A daunting prospect for many small business owners can often be the internet. Maximising the huge potential it has can be confusing and contains many pitfalls. In this blog post however I want to express how simple and easy advertising, Marketing and promoting your business on the internet can be, and how cost effective this can be for small businesses using Google AdWords.
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The above illustration shows the process in its simplest form. 1st of all you create your AdWords account, if you have a Google account already you can sign in with your current details. You then create an ad, including a a headline, descriptive text and a URL which can lead to a non displayed designated URL. Here’s an example below for a small business based in Poole.
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Their headline is directly specifically at their target market, people searching for decorators in Bournemouth. The description is used to express their quality and reassures potential customers with the 01202 area code. The URL links directly to their website. The importance of the actual ad’s appearance is paramount as Hardman et al (2003) [3] expresses in this week’s reading when stating:
“The tendency of surfers to “satisfice” – to stop after the first site that contains the sort of content sought, rather than looking for the “best” result among hundreds of relevant sites returned – makes this “winner takes all” phenomenon even stronger”
This shows how important it is to make your ad the one a potential consumer wants to click on.
Next up is key words. Keywords are the terms you define as relevant to your business, and are ones you believe people will search for in order to find your business. The selection of keywords allows small business to be more specific when targeting customers and eliminate any irrelevant searches. There are 4 types of keyword matching:
1. Broad Match: This will search for all keywords you have defined, not phrases. This is not a wise tactic for a small business. If our Bournemouth based Painter and decorator appeared every time someone searched for painter and decorator then this would prove hugely expensive and ineffective.
2. Phrase match: This allows for search phrases in “quotation marks” to be matched within a broader search containing other words. This is a cost effective way for small businesses to match relative results.
3. Exact match: (Bracketed) keywords or phrases will show up when an exact match is searched for with no additional keywords, this would be good for exact company names.
4.Negative keywords: This function lets you control what searches your keywords do not show up for. This will save on irrelevant searches. For example our Bournemouth Painter and Decorator only did interiors they may want to exclude themselves for the search of; exterior painter and decorator.
Choosing the right type of keyword matching is important for all businesses but I would argue the most important thing is Geographical targeting. Ads can be targeted to a specific region. This means our Bournemouth based painter and decorator won’t waste time advertising to people in Birmingham, he can just target the Dorset region. This shows how much control small businesses can have over their advertising.
1. Broad Match: This will search for all keywords you have defined, not phrases. This is not a wise tactic for a small business. If our Bournemouth based Painter and decorator appeared every time someone searched for painter and decorator then this would prove hugely expensive and ineffective.
2. Phrase match: This allows for search phrases in “quotation marks” to be matched within a broader search containing other words. This is a cost effective way for small businesses to match relative results.
3. Exact match: (Bracketed) keywords or phrases will show up when an exact match is searched for with no additional keywords, this would be good for exact company names.
4.Negative keywords: This function lets you control what searches your keywords do not show up for. This will save on irrelevant searches. For example our Bournemouth Painter and Decorator only did interiors they may want to exclude themselves for the search of; exterior painter and decorator.
Choosing the right type of keyword matching is important for all businesses but I would argue the most important thing is Geographical targeting. Ads can be targeted to a specific region. This means our Bournemouth based painter and decorator won’t waste time advertising to people in Birmingham, he can just target the Dorset region. This shows how much control small businesses can have over their advertising.
Small businesses often fail because of a lack of cash-flow. Controlling spend and budgeting is key. Google AdWords allows you to control your spend setting a daily and weekly budgets. AdWords work on a cost per click basis. The ability to set a maximum limit per day to spend on ads means that when your daily limit is reached your ads will stop being shown.
Finally, let’s look at measurement. Tracking and measuring the effectiveness of traditional advertising media is difficult. It’s hard to tell who has seen your print ad in a local paper, which made them come in and make a purchase. With Google Analytics [4] users can track not only ad info but site info. The ROI from users who click on your ad to finally make a purchase can also be tracked, allowing for a profitability figure to be attained.
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Small Businesses can suffer in tough economic times, they seek control, assurance and value for money. Google AdWords can be a trusted companion in any small businesses advertising and marketing strategy to create a truly dynamic duo!
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Recommended Read: The Dawn of paid search without keywords.http://searchenginewatch.com/3641744 << Really interesting future for searching. Could help small businesses alot, especially through advertising automation and Google Boost.
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Top Tweeter: @smallbiztweets
[1] Google AdWords image: adwords.google.com/
[2] Google ad Bournemouth Decorators: http://www.google.co.uk/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=bournemouth+television+repair#hl=en&pq=building%20supplies%20in%20bournemouth&xhr=t&q=painter+and+decorator+in+bournemouth&cp=27&pf=p&sclient=psy&safe=off&aq=0&aqi=&aql=&oq=painter+and+decorator+in+bo&pbx=1&fp=4b055a4cc7fcdbb6
[3] Hindman, M., Tsioutsiouliklis, K. and Johnson, J. Googlearchy": How a Few Heavily-Linked Sites Dominate Politics on the Web. https://mybu.bournemouth.ac.uk/@@/F55A6B96A270845A303AA9033A7DDC34/courses/1/045755/content/_499559_1/googlearchy_top-results-important.pdf
[4] Google Analytics image - http://www.google.com/analytics/features.html
[5] Batman and Robin – Batman cool internet video http://www.encyclopedia.com/video/HIGmZApN9pU-batmans-cool-internet.aspx
[2] Google ad Bournemouth Decorators: http://www.google.co.uk/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=bournemouth+television+repair#hl=en&pq=building%20supplies%20in%20bournemouth&xhr=t&q=painter+and+decorator+in+bournemouth&cp=27&pf=p&sclient=psy&safe=off&aq=0&aqi=&aql=&oq=painter+and+decorator+in+bo&pbx=1&fp=4b055a4cc7fcdbb6
[3] Hindman, M., Tsioutsiouliklis, K. and Johnson, J. Googlearchy": How a Few Heavily-Linked Sites Dominate Politics on the Web. https://mybu.bournemouth.ac.uk/@@/F55A6B96A270845A303AA9033A7DDC34/courses/1/045755/content/_499559_1/googlearchy_top-results-important.pdf
[4] Google Analytics image - http://www.google.com/analytics/features.html
[5] Batman and Robin – Batman cool internet video http://www.encyclopedia.com/video/HIGmZApN9pU-batmans-cool-internet.aspx
