How To Design A PPC Campaign That Doesn’t Waste Your Budget

If you’re running a business or managing a marketing budget, you’ve probably heard of Google Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising. But are you getting the most out of your ad spend? Let’s break it down in a way that’s easy to understand and, more importantly, easy to implement.

What is PPC Advertising?

PPC advertising is usually associated with search engines, when advertisers pay a fee each time someone clicks on their ad. It’s a way of buying traffic to your website rather than earning it organically. The most popular PPC platform is Google Ads, but other search engines like Bing also offer similar versions of PPC advertising options.

The beauty of PPC is that it can drive targeted traffic to your site almost instantly. But if you’re not careful, it can also drain your budget faster than you can say “click-through rate.” That’s why understanding the dashboard and the goal of the search engines is necessary.

Getting Started: Choosing Your Campaign

Not all pay per click campaigns are created equal. Before you get into the nitty gritty of choosing keywords to bid on (more on that below), you’ll need to choose a campaign that will guide your bidding choices. Google gives you 10 options, each with a different “ultimate” goal in mind. But Google can be tricky with a few of these. What might look like the easy button is a way to get you to trust them with more ads and, ultimately, more of your money. Let’s look at your choices here (we’ll show you the red flags to watch out for):

1. Search Campaigns

• Purpose: These are what most people think of when they think “pay-per-click,” but they’re just the beginning. Nothing to sneeze at, of course, search campaigns are text ads that appear on Google search results pages when users search for relevant keywords.
  
• Best For: Generating leads, sales, or website traffic. Ideal for advertisers who want to reach people actively searching for their products or services.
  
• Example: If someone searches “buy patio furniture,” your ad might appear at the top of the search results.
  

2. Display Campaigns

• Purpose: Visual banner ads that appear on websites across the Google Display Network (GDN), which includes millions of sites, apps, and videos.
  
• Best For: Building brand awareness, retargeting users who visited your website but didn’t convert, and reaching people who are in the consideration stage of buying.
  
• Example: Your ad could appear as a banner on a blog about home improvement, reaching potential customers who may be interested in your patio furniture.
  

3. Video Campaigns

• Purpose: Video ads that appear on YouTube and other Google partner websites.
  
• Best For: Engaging users with rich video content, increasing brand awareness, or driving conversions with engaging videos.
  
• Example: You could create a video ad showcasing your patio furniture and target it to users watching videos related to home improvement or outdoor living.
  

4. Shopping Campaigns

• Purpose: Product listings that show up in Google search results and on the Google Shopping tab when users search for specific products.
  
• Best For: E-commerce businesses looking to promote physical products with images, prices, and details. Shopping campaigns are great for showing users exactly what you’re selling.
  
• Example: When someone searches “outdoor patio chairs,” your product listing could show up with a picture, price, and a link directly to your product page.
  

5. App Campaigns

• Purpose: Ads that promote mobile app downloads or in-app actions across Google’s networks, including the Play Store, Search, YouTube, and the Google Display Network.
  
• Best For: Mobile app developers looking to drive more installs and in-app interactions.
  
• Example: If you have an app related to home improvement, you could create an app campaign to encourage users to download it.
  

6. Smart Campaigns (Watch Out!)

• Purpose: A simplified, automated campaign type that automatically handles most of the settings for you, including bidding, targeting, and ads.
  
• Best For: Small businesses or advertisers who don’t have time to manage campaigns in detail. It’s a hands-off option that relies on Google’s machine learning to optimize for your goals.
  
• Example: A small business owner might use a Smart Campaign to run ads across Google’s platforms, focusing on getting more calls, website visits, or store visits without worrying about granular details.
  
• What To Watch Out For: In automated campaigns like this, Google will leave certain boxes ticked that count as “conversions” for you. This includes simple website views. You might be confused when you see on your dashboard that you’ve had 15 clicks but not 15 sales. With that one box ticked, Google counts any visitor to your site as a conversion, regardless of whether or not they stayed or made a purchase.

What’s more, when you choose this campaign, you cannot change the default settings! The option is there, but once you change the radio button, the option to save remains grayed out:  

Bottom Line: If you go with this campaign, view your dashboard with a grain of salt. The number of clicks is always going to be higher than your actual leads. 

7. Local Campaigns

• Purpose: Ads designed to drive foot traffic to physical business locations by showing ads on Google Search, Maps, YouTube, and Display Network.
  
• Best For: Brick-and-mortar stores or businesses that want to increase local awareness and bring customers to their physical locations.
  
• Example: A local furniture store might run a local campaign to promote special deals and increase store visits.

8. Discovery Campaigns

• Purpose: Ads that appear in Google’s Discovery feed, including on YouTube Home, Gmail, and the Google Discover feed. These ads blend in with other content users see and can be visually rich.
  
• Best For: Building brand awareness and engaging with new potential customers who may not yet be aware of your brand.
  
• Example: You could create a visually appealing ad that appears to users while they’re browsing content on YouTube or exploring the Google Discover feed.

9. Performance Max Campaigns (Watch Out!)

• Purpose: A newer, fully automated campaign type that uses all available Google Ads inventory across different platforms, including Search, Display, YouTube, Gmail, and Maps. It optimizes performance across all channels to maximize your conversion goals.
  
• Best For: Advertisers who want to simplify campaign management and use Google’s AI to optimize performance across all Google channels.
  
• Example: If your goal is to maximize conversions across multiple platforms, Performance Max will automatically deliver your ads to the most relevant audiences.
  
• What To Watch Out For: This campaign option basically gives Google full control over which terms to bid on. That means it’s going to bid on anything and everything under the sun that it thinks has something to do with your business, regardless of whether or not it actually helps you. These are called “broad” search terms, and they are rarely (if ever) effective. For example, if you’re a marketing agency, Google might bid on the word “agency.” Suddenly, you’re showing up in search results for “home health agency,” “talent agency,” and the 2024 Netflix thriller series, “The Agency.” People looking for those things click on your site and bounce when they realize they’re in the wrong place. That’s not just annoying for them and unhelpful for you: higher bounce rates are detrimental to your search rankings. 

10. Call-Only Campaigns

• Purpose: Ads that encourage users to call your business directly from the search results rather than visiting your website.
  
• Best For: Businesses that rely on phone calls for conversions, like service providers or local businesses.
  
• Example: If you run a plumbing service, a call-only campaign would make it easy for customers to contact you directly by clicking the ad.

And Now, We Bid

Bidding as it pertains to a PPC campaign is the process of setting a maximum amount of money you’re willing to pay for a click on your ad in Google Ads (formerly Google AdWords). Google Ads operates on a bidding system where advertisers compete for ad placements in search results and across Google’s network of websites. 

Here’s the short and sweet of how it works:

1. Bidding Types:
   
   • Manual Bidding: You set a maximum cost-per-click (CPC) bid for each ad.
     
   • Automated Bidding: Google automatically adjusts your bids to achieve your goal (e.g., maximizing conversions or clicks).
     
2. Bid Strategy: Your bid strategy determines how Google spends your budget to achieve your goals. There are a few to choose from, and you may need to adjust your strategy here and there for better results:
   
   • Manual CPC (Cost-Per-Click): Gives you full control over your bids, allowing you to set the maximum amount you’re willing to pay per click. Best for experienced advertisers who want granular control over their ad spend.
     
   • Enhanced CPC (ECPC): A semi-automated strategy that adjusts your bids based on the likelihood of conversion. It increases bids when a conversion is more likely and decreases them when it’s less likely, helping optimize your return on investment (ROI).
     
   • Target CPA (Cost-Per-Acquisition): Google adjusts your bids automatically to get as many conversions as possible at a set acquisition cost. Ideal for businesses focused on lead generation or customer acquisition.
     
   • Target ROAS (Return on Ad Spend): Focuses on maximizing revenue for every dollar spent. Google sets bids to achieve a predetermined return percentage, making it best for e-commerce businesses that want to optimize for profit margins.
     
   • Maximize Clicks: An automated strategy that aims to get as many clicks as possible within your budget. Good for increasing website traffic but may not always result in high-quality conversions.
     
   • Maximize Conversions: Google automatically sets your bids to get the highest number of conversions within your budget. Great for businesses with well-optimized conversion funnels.
     
   • Target Impression Share: One of the least utilized campaigns out there, and one of our favorites. This focuses on getting your ads seen in specific positions, such as at the top of search results. And you get in front of more people. This strategy is the best for increasing brand awareness.
     
3. Auction: Each time a user enters a search query, Google runs an auction to determine which ads will show and in what order. Your bid, combined with factors like your ad’s quality score (more on that next), determines your ad’s placement.
   
4. Quality Score: It’s not just about how much you bid. Google evaluates the relevance of your ad and landing page to the search query, user experience, and previous performance. A higher Quality Score can result in a lower bid for the same ad placement.
   
5. Budget: Your daily budget works together with your bids to ensure you’re not overspending. The budget limits how much Google can spend on your ads per day, while your bids influence how often your ads show up.

Tips to Get the Most Out of Your Campaign PPC Budget

You might be surprised how quickly Google can spend your PPC ad budget if you’re not paying attention. For our next trick, we will give you a little guidance on how to get the absolute most out of your PPC budget: 

1. Define Clear Goals

Before you start the bidding process for your PPC campaign, ask yourself what you want to achieve, and more importantly, what is your customer journey? 

Are you looking for brand awareness, lead generation, or e-commerce sales? Or do you envision potential clientele seeing your ad and immediately calling your office to schedule an appointment? Is your service offering a longer tail engagement where potential clients want to do more research before having a discussion with you. 

Having a clear goal will help you choose your winning path. 

2. Do Thorough Keyword Research

The success of your PPC campaign heavily depends on choosing the right keywords and, more importantly, asking search engines questions that you are willing to pay to have the answer for. Many ad campaigns are won and lost by picking too general a keyword, which inevitably drains your budget. Rather, you will want to focus on longer and more specific keywords and phrases. These can be refined to target your exact audience, which increases the likelihood of a conversion. 

For example, think of the common questions you get when you start your first engagement with a customer. What questions are they asking you right out of the gate? What questions pop up as you’re walking out the door? These “questions” actually count as long-tail keywords and can be the most important ones to bid on in Google ads (more on that below). . 

You can use tools like Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs, or SEMrush to find relevant, high-intent keywords if you need some initial ideas, but be sure you focus on:

• Long-tail keywords: Again, these are longer, more specific keyword phrases (e.g., “best running shoes for flat feet” instead of just “running shoes”). They typically have lower competition and higher conversion rates because they target users who are closer to making a purchase or taking action.
  

Here we can see that, although “running shoes” has a high search volume at 254,000, it is also very hard to rank for. On the other hand, “best running shoes for flat feet” has a more-than-decent search volume and is easy to rank for. That’s a long-tail keyword worth bidding on.

• Negative keywords: These are keywords you exclude from your campaign to prevent irrelevant clicks. For example, if you sell premium watches, you might add “cheap” as a negative keyword to avoid attracting bargain hunters who are unlikely to convert.
• Competitor analysis: To see what keywords your competitors are bidding on, use tools like SEMrush, SpyFu, or Ahrefs. These tools allow you to analyze competitor PPC campaigns, uncovering high-performing keywords you can leverage in your own strategy. Or look to where people are not bidding aggressively and see where you can round out your keywords with less expensive search that marketing people don’t understand as quality search.

3. Optimize Your Ad Copy

Your ad copy is what convinces someone to click. Suffice to say, it is important. There are plenty of tactics you can use to create compelling copy for an effective digital ad, but be sure to always include:

• A strong call-to-action (CTA), like “Shop Now,” “Sign Up Today,” or “Get Your Free Trial.”
• Emotional triggers or a sense of urgency, such as limited-time offers.
• Clear, easy-to-read typography that is consistent with your branding.

4. Improve Your Landing Pages

If your ad brings traffic to a weak landing page, your budget is being wasted. Optimize your landing page by:

• Ensuring fast load times (people don’t wait for slow pages!)
• Making it mobile-friendly
• Having a clear, compelling CTA
• Keeping the message consistent with the ad

Learn more about designing a great landing page. 

5. Use A/B Testing

Never assume that your first ad version is the best. A/B testing, also known as split testing, is a method of comparing two different versions of an ad or landing page to determine which performs better. Instead of guessing what works, A/B testing allows you to make data-driven decisions.

Key elements to test include:

• Headlines: Try different messaging to see what resonates with your audience.
• Ad descriptions: Test variations in tone, style, and wording.
• CTAs (Call-to-Actions): Experiment with different phrases like “Buy Now” vs. “Get Yours Today.”
• Landing page design: Try different layouts, images, and color schemes.

You’ll have many opportunities to do an A/B test, and what most people don’t think about is how different everyone is. When you search for an answer in your favorite search engine, many people consider information differently, so it’s important to have different journeys with each ad campaign.

6. Adjust Your Bidding Strategy

Each PPC bidding strategy has its strengths and weaknesses, so test and adjust based on your goals. If the one you’re using isn’t working as well as you’d hoped, switch it up! 

7. Use Ad Scheduling and Geo-Targeting

Not all clicks are created equal. Analyze your campaign data to see when and where your ads perform best. Also, there are little landmines within Google ads (and others) that make it easier for Google to spend your budget. This is one of them. Look for a place to do some advanced options around location targeting, and only allow your ad to show when people are in the locations you set. (I’ll give you a hint: Google sets it to be able to share anywhere.)

Notice the choices under the “include” heading at the bottom of the visual. The first says “people who’ve shown interest in your included locations.” This might sound like the right selection, but, according to Google, anyone can be “interested” in your location simply by having just visited in the past year or by looking up a business within the area. If you choose this option, Google will potentially show your ad anywhere in irrelevant locations, which will quickly dwindle your budget.

Other things to consider:

• Adjust bids to show ads during peak conversion hours.
• Target specific locations to avoid spending money on areas with low engagement.

8. Monitor and Optimize Continuously

A lot of people will adopt a “set and forget” mentality when it comes to their pay-per-click ads. Google is counting on this, so regularly check:

• Which ads are performing best
• Conversion rates
• Click-through rates
• Cost per conversion

Use this data to pause underperforming ads and invest in more successful ones. You can also experiment with a new campaign style to see how it performs. Check frequently, and don’t blindly follow Google’s recommendations—they’re designed to get you to spend more.

Google will push suggestions that ultimately boil down getting you to increase your spend. They’ll recommend raising your budget (obvious enough), adding more keywords (especially broad match terms), and uploading customer data to refine targeting. None of this is necessary, or even a good strategy, for a successful PPC campaign. 

When you accept Google’s auto-suggested keywords, they’ll often nudge you toward broadening your audience, which leads to budget increases under the guise of maximizing reach. That’s a sneaky one. As for customer data, it sounds useful, but Google charges more for impressions on new audiences—driving up your cost per click, depleting your budget faster, and pressuring you to spend more, especially on high-traffic days.

Stay in control and make data-driven decisions that serve your business, not just Google’s bottom line. As a business themselves, it is in Google’s best interest to get you to spend more money. Always be mindful of that before going with their suggestions.

Let Us Help You Design A Killer PPC Campaign

Designing a successful PPC campaign requires near-constant monitoring and an understanding of the complexities of Google’s available strategies. It is time consuming and can easily become overwhelming, especially for a beginner. This is why we almost always recommend that you outsource your PPC management to an experienced marketing firm (like us: nudge nudge, wink wink). 

This is not to say that you shouldn’t be involved at all in your campaign–on the contrary! At RCG, we value collaboration with our clients. After all, no one knows your customers better than you. We encourage feedback and any insights you can give us so we can score those keywords that your competitors aren’t even thinking about.  

Bottom line: if you need help setting up a PPC campaign, RCG is here to help. Our marketing managers are out-of-the-box thinkers who are well-versed in Google’s sneaky ways. Whether it’s driving sales or introducing your brand, we will design a campaign that utilizes every cent of your budget to its full potential so you can achieve your end goal. Call or go online today to schedule a chat and see how we can help you.