How to start a website redesign

September 7th, 2010

Before beginning a redesign – companies should be totally aware of what they wish to achieve from a redesign for themselves and their customers . The last thing you want to end up doing is blowing a whole load of well earned cash on a redesigned website that may look better than the old one but is actually no more useful or better designed. Therefore there are a few key questions that you should be asking yourself and your team before you change anything.

1. What Are Your Goals?

–What exactly do you need to gain from this redesign? Do you need to attract new clients? Is it that you need to serve your existing clients better? Or do you want to create a whole new brand identity for your company so that it portrays a whole new image?

2. What Doesn’t Need Changing?

- You need to have a look at parts of your website that do work and are proving to be successful. You can do this by looking at successful keywords that are driving traffic to pages of your website and finding the pages that have inbound links that are also proving to be successful. Doing this will help to rebuild your redesign around things in your current website that you know attracts traffic and works well.

3. What are the right reasons for a website redesign?

-  You need to make sure that you have an actual reason for redesigning your website,a common pattern of redesign is when new management takes over a business. Companies think that they need to change their look and logo as a re-organization process and that’s really not a valid reason to have a redesign of your website.Todd Hockenberry from Hubspot thinks that ‘sometimes companies build a site as a means of fixing all their business issues, without looking deeper at their true problems. We deal with a lot of small to medium sized manufacturers and there are many who think a new website will be a field of dreams.’

Of course every company is going to have their own reasons and motivation for a redesign, all we re trying to say here at Sitetastic is make sure that you take your time before investing time and money into a website redesign.

Tags:
Posted in Website Planning | 29 Comments »

Why we must keep on the blogging machine

August 19th, 2010

It’s so easy to lose track of your blogging – in the blink of an eye you can go from being a loving and devoted blogger to leaving your blog starving and neglected. It’s somewhat like going to the gym – it can so easily become inconsistent and therefore pointless.

So why is it so important we keep our words flowing and how often should we do so?

Most of us should be putting ‘pen to paper’’ consistently in order to keep traffic at a certain level. Some bloggers can generate search engine traffic to older posts sufficiently enough to not have to worry about generating new posts. Most bloggers however will not be so lucky, and this majority will need to keep on the running machine in order to shift the pounds. New posts will ensure that subscribers keep coming back for more, that new pages are added to search engine indexes and that social media votes keep on the rise.

In this day and age when you’re running a business, doing the school run, trying to maintain a hobby and walking the dog – I realise its hard to find time to go to the gym/update the blog. We just need to remember that posting consistently doesn’t mean you have to post every day, it just means that new content needs to be published on a regular basis.

Don’t get disheartened – Consistent Traffic Is Almost Impossible

Posting does need to be consistent but unfortunately that doesn’t automatically mean that traffic levels will keep consistent too. Two days in blog world are not the same and your traffic will have good days and bad days. Take the rough with the smooth – enjoying days when the traffic is high and remaining on the blogging machine when times are slower. The fluctuation should cause excitement so don’t quit when the going gets tough.

Balance

Keeping your options open and creating a varied source of traffic sources will cover your back if one source turns out to be particularly inconsistent. For example –  Social media traffic can be quite inconsistent so just because you’ve been getting a lot of traffic from there doesn’t mean you can always bank on receiving it. Search engine and organic traffic ranks are by no means a permanent fixture either so I would advise against relying solely on search engine traffic – spread yourself thin and then you’re covered for all eventualities.

I also think we should remember to  have an ‘every penny counts attitude’ when it comes to thinking about sources of traffic. Not all the sources you invest in will send you hundreds of visitors but every visitor is valuable to you. You might find participating in forums tiring but the few visitors you might gain from this activity can prove to be very valuable – they’ve chatted to you in person and are more likely to be a consistent reader of your blog.

Keep your friends close

A strong network of other bloggers, friends and colleagues will help you out beyond belief. These people can provide you with links to your blog, become your fans on facebook, follow you on twitter and motivate and inspire you with your blogging.

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in Social Media | 124 Comments »

Tweeters are you tracking your keywords?

August 5th, 2010

Are you really ‘getting’ social media – whilst we are spending time tweeting and updating pages – there’s uncertainty about any ‘return on investment’.

A recent study (SEMPO June 2010) study reported that marketing budgets are shifting – reducing allocation on traditional media (exhibitions, offline advertising) and providing more to the social media pots.

However, the same study reported that in the B2B and B2C sectors organizations 38% of businesses stated that their biggest challenge to getting started with social media was ‘building a sufficient business case’

The challenge in building that business case is the all important ‘return on investment’ factor – it’s not enough to be out there in conversations as part of  brand building– it’s expected that such an immediate and consuming channel should provide a more immediate and direct response

So what can businesses be doing to ensure that they are leveraging their ‘Twitter’ activity.

It’s likely that tools to help you target and receive targeted traffic from social media platforms will improve over the coming months and years – however, for now – there’s a simple way to leverage your efforts on Twitter –

Many Twitterers and brands are missing out on ‘keyword tracking’.

Now what do I mean by keyword tracking you ask?

Well……By this I mean setting alerts against relevant keyphrases that are being ‘tweeted’ in the tweetosphere.

Tracking the occurrence of keywords in twitter through one of the social media platforms is a quick way to add value to your experience.

Brands often use this approach to track mentions of their products and companies, developers can use it to track mentions of their favourite languages, frameworks, and open source projects.

Tracking keywords need not be complicated, particularly if you are using a social media platform such as – www.hootsuite.com – a total social management resource where you can align your Facebook profiles, Twitter Accounts, Linked In and others. There are other platforms too eg: Tweetdeck, Tweetbeep etc – but this is the one I favour.

TweetBeep sends email alerts based on the tracking of specific keywords in Twitter, and can track specific URLs, even if they have been shortened.

TweetLater, allows you to “schedule a tweet for posting at a later time” and it also provides a feature they describe as “Track keywords on Twitter”. The not so great features include

  1. Automatic DM to new followers, which can be annoying
  2. Automated following of people who follow you, which isn’t always necessary
  3. Automatic un following of those who un follow you (jury is still out on this feature)

Hootsuite however is brilliant and I would highly recommend as you can track keywords, bring in your facebook and linked in profiles, set up pending tweets in a very neat and easy fashion and you are totally in control of who you follow/unfollow/DM etc but most of all it’s very  user friendly.

There are a number of ways you can be tracking keyword and keyphrases – for example

1)      Tracking keywords which are relevant to finding new followers – for example, in my case, I want to follow people who are talking and sharing about social media, professional services marketing and user experience, usability.  Therefore, I track these keywords to help me tune into relevant conversations. In my efforts of doing this, I’ve been able to follow some really useful experts, been invited to guest blog and also been able to grow my blog subscription by sharing relevant and helpful posts, all thanks to tuning into relevant conversations.

2)      Tracking keywords for clients – similarly, watching what’s happening in their ‘keyword’ space and alerting them to relevant followers, influencers and conversations.

3)      Tracking direct response keyphrases.  By this I mean keyphrases which not only house the keyword – but also include a direct response element such as ‘looking for help with’ – ‘can anyone help with’ – you can string these keyphrases together with keywords to assist with targeting on relevancy.

These are just a few ways that you can be starting to leverage the conversations that are taking place. So my advice is to get watching those keywords and keyphrases – and then start considering how you can leverage these highly relevant requests and conversations

Posted in Social Media, Website Planning | 137 Comments »

Case Study from The Meatwagon – How Social Media works for them

July 2nd, 2010

My colleague Vikki recently attended a wedding and was going through the pleasant but predictable conversation that often comes with sitting next to somebody you’ve never met before.

As she sat down to enjoy the hog roast one thing led to another and they got on to the subject of what she does for a living.

She explained that her focus is on helping getting clients started with social media – and the importance of the viral conversation and online marketing, (all the while trying to manage her crackling with as little embarrassment as possible).

The conversation took an unexpected and interesting turn when her new friend began to share the fact that whilst he knew very little about the effects that social media could have on a business, he had recently heard a great interview on Radio 4 that had demonstrated how social media, if used correctly, could be explosive!

Apparently…Radio 4’s Food Programme had done a really good piece a couple of weeks prior on food critics,  in which the boys from the famously praised ‘Meatwagon’ had discussed how Twitter and the blogosphere in general had been extraordinarily beneficial for their business.

To give you an overview – the ‘meatwagon’ is a modest food van that serves (according to their online reviews) arguably some of the best burgers in London.  The Meatwagon’s most steady home is in a zone 2 industrial estate close to Peckham Rye station, but they move around London a lot and have taken the burger industry by storm.

Anyway, to cut a long story short  we learnt that with the help of Twitter and blogging, the boys publish the Meatwagon’s next location and inevitably their ever growing fans turn up in the masses.

At this point the conversation was interrupted by a man sitting opposite who introduced himself as a co– conspirator of the Meatwagon and, in fact, one of the men that Vikki’s new friend had heard on Radio 4! Result! Vikki now had some hard cold facts – ripe for a blog post to pinpoint exactly how social media can impact businesses if used effectively.

Yianni, the Founder of the Meatwagon,  has been really kind in answering a few questions for us, so that we can share, in black and white, exactly how one business is really benefiting from social media activity.

Whilst many businesses are busily setting up Facebook pages and Twitter accounts – there’s more to social media marketing than simply setting up accounts.  Many businesses report that they’ve opened Twitter accounts,  but are disappointed that it doesn’t generate direct sales.  However, there’s more to it than that.  With effective social media planning – and effective listening – as demonstrated by the Meatwagon – businesses can achieve great results.  So let’s learn some top tips from the Meatwagon:

1. Yianni,  how would you describe your activity in the social media scene?

I use social media to keep my customers informed of what we’re doing. It also helps a great deal with customer relations.

2. You have a lot of followers on Twitter without following the millions. When you put the Meatwagon on Twitter, how did you encourage people to follow you?

I just told every customer that it was the best way to get the most up-to-date information on what The Meatwagon was doing. Some people joined Twitter purely to stay abreast of where we were going to be next. If you’re putting out concise and informative tweets, once you’ve got a few followers, their followers may start to follow you and it’ll start to grow by itself. I see a lot of spikes in new followers after an interview or a review’s been published, and also after one of our “Meatings”, but the number of followers grows naturally anyway. I see Twitter as an appropriate communications tool for my particular business. I’ve never seen it as a priority to increase number of people following me; I think that by going down that route, businesses can lose sight of the fact that one supportive follower might retweet you to thousands of other people who might be interested in what you have to offer: It’s a branching network you’re creating, not a highway.

3. Do you think Twitter has directly gained you sales?

Definitely: A large part of our sales comes from a few key people retweeting what we put out. The growth can be exponential.

4. As well as direct sales – how else has social media helped the Meatwagon?

It’s really helped us build a relationship between us and our customers. Regular customers are the backbone of any successful business, and when it’s managed correctly, social media can be invaluable in developing those relationships.

5. How often do you blog?

Only when necessary. My blog exists purely to provide my customers with relevant and up-to-date information on my business; it’s not an appropriate place for me to sound off about that parking ticket I just got or a forum for me to criticise my competitors or blow my own trumpet.

6. What do you consider are some of the biggest mistakes that people with restaurants and pubs make in social media marketing?

Far too many people make the mistake of spamming their customers with dozens of messages a week. This really turns people off and you’ll lose more followers than you’ll gain if you succumb to the urge to fill your customers’ inboxes with irrelevant updates. Definitely a case of “less is more”. It’s better to consolidate information into fewer posts or tweets and time their release appropriately, right down to the hour or the minute sometimes.

7. What’s the one piece of advice you would give to any business starting out in social media?

Make sure you have a high quality product in the first place. Remember that social media has different rules from traditional advertising:

You’re starting a two-way conversation and people will use their right to reply to point out things they don’t like (sometimes to thousands of people) just as often, if not more often than they’ll talk about what they do like, so you better be able to back up any claims you make…

One final thought: Don’t let personal opinions spill over into your business communication!

Many thanks to Yianni and Bernard for taking the time to answer our questions and if you want to try one of the Meatwagon burgers for yourself, then follow them on Twitter – @themeatwagonuk and find out their next location!

For more information about getting started with social media – then don’t hesitate to contact us.  Visit our blogs for more information and view our range of social media services.

Posted in Social Media | 38 Comments »

Ask Michelle Carvill, ‘Why get involved with social media?’… her response will be; ‘Why not’

May 25th, 2010

Many people I speak to are often confused about ‘social media’ – when I talk about my passion for Twitter and blogging, I am bombarded with responses such as – ‘I don’t get it’ – ‘isn’t it a waste of time’ – ‘it’s not relevant for our business’.

I’ve written extensively on my carvillcreative/blog about social media tips and tactics – lots of practical how to’s.  And I’ve coerced a few of my clients to dip their toe into the water – they were very sceptical initially, but with some close handholding, now that they’re pretty much into the swing of things – they are starting to see the true power of social media.

So, I thought I’d have a stab of attempting to explain what social media is about – and what is means for ALL businesses… so here goes:

Firstly, I read an excellent blog post recently by Robert Clay – @marketingwisdom (for those that follow Twitter).  It was an intensive piece about the creation of a social media strategy.  I myself had written something in a similar vein – and so it was good to see a fellow respected marketer concurring with my tactics.

What was particularly great about his piece was a ‘social media description’ by David Meerman Scott (whose recent book I am actually currently reading, but have to say, currently not getting a lot out of) – the description went as below:

You can buy attention (advertising)

You can beg for attention from the media (PR)

You can bug people one at a time to get attention (sales)

Or…

You can earn attention by creating something interesting and valuable and then publishing it online for free: a youTube video, a blog, a research report, photos, a Twitter stream, an ebook, a Facebook page.

So let’s take the first three areas David points to (buy, beg, bug) – they are all ‘pushing’ messages down the throats of participants.  Hence why traditional marketing tactics are now referred to as – ‘push marketing’.

The latter one – earning attention – this is about publishing something that ‘attracts’ – as a magnet, it ‘pulls’ the user towards your business.  So we call this ‘pull marketing’.

These two areas are also referred to as outbound and inbound marketing – but whatever we call it – whether outbound or push – they refer to the more ‘traditional’ mediums.

Social Media enables a new way of marketing activity – the pull or inbound or ‘conversational marketing’ – as it’s sometimes referred to.   By sharing content about yourself, your products, services, your business etc – then you ‘attract’ people / customers / influencers – and hopefully they’ll share your content with people they’re associated with too.  A powerful medium indeed.

And it’s not just about creating content – it’s about ‘listening in and having conversations’ – Dell are a great example of a big brand that has embraced the power of social media. Not only are they using Twitter to provide sales support and customer advice – but they are also engaging customers and potential customers to advise them about product development and innovation – getting users involved in the features and developments of new products, or product enhancements.  Very powerful.

And it’s all 100% free!

A big attraction for social media – it that it’s accessible to absolutely everyone.  You don’t have to be Coca Cola with a huge marketing budget to run billboard and TV commercials – social media is truly an ‘all inclusive media’.  As many, indeed most, of the applications are 100% free to use!

So let’s take a very ’surface’ look at what some of the Social Media Platforms out there enable you to do:

Twitter

You can create personal profiles or business profiles – or even profiles based around the products you provide.  By sharing and communicating on a regular basis – you can develop an ‘online personality’ which may mirror your own – and the values of your business.  Transparency is key on social media platforms – it does become very apparent when users are running profiles in a ‘spammy, pr and sales’ way.  Authenticity rules online – and so I would advise my clients to share – a little of who they are at the same time as sharing the values and ethics of the business.

The key element of Twitter is the fact that it enables you to ‘listen in’ to what potential and current; users, customers, partners are talking about – in your sector – and then start joining in the conversations and engaging in a relevant and ideally, useful way.  This post is focusing on ‘Social Media’ rather than just on Twitter – but you’ll find in previous posts on my carvillcreative/blog – that there are many resources you can use to target your listening activity, so that you are honing in on relevant conversation threads (eg see my: How I am using Twitter by a relatively new Twitterer post).  But what’s key about Twitter is that you can hone in on targeted conversations – and therefore, follow targeted users – growing your audience base in a targeted way.  I’m sure you’ll agree, a task which is impossible to manage on any relevant scale offline.

Linked In

Here you can create a personal profile to showcase who you are, your business and your previous experience – and the objective is to ‘add relevant contacts’ – either who you have worked with, been to business school with etc – and ‘hook up’.  Make recommendations on peers / colleagues and effectively create an online profile.

What I personally think is very useful from a business perspective – are the Linked In Groups. Groups have already ‘linked in’ relevant groups of users with a common interest in say, marketing or legal technology or start up business – so what you have is ‘targeted audiences’ to engage with.

Facebook

Personally, I was never a big fan of Facebook – I didn’t and still don’t like the ‘privacy’ issues with it (I much prefer Bizzbug.com). However, I can see it’s uses for tactical social media activity. It’s a great medium for sharing – and again, has lots of relevant groups you can become a fan of and ‘share’. We recently ran a marketing campaign for a client using Facebook – which consisted of purely Tweets, Facebook sharing via relevant Groups and some targeted Facebook advertising – and it was a complete success.

YouTube

The power of showcasing who you are, what you do – all via a simple video stream – uploaded onto YouTube and then shared via your Twitter, Facebook or Blog or website.   Again, the transparency and ease of video communication

And, all these platforms converge – you can share your tweets via Linked In and Facebook – and share your Facebook offers or wall on Linked In etc – so it all ‘joins up’.

Content is King

Of course, all of these (and there are other platforms too) create content – and, in my view, content is still KING.

Another quick and easy way of generating authentic and unique content is via a ‘blog’.  Blogging is the epitomy of ‘sharing’ (I run 3 of my own blogs now, as well as managing others for clients).  As online publishers of content (which is what we are when we interact with these social media platforms) – the power has been transferred from the few – to the many.  Ok – so that makes it a tough gig – as the landscape is more competitive – but that’s no reason not to participate – after all, isn’t that the same case as with ‘traditional media’, and yet businesses are far more comfortable spending money on advertising in magazines than participating with social media.

So if I’ve convinced you that you too should consider engaging with social media as part of your marketing activity – how do you get started?

It’s not just as simple as signing up for Twitter, Linked In or Facebook or creating a blog – you probably will do all of those things – but just as when you are planning any campaign or marketing strategy – plan your approach.  Ask yourself the same strategic questions – to name but a few:

What are your objectives?

Where do we send people?

What is our message?

What do we give them?

What’s our target audience?

Where do we find them?

What are our tactics?

How do we participate?

What’s our USP?

What are our competitors doing?

For businesses of all shapes and sizes, getting involved in social media is a must.  Right now while it’s still pretty ‘emerging’ – businesses will get away with the ‘aloofness of not wanting to waste time on it’.  However, if you continue to bury your head in the sand – then in the not too distant future, that hesitancy to participate will be perceived as ‘I don’t want to others to talk about my business’.  And as a business owner – I don’t think that’s a great message to share.

Tags: , , ,
Posted in Social Media | 135 Comments »

What you need to know about Google Adwords

May 5th, 2010

Advertising online has grown significantly over the past few years – and is now a multi-billion pound industry.

Pay per click (PPC) advertising has grown in popularity due to its relatively low set up costs and high level of accountability. Unlike traditional advertising media, you only pay for your ad each time someone clicks on it.

It’s an all inclusive, ‘everyone welcome’ platform that has certainly flattened the advertising landscape entirely. It was only a few years ago that advertising campaigns were largely dominated by big brands – however, with online advertising via Google Adwords, even small and start up businesses can engage in online advertising – bringing their wares to targeted audiences, without any brand awareness or a huge marketing budget.

However, as with all marketing activity – you need to have a plan. Too many people dive into Google Adwords without any clear strategic objective as to what they are looking to achieve. Remember, it’s all very good getting people to click on your ad – but then what? Have you got the right call to action in place? Are you leveraging the traffic you receive and converting it into sales? Ask yourself – what’s your objective.

You can burn a lot of money if you don’t know what you’re doing with Adwords – so here are our top 10 tips to help you along the way:

1 Keyword selection

Targeted marketing is always the most efficientl form of marketing – and therefore, the ‘words’ – or keywords you select for your advertising campaigns are critical. You want to attract users who are genuinely interested in what you have to offer. To put it simply – your product and service offerings and descriptions need to match what users are searching for.

When creating your keywords there are various tools you can use to assist you. However, word of caution, selecting too many keywords can be costly and detrimental to a targeted campaign. It’s not just about getting any old traffic to you site – you want quality traffic which has the potential to convert into sales at a cost that achieves a positive return on investment for you.

To assist with campaign management you can create multiple AdGroups in which you house selected keywords – enabling you to create ‘text ads’ that relate to specific keywords – and track performance more accurately.

2 How to target your advertisements

There are various options to assist you with your ad message reaching a more targeted audience.

  • Location: Via Adwords you can specify a geographical location – be it whole of UK, or 25 mile radius surrounding London – or whole of the world! You can specify languages for your ad and also at what time of day your ad is to be shown.
  • Network: Most ads target the Google network meaning that your ad will appear on Google and its network of partner websites. There is also the option to advertise on Google’s ‘content’ network which includes all AdSense publishers. Clicks from the content network are usually attained at a lower CPC (cost per click) however, the quality of these clicks from a sales conversion perspective is likely to be far lower – and there is also risk of fraudulent clicks – as it’s a wide open space. However, if your objective is more about gaining traffic than converting sales (as in promotion / brand awareness) – then the content network does offer you more visibility.

3 Competitor activity

It’s always worth reviewing the keywords you are looking to use via simple Google searches and seeing what comes up. This is a simple way to assess competitor activity. For example – with one client, we noticed that none of their competitors were indicating the price of the service in their ads. Therefore, whilst the service was quite a generic one – we were able to differentiate our clients ads by including details of the price – which whilst just a bit more competitive than others – was a differentiator online purely because no one else was mentioning it. So it’s worth reviewing what’s happening in the landscape you want to advertise in – and seeing how your ad can stand out from the rest. If it’s different and engaging – it’s more likely to be clicked.

4 Using effective matching options

  • Exact Match: For an optimised advertising campaign then using the ‘exact matching’ option on all keywords ensures that you are only bidding against that individual keyword search. Use of exact matching enables a more targeted and efficient approach as you are only bidding on the relevant keywords you have specified – and if your keyword research is accurate – then your CTR (click through rate) should improve. Click through rates (CTR) is an important factor in ensuring your ‘cost per click’ is efficient. You only want to attract clicks that matter – and so by using exact match – you narrow the margins of capturing non relevant search. However, conversely, using exact match does reduce the amount of traffic you are likely to receive. It’s worth testing campaigns using exact match and also broad match (which will include various permutations of the keyword search phrase). Analysis may show that these less specific searches are costing you too much and not achieving anything – however, you could end up stumbling across a keyword phrase which is highly successful!
  • Broad Match: Using only the exact matching option can have the negative effect of only receiving a low amount of traffic as you are only targeting a specific audience. In addition, to attract a wider range of searches it may be worth adding the phrase and broad match versions of your exact match keywords. As these are less specific they are likely to achieve a lower CTR and conversion rate but will increase the amount of clicks.
  • Negative Match: Including negative keywords as part of your list is best practice when creating targeted keywords. Not using negative keywords means that your ads may show to people who are not interested in your proposition, so including them, enables you to stay targeted. For example: If you don’t want your ad to show when people are searching ‘free trial’ – then you would include ‘free trial’ as a negative keyword. As above – you can include negative keywords on an exact match or broad match basis. Including negative keywords will reduce how many people see your ads – however, again, it’s the balance between traffic and a targeted audience.

5 Managing your budget

Setting a daily budget is a bit of a ‘suck it and see’ activity. Google will automatically recommend a daily budget for you – but I would suggest that the best tactic is to start low – and watch what is happening to both traffic, ads, positions and ultimately conversions. You may find you aren’t bidding on the right keywords – or that some keywords gain more traffic and traction than others – it’s a learning curve. Once you’re seeing the benefits – and a positive return on investment is occurring, then you can start to look at increasing your daily budget.

6 Good, no not good, great… advertising copy

In my view, this is the most neglected, yet vitally important, element of an Adwords campaign. The ads you supply are limited in line space (text) – so you have to get your message across, clearly and succinctly and in a targeted way. And of course, when advertising with Google, you’ve also got to consider the ‘quality scoring’ elements of your advertising. If you include keywords within the ad title and use call to action keywords such as sign up, register, buy now – so that the user knows exactly what to expect when they click – then all the better – and further, you need to ensure that the page the user clicks through to from your ad is wholly relevant to the ad (see point 7 below). It’s common sense really – but then again, how common is common sense!  The other element of ‘Ad Copy’ is to really monitor which ads are performing and which are not.  My advice is to run with 3 ads initially for each campaign and see which one performs the best.  Then drop either one or two of them – focusing attention on the main converter.  Again, it’s about being targeted.

7 Targeting your destination URL

You can target a specific landing page URL from your ad to ensure that the user will get to a page which is wholly relevant to your ad. For example – if you are advertising ‘red and white striped golf umbrellas’ – then take the user directly to that product page – rather than to your home page – or even your ‘umbrella page’. Be specific and targeted. You know yourself that there is nothing more frustrating than searching, finding a link that appears to offer exactly what you are looking for – and then when you click it, is it totally or partially irrelevant. It’s a total waste of a click – inefficient and bad for your campaign in every way – so be sure to match your ad text to a relevant landing page.

8 Tracking conversions

What you can measure you can manage – and therefore, it’s important that you manage the performance of your campaigns. Tracking actual conversions – be it sales, or sign up – will help you to measure your campaign activity. It’s a balance and good business practice to ensure that you know exactly how much it costs you to convert – and whether that cost is profitable / useful for your business.

9 Campaign Reports

Google Adwords provides you with pretty sophisticated reporting. The reports provide you with a clear and visual overview of activity on your campaigns. Statistics which show you where the clicks are coming from – which ads, what time, which position you were in – click through rates, conversions and costs per click – provide you with very comprehensive and detailed information. Therefore, you can regularly review these reports to make important decisions about your campaigns, and make changes to measure impact, as they are running.

10 Google Analytics

Whilst the Adwords campaign reports enable you to measure what’s actually happening with your ads – Google Analytics enables you to monitor how users are interacting with your website. You can choose which pages on your site you want to apply analytics to (all of them if relevant) – you can also integrate Adwords into Analytics so that you can track exactly what your click leads to. Analytics provides you with data on where your visitors come from; most popular pages on your site, which search engine they use, their locality – whether organic or sponsored traffic (ppc) and also provides you with valuable information on which search terms / keywords are driving traffic. Again, regular analysis of Analytics enables you to steer your online activity in an effective way.

How Sitetastic can help you with your Google Adwords management:

The team at Sitetastic has significant experience with Google Adwords – as well as a lot of hands on experience in running campaigns, so we’re well equipped to share our knowledge and expertise.

If you would like to explore Google Adwords – then don’t hesitate to contact us michelle@sitetastic.co.uk or call us on 01628 634066.

Also for more info, check out Google’s video for getting started with Google Adwords http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFzoM59bIQ8

Tags: , , ,
Posted in Online Advertising | 55 Comments »