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In today’s article I will introduce you to 13 tips on how to reduce your AdWords costs. Google AdWords campaigns are among the best ways to attract new customers online. With AdWords campaigns you can target people who are looking for your solution. However, if you don’t keep an eye on your AdWords campaigns, they can be costly. In the following I describe different ways of optimizing Google AdWords campaigns.

Reduce AdWords costs: Top Tip

1. book keywords as exact match

In the classification of keywords, advertisers can choose between Exact Macht, Phrase Match and Broad Match. By default, keywords are classified as Broad Match. In Broad Match, not only the specified keyword is entered, but also largely matching keywords. This includes synonyms and variations as well as misspellings. If you want to work with Broad Match keywords, you should not forget to also enter negative keywords. However, in most cases it is advisable to enter your keywords as an exact match. In the Exact Match classification, your ads will only be placed if the search query matches your keyword exactly.

More detailed information about the keyword setting Exact Match can be found here.

2. Reduce the number of keywords in ad groups

When creating Google AdWords campaigns, ad groups often contain far too many keywords. Google itself suggests using 10-20 keywords per ad group, but this is a pretty bad advice. In order to run AdWords campaigns successfully, the quality factor must be high. This is only the case if the ads match the search terms. You can find out why the quality factor is important and how to calculate it here. From this it can be deduced that your ad groups should contain only a small number of very similar keywords in order to optimize the quality factor. I usually use 2 – 5 keywords per ad group.

3. Conversion-Tracking implementation

„Fifty percent of advertising is thrown out. You don’t know which half that is.“ said Henry Ford. Fortunately, nowadays we have the opportunity to track our advertising campaigns. With Google AdWords it is also possible to track generated conversions. An analysis based on CPC and CTR should be avoided. Your business success will certainly not depend on the click-through rate and cost per click, but on how many conversions you generate for which costs. For this reason, you should enable conversion tracking in AdWords. From sales in online shops to registration in apps, all activities can be set up as conversion. The conversion tracking can be found at AdWords under the menu item „Tools – Conversion“.

4. Mobile vs. Desktop vs. Tablet

In addition to the analysis of which ads and which keywords in our campaign lead to the desired conversion, the respective terminal on which the conversion takes place should also be observed. The click prices as well as the click rates differ considerably per terminal. As a rule, click prices on mobile devices are still considerably cheaper than those on the PC. The click-through rate on mobile devices is also usually higher than on the desktop. To analyze the performance according to devices, click on the tab „Settings“ in your campaign and then on the menu item „Devices“. There you will now find a summary of how the click prices, click-through rate and conversion rate differ per device.

5. Individual keyword bids

If you run an online shop, you probably have a large selection of products (>100). Each of your products has a different price, so that the margins of the products also differ significantly. For this reason, it makes sense to assign an individual CPC to each keyword or keyword group. So you are prepared to accept a higher click price for products with a higher margin. Once you have integrated conversion tracking, you can identify keywords with a high conversion rate and assign them to a higher click price than keywords with a lower conversion rate.

6. Optimization according to time of day

The sixth tip „Optimization by time“ is also all about the segmentation of website visitors. Here is the question:“When do you generate the most valuable website visitors?“ in the foreground. Often the intention of the respective search query changes, depending on the time of day. Thus, the conversion probability is highest in online shops between 8 pm and 10 pm. With this knowledge, it is possible to adjust the AdWords campaigns from display in the evening.

7. WATCH OUT FOR PLACEMENTS IN DISPLAY CAMPAIGNS.

In addition to running search network campaigns, there is also the possibility of using Google’s display network to attract potential new customers. In display campaigns, people are not addressed on the basis of the respective search query, but rather on the basis of the websites and interests visited. For this reason, the placements, i. e. the websites on which the display ads are played, should be monitored. Your placements can be found under the tab „Display Network? Placements“. There you can see the performance of your ads per placement. Unfortunately, it often happens that Google displays the ads on websites that don’t have a thematic fit with the target page. Here it is important to observe regularly and switch off unpopular and poorly running placements.

8. FROM GENERIC KEYWORDS TO LONGTAIL-KEYWORDS

The selection of the booked keywords influences the CPC and CPO most strongly. In many industries (insurance companies, banks etc.) click prices of 5 – 6 € are not uncommon. For this reason, a lot of time should be invested in keyword research, as the selection of suitable keywords has the greatest leverage for the success of advertisements in the search network. In addition, the more specific, the higher the conversion rate. Generic searches, such as „shoes“, do not know what type of shoes to look for. For this reason, the performance on the target side is comparatively weak. With specific longtail keywords such as „Red Adidas Men’s Shoes 46“, it is clear what you are looking for. As a result, the conversion rate will also be significantly higher.

9. Adding NEGATIVE KEYWORDS

If using Exact Match keywords is out of the question, then a combination of phrase match and negative keywords is the right choice. This allows you to filter out certain search terms from the very beginning for which you do not want to appear. Thus, search terms with keywords such as „free, cheap, used“ are regularly included in the list of negative keywords. As a result, there is more budget left over to offer relevant search terms.

10. USING Ad EXTENSION

Ad extensions are actually some of the standard settings for placing effective ads. For this reason, it is still amazing how few advertisers use ad extensions. There are numerous options to choose from: Sitelinks, additional information, caller extensions, offer extensions, evaluation extensions etc. By using ad extensions, your own ad is displayed in a much larger size. The larger display of the AdWords ad results in an increased click-through rate, which influences the quality factor and the CPC. In this way, more clicks can be generated with the same budget.

11. Using KEYWORD PLACEHOLDERS

The keyword placeholder is an extended AdWords function where the user’s search term is automatically transferred to the ad title. The following code must be applied to the title {KeyWord:….}..}. A replacement title is included after the word KeyWord if the current search term cannot be included in the title. The use of the keyword placeholder results in an improved quality factor, which leads to decreasing CPC.

12. ANALYZing SEARCH NETWORKS

When search network campaigns are launched, they are played out as standard not only via the native Google search, but also in the search networks of partner sites, e. g. T-Online.  It is possible that the conversion rate as well as the average CPCs between the search networks may differ considerably. For this reason, your own campaigns should also be analyed on the basis of search networks.

13. AD-A/B TESTING

A perfect No-Brainer, but again and again there are advertisers who play only one advertisement. However, at least two ads per ad group are best played to find out what leads to better performance. It should be taken into account that sufficient data is collected in order to avoid prematurely false conclusions.

BOTTOM LINE GOOGLE ADWORDS REDUCE COSTS

There are many ways to improve the performance of your AdWords campaign. As a rule, the correct selection of the keywords to be applied in connection with the segmentation of the results (time, terminal device, placements) can lead to an uplift of the performance. A prerequisite for a success-dependent analysis and segmentation is the implementation of conversion tracking.

I hope that with my contribution: Reducing AdWords costs, I have provided you with helpful tips for optimizing your AdWords campaigns.

Tobias Dziuba

Mein Name ist Tobias und ich bin Gründer & Geschäftsführer der Amazon Agentur Adsmasters GmbH mit Sitz in Düsseldorf.

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