Creating a profitable AdWords strategy on a small budget

Everyone knows that an AdWords SEO strategy can provide real leverage for a company with an online presence. But considering the competition from big corporations and the battle raging over keywords, it’s hard to carve out space for yourself on a limited budget. How can an SME take advantage of this significant opportunity these days? We’ll give you a few tips for creating an AdWords strategy that will let you increase your sales while keeping your budget under control!

1.      Before you get started

• With a tight budget, we recommend limiting your campaigns to Google Search. It’s true that, in certain cases, it may be appealing to do an AdSense campaign, for example, but generally speaking, conversion rates for AdSense are lower than for Google Search, and in the context of a small budget, it’s best to focus on the most profitable option.
• Before you do anything else, it’s necessary to define your goals. Besides increasing traffic to your site, what are your priorities for your SEO campaigns? Are you trying to respond to the competition or launch a new product? Asking yourself these types of questions will let you choose your keywords and determine the budget to be allocated to them.
• To optimize your AdWords campaign, it’s essential to have an efficient, comprehensible landing page. If this isn’t the case, the conversion rate for your ads risks being low even though the keyword strategy is effective, making all of your efforts for naught!
• First of all, we also recommend limiting mobile queries for your keywords, since these generally have a lower conversion rate than queries on computers or tablets.

• Don’t hesitate to set distribution hours for your campaign. If you communicate via phone, why pay for ads on the weekend?

• Take advantage of $75 for free to start! You can easily find an AdWords coupon by registering, which will let you start off on the right foot, without too many fees. But please note: you’ll still have to spend $25 up to 30 days after creating your account.

2.      Choose your keywords well

• Google also lets you geographically target your queries, which is particularly appealing for those of you who have a geographically limited trading area. Don’t waste your budget prospecting areas you’re not interested in!

• Choosing your keywords is a delicate operation. Don’t hesitate to spend a bit of time on it and test out different words and expressions with the tools offered by Google. Generally, with a small budget, it’s better to focus on expressions rather than single words. The more detailed the expression is, the less competitive it is, and the more it targets your prospects. Your conversion rate will be all the more satisfactory for these types of expressions.

• You should definitely use the “negative keywords” function, which lets you exclude all the words associated with your expressions that don’t represent the needs of your target audience.

• Above all, don’t aim for the top spot on Google, since it’s not necessarily the most profitable! The second or third place, besides being less costly, can bring you a higher quality index. Don’t flatter your ego by overbidding on overly competitive keywords or expressions; consider your budget before anything else.

• Don’t hesitate to use the competition by using the names of their companies or their products as keywords if it fits your strategy! By contrast, never include these names in your ads.

3.      Manage your campaigns rigorously

• The first rule to follow is to not spread yourself too thin. Don’t create more than 3 campaigns at first so that you can manage them properly. Work on your segmentation and avoid keyword overlaps at all costs, so you’re not “paying” for them multiple times…

• You can use ad extensions to make your ads more attractive; they have a definite effect on the click-through rates.

• Generally speaking, you should adopt a very strict monitoring process; monitor the quality index for each keyword. However, it’s not necessary to make changes every 5 minutes; wait until you have a certain visibility over time. Although it’s good to perform tests, it’s best to limit this practice if you have a tight budget. And above all, remove the keywords that aren’t working!

• Refine your ads by trying as hard as possible to attract your genuine prospects and “scaring off” internet users who don’t belong to your target audience. For example, you can specify the price of your product, which will prevent those looking for very low rates from clicking on your ad.

• Besides the quality index, monitor your conversion rates (calls, forms); they’re the proof your ROI.

• Finally, if your strategy is working, increase your budget! If your campaigns are working and bringing you a substantial conversion rate, you definitely shouldn’t change them, but increasing your AdWords budget is what really makes your sales take off.

Difficult isn’t impossible, and an SME with a limited budget has every interest in investing in an AdWords strategy if they want to increase their online presence and take advantage of this opportunity to increase their sales. However, having a limited budget also means exercising caution and vigilance! Not only is SEO a field that’s rapidly evolving, but with a small budget, you can’t test your campaigns like you could with a flexible budget. It’s, therefore, necessary to regularly monitor your performance. But with a little discipline, you can definitely achieve great results; just ask Combustible’s clients!