:

– Search Engine Journal

– Search Engine Land

Useful resources

Are You

Using YouTube

Truview Shoppable

Ads Yet?

@ebkendo

Are you Using YouTube Trueview Shoppable Ads Yet?

• Users click on an invite notification

– Ad unit expands to show products

– Choose the SKUs to be in the product cards

• Or Target with Dynamic Remarketing

• Use Instream ad units only

• Choose your targeting

– Categories, brands or audiences

• An interesting option for branding, fair results from a performance marketing perspective

Show the products that appeared in the video ad with click through capability

@ebkendo

Trueview Shoppable

Implement

Excluded

Audiences

@ebkendo

Implement Negative / Excluded Audiences

• Site Converters

– Wasted ad spends on users who have already converted

• Time on Site > than one minute (give or take)

• Page Viewers

– Viewed 5 pages in under a minute and left

• Out of Stock Items

Not everyone needs to be remarketed to. In fact, some of them may be really tired of you by now.

Remember to exclude these audience groups – they’ve already bought or didn’t see what they wanted.

Explore Gmail

Sponsored Ads

@ebkendo

Explore Gmail Sponsored Ads

• Set up a new Display campaign

– Choose target and bid, add mail.google.com

• CPC based ad unit

– Ad opens to a larger image unit, no additional cost if user clicks through to

site or closes and opens again

• Stick to a 25 character headline, 100 character body copy

– Change ad serving to accelerated

Display your ad in the Promotions tab of over 40 million Gmail inboxes

@ebkendo

Explore Gmail Sponsored Ads

@ebkendo

Explore Gmail Sponsored Ads

• Return was 1:1

– Over the course of a month, once analytics worked

– CPC was really low, like 0.06 for Interests

• Best for branding/exposure

– Focus was new to file customers

– Creative took the user to a video of products with a coupon at the end

• Have to be able to reformat email creative or provide ready to go for the

“landing page”

What we’re seeing: home décor client

Have You

Started Yahoo

Product Ads?

@ebkendo

Have you started Yahoo Product Ads?

• Official launch: November 12th

– “Gemini” removed from the over product name

– All Gemini accounts will be enabled

• Still a lot of “wait and see” going on

– We saw a 6x return with an early beta test

Display your ad on Yahoo.com, desktop and mobile, sprinkling in Polyvore ads for women’s fashion.

@ebkendo

Have you started Yahoo Product Ads?

Some set up notes

• Dropbox (or Fetch) used to submit feed file

• Still need a Yahoo AM to create the FTP Yahoo Dropbox

• Not all 3rd party providers ready to support fully yet

• Feed configuration follows Google’s specs very closely

• There is a Merchant Center within Yahoo Gemini

@ebkendo

Have you started Yahoo Product Ads?

What CommerceHub has been seeing with Product Ads (Bing vs. Yahoo)

Throw Some

Money at Bing

Product Ads

@ebkendo

Throw some money at Bing Product Ads

• Easy to import existing AdWords structure into Bing Ads

• Don’t structure too granularly

– About 1,000 clicks per product group over 30 days

• Run Product Ads and Shopping concurrently until transfer of traffic is complete

• 8% or less is on mobile, primarily desktop

January 2016 is now the official sunset date of Bing Product Ads campaigns.

@ebkendo

Bing Shopping Campaigns

CommerceHub saw 30% year over year growth (2013 vs.

2014 ) on average after switching from PLA campaigns to

Shopping Campaigns on Google AdWords.

Leverage Ad

Customizers:

Countdown

Text Ads

@ebkendo

Ad Customizer: Countdown Text Ads

• Text ads only

• Set up and let these customized ad units ignite fear and urgency

– 30% CTR increase, 2x Conversions for countdowns

– 50% reduction in CPA for geo customizers

• Tons of other ad customization options, but for the holidays, start here

• Learn more about Ad Customizer

– Search Marketing Expo : Customizers – Madlibs and more

– Gauging the impact of AdWords Countdown Customizer

Find this easy-to-use template in the Business Data area of AdWords

Using

Conversion

Optimizer

@ebkendo

Using Conversion Optimizer

• Must have AdWords Conversion Tracking set up

• At least 30 conversions in the last 30 days

– In order to get the feature enabled

• If not, recommend at least 1,000 clicks in 30 days before trying anything else

– Like Enhanced CPC

• Works especially well on the GDN and with Dynamic Remarketing

Gain statistical significance and let Google do the heavy lifting, especially on the Display Network.

@ebkendo

Using Conversion Optimizer

Can try accelerated ad serving to “speed up” getting enough conversions to enable

After the Holidays

• Make sure to change CPA goals to align with pre-holiday times

• Otherwise, you’ll choke off pretty much all the traffic, unfortunately there’s no “forget

this giant spike in traffic” timeframe exclusion setting

• Continue to enjoy the machine learning after holiday, just at a much slower and probably

a higher CPA rate

UPCOMING:

Purchase on

Google

@ebkendo

Purchase on Google

MERCHANT

Product

Catalog

PLA with Purchase

on Google

Complete a

Purchase

Ship OrderOnline Management

System

Send payment to

MerchantReceives Order

CUSTOMER

@ebkendo

Purchase on Google

A glimpse of what’s needed:

• Still an experiment and heavily gated entry

• Feed provider with full API integration set up

• Order management set up

• Merchant Center set up and feed configuration

• AdWords account enablement

• Payment set up from Google to you

• Lots and lots of testing around end to end

order fulfillment

BONUS!

Turn it off

@ebkendo

Turn it Off

Set a Floor for Holiday

• If you’re strapped on budget, pause that ad group or campaign and move that

budget over to where you need it

• Even if it’s only $5

• You could bid down, way down, alternatively

• But, I’d rather have the money and spend elsewhere than hope for the miracle

Sometimes you need to retreat from your current campaigns and regroup

BONUS 2!

Who Buys This Stuff?

@ebkendo

Who Buys This Stuff?

30% of 2014 Black Friday and Cyber

Monday shoppers bought items for

themselves, not as gifts.

http://time.com/money/3623259/self-gifting-christmas-holidays/

@ebkendo

Who Buys This Stuff?

• Go through the site, try and buy something

– Where do you get hung up? What couldn’t you find?

– How easy/hard was it to check out or keep going?

• Experiment with different parameters that determine buying decisions

– Gift? For self? Women? Men?

– Geography?

– Time of Day?

In other words, BEING your customer

is your best bet for PPC success!

Know your customer before you begin ANY of this!

Questions?

Expert help is a click away!

www.commercehub.com

Call us at 518-810-0700 | 206-832-3900

Finding Paid Search Zen | Presented at State of Search 2015