Saturday, February 28, 2009

How To Get A Better Clickthrough Rate With Google Adwords

By Dennis J. Thomas

Marketers inexperienced with the process of creating an effective advertising campaign using Google Adwords probably see the system as intimidating and difficult to use. It's true that if you jump headlong into Adwords and start writing ads without regard to how the process actually works, your results will be less than ideal. In reality, though, marketers who have come before you and have achieved enormous successes using Adwords can guide you along the path to success. Perry Marshall and other pioneers of marketing have developed proven methods of increasing clickthrough rates and therefore sales.

If you're looking for ways to get a better clickthrough rate with your Google Adwords strategy, here's what you need to know:

Figure Out Which Keywords Don't Work

Since Adword ads rely so heavily on the correct use of keywords, you will want to run frequent keyword reports. This can be done using various different software tools, many available online, and some even for free. Wordtracker, one such tool, offers a free keyword selector as well as a subscriptions. By creating a spreadsheet filled in with all the effective and relevant keywords, you can learn a great deal about how best to focus your ad campaign on potential customer. Also important, however, are negative keywords.

Negative keywords and key phrases are those that are related to your specific niche, product or service, but do not offer immediate value. After identifying what your ideal customer may be searching for, you'll be able to conjecture the specific key terms (positive keywords) they may use to find you. For example, if you are selling referral tracking software, you want to identify customers who are typing in key phrases such as 'buy referral tracking software', 'using referral tracking software', etc. Those who might type in 'free referral tracking software' do not fall under your target market radar, and need to be eliminated. You can employ this strategy with every niche and keyword list, paring it down until you have a very refined, highly targeted listing of keywords that apply only to your ideal customer.

Split Test to Create More Effective Adwords Ads

Split testing is commonly used in offline marketing strategies to test the market. For example, a company may send out two different direct mail pieces to select customers to gauge response rates, or they may create two different promotional offers to see which message or campaign is more effective than the other.

You can employ the same strategy with Google Adwords, especially after you've conducted your keyword research and pared down your lists to remove negative keywords. A highly targeted keyword list is a powerful tool that helps you identify only the essentials your ideal customer is after; the next step is to test out variations of your ads and measure results.

Split testing with your Google Adwords campaign is one of the best ways to maximize your online marketing efforts and steadily increase your clickthrough rate. Perry Marshall, a Google Adwords educator and online marketing strategist explains that this is one of the most effective - if not the most effective way - to increase your clickthrough rate over a short period of time. By continually split testing ads against each other, you'll start to see a noticeable traffic increase and can eliminate the poor-performing ad early on in your testing phases. - 15275

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