PPC advertising – heard of it? If you own a business with an online presence, it’s likely that you’ve come across the phrases PPC, paid ads, and Google ads before. When used correctly, these are great tools that can bolster your reach, increase your conversions, and have a real impact on your business. We should know. At iLeads, we are all about helping businesses get real results from PPC advertising. Google Ads is one of the many tools we use to achieve that. But for beginners, it can seem out of reach. So, we’ve poured all our knowledge into this quick and easy-to-read beginners guide to Google Ads. Don’t forget, you can always get in touch with our team if you need a helping hand!
“Google Ads” refers to Google’s entire online advertisement platform. It enables you to create adverts that are displayed across Google’s many channels. You’ve probably seen Google ads when you’ve used Google’s search engine. The first handful of results are marked with ‘Ad’ by the side. That’s just one example of an advertisement with Google (see ‘Search Ads’ below). You can create ads to raise awareness, attract leads, and increase traffic to your website. The great thing about Google Ads is that allows you to reach the viewers that are interested (or most likely to be interested) in your product or service. It’s all about connecting your business or website with the people who are trying to find it. If you know that your business has a lot to offer but can’t seem to reach the people that need it, Google Ads could be a solution. You can manage Google Ads online (or hire experts to do it) to control where your ads appear, measure their impact, and set a budget.
Google Ads, particularly Google Search Ads, is also known as pay-per-click (PPC) advertising. You bid on keywords and then pay whenever a user clicks on your ad. So rather than paying for every time your advert is displayed to a web user, you only pay when a web user clicks on your ad. But before we delve into the intricacies of PPC advertising, you need to understand the core services that Google Ads provides and the channels it can advertise on.
These are the main types of advertisements that you can utilise as part of Google Ads.
When you use Google to search for something, you type in your query and the search engine returns a page of results. At the very top and bottom of that page, you’ll find ads. They look the same as the normal results, except they are marked with ‘Ad’ by the side to let you know that they are paid advertisements. A business has used Google Ads to be there. Importantly, the ads are related in some way to the search term you entered. If you decided to Google ‘Chinese takeaway near me’ for example, then you’ll see a range of ads that are relevant to that. It might show you an advertisement for a local restaurant, or you may see an advertisement for an online food ordering and delivery service.
Display ads are more visual, compared to the text-only Search Ads. These are images that are displayed on third-party websites – usually a square box or rectangular banner that goes at the top, bottom, or sides of the main page content. You can create display ads in multiple sizes, so they can fit into spaces on webpages. Websites that are registered with Google’s Display Network can show Display Ads on their websites.
Video Ads are self-explanatory. These are adverts that are videos! Appearing before or during YouTube videos, these ads can be long or short. When creating YouTube Ads, Google has many different formats to select from. You’ll need a different format for an awareness campaign video ad than a conversion-focused video ad, for example.
With Google Ads, you can also create advertisements to feature on mobile apps. These ads pop up in selected mobile apps, usually in the “free” version of the app. Sometimes ads need to be watched in order for the user to unlock a reward or achievement. App creators use Mobile App Ads to build revenue. Their users either watch the ads or pay for the ad-free version. These Mobile App Ads also convert into paying customers, usually with a goal for the user to download other apps that are advertised.
Product Shopping Ads appear in two places: on the Google Shopping tab and on the normal search results page, if you’ve searched for a specific product. These Google ads are designed for advertising specific products. If you were to Google ‘red shoes’ for example, you would see a carousel of results at the top of the page before the main results. These are paid Product Shopping Ads, showing an image of the product, the name, the price, and the website where they are being sold. If you then click on the shopping tab, you will also see advertised products as well as organic results (unpaid for).
At iLeads we specialise in Search Ads that drive visitors to custom-designed landing pages which are designed to convert visitors into leads and enquiries. Creating a dedicated funnel like this ensures that the Google Ads campaign works efficiently.
Using Google Ads can be an effective way to draw in new business, but it’s not the simplest tool to work with. Beyond the types of ads you can choose from, there’s also ad groups, keywords and variants, optimisation scores, and more to learn about.
We hope that our beginners guide to Google Ads has helped you understand the fundamentals of what this PPC advertising tool can do. If you’d like to learn more, get in touch with our team today.
