To PPC or Not to PPC: That is the Question!
With apologies to Shakespeare, to be or not to be isn’t the question anymore. Business success is helped or hampered by the Google powers that be. For many business owners and entrepreneurs, that is why the question has become: To Pay Per Click or Not to Play Per Click?.
PPC is both an awesome way to get noticed by Google searchers (aka your prospective customers) and an awful game to be forced to play. When it works, your business moves up the ladder, attracting traffic, gaining customers and impressing Google’s free algorithm. When it doesn’t work or it’s too expensive, your business is in a holding pattern or is sliding backwards.
To Pay Per Click…
Let’s face it. The free algorithm limits your exposure and makes lots of demands on how your website presents itself. You can have a terrific website, but it has poor site health or it’s simply too new to have built authority. Perhaps you have just what you need on every page, but the Google algorithm demands something different. These difficulties can all go away if you pay to play. Oh, excuse me. Pay Per Click.
Businesses of all sizes are using PPC to move to the front of the line. When it comes to Google, being at the top of the list is essential to your success. Searchers barely look beyond the first few suggestions. In many cases, they don’t even have to click to get the information they want. They just check the short descriptions that appear magically via Google.
PPC can be a valuable tool in the right hands. It can be cost effective. The right oversight is key. There are nuances to getting the formula to work for your business. Like every other aspect of the algorithm, there is no “one size fits all.”
Or Not to Pay Per Click…
On the other grand, why does PPC have to be so awful? It is hard to determine its effectiveness unless you are an expert. You have money going out but you don’t necessarily see a return. Even though you are paying, you feel an uncertainty about whether it is benefiting you more than simply taking your chances with the free search algorithm.
If your business has lots of competitors, it drives up the price and you feel like you can’t afford enough PPC to make a difference. Yet, in this highly competitive climate, you are scared that you will be trampled if you don’t play the PPC game.
Speaking of Games….A Few Frustrating Case Studies
Then there’s the fact that Google overlords can be demanding. Recently we had to delete a very common phrase from a dental website because Google refused to run our PPC campaign until those words were deleted. Who knew that nitrous oxide was controversial? I think my grandparents were getting nitrous oxide at the dentist in their day. Fortunately, this was a fairly easy ask, but the next one was really challenging.
On a new website we were developing for a client, Google demanded that two key phrases be removed or the PPC ads couldn’t run. The powers that be Google didn’t like those phrases, which are common in the industry but not widely accepted by the wider world, and so those phrases had to go. Who wants to put up with this? Our client eventually agreed to two websites. One has the phrases. The other doesn’t. Guess which one is tied to Google PPC.
In a third case that we recently witnessed, a client was paying two times what we thought was necessary to make PPC work. After our team took over, it turned out that we only needed a third of what had been spent to conduct an effective campaign.
This overspending happens when a PPC campaign is unfocused, and oversight is lax. Still, if you are the one paying three times as much and it’s not working, you may not care why.
Making PPC Work for You
PPC can work for you just as it has for others. It’s a tool we use often to help our clients capture customers faster. The key is a focused campaign that isn’t allowed to go off track or waste money.
It helps to coordinate your SEO strategy, your website content, and your PPC because everything is working toward the ultimate Google goal. You want to be seen by the algorithm to be a trusted expert. A trafficked site attracts more traffic. It’s the Google way.
To us, coordination is key. We believe in monitoring the PPC campaign and tweaking it until we find what works. Then we repeat the process again and again week after week as necessary. Meanwhile, we are helping to develop content and utilize SEO to make sure the website can grow without PPC. Working from both angles generally yields more lasting results.
Ultimately, our goal is what works. And we don’t like to waste your money trying to get there. So let us talk about what your goals are. Our team can help you with PPC, SEO, Facebook ads and many other tools that can help you break through the barriers and reap the rewards you deserve.
Give us a call or use our online form to get in touch. Let’s tackle the Google algorithm together.
