Are Your AdWords Campaigns Working Hard Enough?

One of the biggest mistakes business owners make when setting up and managing their own AdWords campaigns is failing to consider how they will track the results generated from their advertising spend.

Read on to discover easy ways to track results from your AdWords campaigns, so you can find out how hard they are working!

In the online world a Conversion is an action that you want people to take once they’ve arrived at your website.

Conversions include:

• placing an order
• making a phone call
• filling out your enquiry form
• and signing up for your newsletter.

Google AdWords and Analytics offer several ways to track conversions.

Taking time to set up Conversion Tracking (or working with the right people to help you) is one of the most important things to do before you start running your AdWords campaigns.

Without this tracking set up you’ll never have access to data about the results you’re getting AND you’re missing a huge opportunity to optimise your campaigns to lower your average cost per conversion.

Conversion Tracking lets you make your AdWords campaigns work harder!

Google AdWords Conversion Tracking

1. Track purchases, form submissions and other online actions

This can be done by adding a piece of code to the page that people reach once they’ve completed a conversion, for example:

1. The order confirmation page that’s viewed once an order is placed
2. The “thank you” page that’s viewed once someone submits the form on your Contact Us page
3. The confirmation page that’s viewed once someone has successfully signed up for your newsletter.

2. Track Calls from Ads

In AdWords Search campaigns you can add a Call Extension which means people can see your phone number as part of an ad seen on a desktop, and there will be a “click to call” button as part of your ad when it appears on a mobile device.

Tracking “calls from ads” conversions allows you to tracks calls made by people who:

1. click on the extension via a mobile device
2. see the phone number in a desktop ad and then call you.

This tracking can be set up within AdWords as part of your Call Extension and doesn’t require any code to be added to your website.

3. Website Call Tracking

While “calls from ads” allows tracking of calls made by people who may not have visited your website, “Website Call Tracking” allows tracking of calls made by people who click on your ad to visit your website and then call you. To set up Website Call Tracking you need to add a piece of code to your website that allows a Google Forwarding Number to be shown to people who clicked on your ad, instead of your phone number.

Here’s my video on how it works

These features are included as part of AdWords and there is no additional cost to use them (you may need to pay your web developer to make the code updates but that should be a one off cost).

Google Analytics Conversion Tracking

1. eCommerce Tracking

For businesses that sell items online, eCommerce tracking allows you to see:

a) how many transactions have been made and

b) the revenue generated from those transactions.

This is incredibly powerful because it allows you to see the number of transactions and amount of revenue generated from all your different traffic sources, including your AdWords campaigns.

Speak to your web developer about adding eCommerce Tracking to your Google Analytics. And if you’re an AdWords customer, AdWords support can walk you through the steps and code updates.

2. Goals

Goals are similar to the first type of AdWords conversion tracking in that one type of Goal allows you to track purchases, form submissions and online actions. The difference is that Goals are set up within Google Analytics and don’t require additional code to be added to your website. Once set up they can be imported to your AdWords campaign.

Another type of Goal can track Events, such as clicks on a button, downloads of a document or views of a video. Setting up Event tracking does require updates to your Google Analytics tracking code.

You can also set up Goals to track views of a specific web page, people who spend a minimum amount of time on your website or view a minimum number of pages.

As per eCommerce tracking, speak to your web developer, or AdWords clients can speak to AdWords support about getting Goals set up.

Test that your Conversion Tracking is Working

Once the tracking is set up, do some tests to make sure that it’s working correctly. After a day or two check that the orders received match those tracked on a particular day, or that the eCommerce revenue tracked matches payments received (minus GST and delivery costs). For online form submissions check that the enquiries received match the number of Goals tracked.

It’s also worth considering that Google Analytics tracks online enquiries from all traffic sources whereas AdWords Conversion Tracking will only track those generated from your ad campaign.

Evaluate your Results

Once you have information about the sales, online enquiries and phone calls that you’re getting from your AdWords campaigns, evaluate it in terms of how much you spent on advertising (plus agency costs if you’re working with an agency).

Then consider what return on investment AdWords is generating to help grow your business and generate profit.

Optimise your Campaigns

Once Conversion data has built up in your AdWords account you can use it to optimise your campaigns by focusing on the keywords and ad copy that have the most efficient conversion cost and bring the highest value return.

Focus your ad spend on the keywords that bring the most conversions at the lowest cost, and pause keywords that don’t bring conversions.

Optimising your campaigns based on conversion data requires regular monitoring, adjustments to your bids and review of results. AdWords allows you to see information about the geographic locations, time of day, day of week and type of device where your conversions are coming from, and you can make adjustments accordingly to maximise conversions.

Make sure your Campaign is set up according to Google’s Best Practices, right from the start

Aside from looking at Conversion data, your campaign structure, keywords, ad copy, ad extensions, negative keywords, mobile bid adjustments and other factors all play a role in how hard your AdWords campaigns work to help you build your business. So make sure your campaign is set up according to Google’s Best Practices.

Read more:

• 15 Real Time Ways to Improve your AdWords ROI
• Key Factors to Consider When Setting up an AdWords Campaign.

Work with a Google Partner

Let’s be honest, if you’re not familiar with the techniques required to optimise your AdWords campaigns it can be overwhelming.

I recommend working with a Google Partner to outsource your AdWords campaign set up and management. And as a Google Partner with ten years experience in AdWords management and seven years in the Partner program, I’m happy to give you an honest, non-Google-speak opinion about how your AdWords campaigns could work harder!

Contact me to start the ball rolling.