Google Ads: What is Google Ads and How Does it Work?

What is Google Ads?

As the online world grows and develops, with more and more brands and businesses taking the steps to promote themselves online, it is becoming increasingly more important to make sure that your website is seen by your target audience. To increase your visibility and traffic that makes its way to your website, Google has introduced Google Ads (previously known as Google Adwords) where marketers, brands and businesses can bid for their ads to be shown, both on search engines and across other platforms. Google Ads offer brands and businesses the chance to increase their traffic and potentially find new customers through paid-for listings that are designed through different types of listings. The type of listing that you choose to use depends entirely on your product and your goals, offering just about any type of business the opportunity to create an advertisement that suits their needs.

How Does Google Ads Work?

Google Ads works with a pay-per-click design, where users who have purchased advertisements only pay for the clicks that they get from a specific advertisement. This type of model ensures that users are not paying for advertisements that are not geared towards the right audience, protecting them from unnecessary costs. This design is particularly effective when it comes to small businesses, which generally have a lower budget to spend on advertisements. It is also extremely effective for web pages that have content that is geared towards purchasing items, such as shopping networks as these types of pages will more than likely receive a sale from the site visits!

This unique set-up ensures that brands and businesses are only having to pay for results, and with Google providing statistics and being open about who visits your page and what types of site visits are resulting in users completing the desired action, it is easy to see whether or not your Google Ads are working for you. This open and transparent way of working allows for brands and businesses to see how their content is working and whether or not it is driving people to purchase something or complete a certain action.

Is Google Ads Free For Companies?

Google Ads pricing has been designed to provide advertisements to businesses through a special payment prerogative. The amount that a business pays for the services that Google Ads offer depends on the number of clicks that a specific advertisement receives, with businesses only being charged when a user clicks and the ad and is taken to the companies website. This system works to ensure that businesses are only paying for the clicks that they receive, this is known as a pay-per-click payment plan.

What the platform does provide to users for free are the analytics and metrics that are used to monitor and display the types of people who are venturing to your web page and whether or not these site visits are translating into sales or action. This information is extremely valuable and it can help a brand or business to better structure their content and align it to match a certain market.

One way that Google ad users can actually make money from the platform is by using Google Adsense. This platform pays you to display one of the advertisements that they receive from Google Ads, paying you and taking a small commission for every time an ad is clicked on your webpage. For larger websites that receive a lot of traffic, this monetization tactic can help you to pay for your one Google ad account and it can even develop into a source of revenue if enough clicks are generated from your website. It is important to note that Google does not look favourably on websites that have been created for the purchase of displaying these ads, so you need to be a reputable page in order to participate.

How do Google Ads Comply with SEO?

Google Ads and SEO are two marketing techniques that walk hand in hand with one another, and most marketers and SEO experts suggest using both together. The aim of both SEO and Google Ads is to increase the amount of traffic that marks its way to your page, the only difference is this is achieved. Many brands and businesses use Google Ads data to analyse certain SEO features on their webpage, this is done thanks to Google Ads metrics and measurement information that is provided to its users.

Why is Google Ads Valuable for Businesses?

Increased Leads and Customers

Google Ads is a target form of marketing and the ads for your brand or business are sent to consumers within your target market. This form of targeted marketing ensures that not only are you getting traffic from these ads, but the users who are visiting your website are more likely to complete the desired action or make a purchase. This increase in the number of valuable customers who venture to your page means that those who click on the advertisements are customers that would be interested in what you have to offer. Other forms of online advertisements have more of a general approach, meaning that you may get people clicking on your ad who are not going to make a purchase. This can lead to losses as you have to pay per click and not only when a click results in a sale.

High ROI Potential

When it comes to marketing, receiving a high return on investment is extremely important. When it comes to Google Ads, the chance of a high ROI is extremely likely, due to the fact that you are only paying for the clicks you receive on your ad. This ensures that Google Ads are an extremely valuable resource for businesses, no matter what their size or marketing and advertising budget.

Explore The Audience

One of the top reasons why businesses invest in using Google Ads is because it is a platform that allows for brands to get a better understanding of their audience. With many different metrics used to show who is making their way to your page and which types of people are actually making purchases, you can better structure your content and direct it towards certain groups of people. this is a highly beneficial feature for many different types of businesses, particularly ones who are looking to become more diverse and are hoping to find out which types of customers like which products you have on offer. With this type of data on hand and are provided freely on the Google Ads platform, you can keep track of your market and audience in an easy to understand way.

Get Fast Results

One of the main reasons why brands and businesses prefer to use Google Ads as opposed to traditional SEO methods is due to the fact that Google Ads generate traffic quickly. If you are hoping to get a lot of traffic directed to your site in a short amount of time, Google Ads offer brands the opportunity to generate high-quality leads within a short timeframe. This can be extremely beneficial if you are looking for a surge in the number of site visits. Many marketers and advertising agencies will suggest that you use both Google Ads and SEO to increase traffic, and while SEO is slowly building you up to be a high ranking web page, you can help these efforts by increasing traffic flow, as this is a ranking factor that Google and other search engines take into account.

What are The Advantages of Using Google Ads?

Ads are targeted: Unlike many other forms of more traditional paid advertising, where you are essentially taking a shot in the dark and not targeting your advertisements to certain people, Google Ads allow for you to send your advertisements to specific people with specific interests. Through things like location, keywords and even the devices that users use, brands and businesses are able to drive their ads towards a target and predetermined group of people. This unique and interesting targeted feature ensures that these advertisements are far more likely to be clicked on.

Google Ads allow for you to see who is clicking: For those who are hoping to measure and analyse who is clicking on their page, Google Ads provide this information as well as whether or not their site visit resulted in the desired action. This helps marketers to measure whether or not their content is effective in compelling a person to make a purchase.

Cost control: Not only do you only pay for the clicks you receive on advertisement but you are also able to list how much you can spend per month on Google Ads, and the platform will never exceed this amount. This allows for budgets to remain intact as you will never exceed the amount you have set aside for your Google Ads account. The amount you set aside can be anything, as there is no minimum on the amount you can spend. This feature ensures that any brands, from the small businesses who have just started out to massive corporations, will be able to use this platform, the maximum spend would just be different. You can easily manage these costs through your Google Ads account.

What are The Types of Google Ads?

Search Campaign

Google search ads are advertisements that are displayed on search engine results pages and they rely heavily on keywords. Google will determine when best to display your ad depending on what the search query is, ensuring that only valuable clicks come from your ad being placed on the page. When writing out what your search campaign will say, it is important to remember that your content should be compelling, making the user seeing the advertisement want to click on it and see what you have to offer.

The information should be as accurate as possible to ensure that those who are clicking on the advertisement will want to make a purchase or complete the desired action. Brands and businesses using this type of campaign should also make sure that they bid to purchase their brands’ name, as this ensures that when anyone types your name into Google your advertisement will be the first thing that they see. This is extremely important for smaller and newer businesses that may not have made an impact on the organic search results and would otherwise not be found.

Shopping Campaign

Shopping campaigns revolve around designing advertisements that let a user know what your product is before they have even clicked on the link to your webpage. This concise and informative type of advertisement campaign offers Google Ads managers the chance to see whether or not the product being advertised is being brought, and whether or not the advertisements are being directed to the most appropriate audience, and this is done using Google Ads conversion tracking tools.

Display Campaign

The one negative thing about using search ads to display your information is that you are not allowed to use images to do so. if you are hoping to use images to draw customers in and grab their attention, then it is best to use a display campaign. Unlike search ads, display ads are displayed as banners on websites and even in Gmail. To make sure that these advertisements are being directed towards your target market, Google uses the Google display network to monitor which websites, videos or email accounts would generate the most amount of traffic. This network contains over 2 million different applications, videos and websites where your ad can be displayed, ensuring that you are able to target the most effective and valuable users to your website.

Video Campaign

This type of advertisement is similar to a display campaign, expecting the fact that instead of an image being displayed it is a video. A Google Ads video campaign is very eye-catching, and those hoping to draw people in using this type of advertisement often receive a ton of clicks! Many different industries can use this type of ad to show off their products and offerings. The one major difference between this type of campaign compared to others is that they can be quite pricey as you should make sure that the video produced is of the best quality, and you would probably need a professional video editor and creator to help bring your vision to life.

App Campaign

A Google Ads app campaign is one that helps a brand or business to promote their apps through many different channels, from Google searches to banners that appear on Gmail. Your apps will also be displayed on Google play, offering a large platform where your app is more liklley to be downloaded! These types of campaigns are extremely valuable, especially if you are trying to launch an app and are hoping to help it gain traction.

How to set up a Google Ads campaign?

The best place to start your journey on setting up your Google Ads account is to learn a bit about the different elements you will need to ensure your ads are successful. One of the most important things to have a basic understanding of are keywords and the different ones that would be most effective for your webpage. With the Google Ads keyword planner on hand, this platform has made sure that you have a basic guide to understanding and picking the most relevant and effective keywords to make sure your ad is not only noticed but noticed by the right people. Another aspect to gai8n as much knowledge on as possible is Google Ads bidding.

Organise your Google account: The next step of the process in setting up your Google Ads account is to organise it. There are two different levels of organisation on a Google account, your campaigns and then within the campaign level, there are ad groups. This separation of different groups, keywords and campaigns is a feature that is used to ensure that your advertisements are received by people looking for a specific product, if there were broader categories, one who is looking for soccer shoes may come across your advert for tennis shoes. This is another way that Google Ads is making sure that your ads are seen by relevant and targeted groups of people!

Decide on what your budget is: Google Ads allow for businesses to pick their own budgets and maximum spending, ensuring that you never exceed the amount you have set aside for Google Ads marketing. The budget is set up and spread across each of your campaigns, and you re able to decide which campaign receives however much of your budget. It is suggested that those just starting out attempt to spread their budget evenly over each of the campaigns as you do not yet know which one will result in the most clicks and purchases.

Decide on your keywords: the next step in the process is deciding on which keywords you are going to use. By using the Google Ads keyword planner tool, you are able to easily generate a list of some of the most effective keywords according to who your brand or business is. This is an important step in the process and ensuring that your Google Ads have the most effective keywords to draw in customers is extremely important.

Set your keyword match type: Another important step in the process is to set up your keyword match type. This process offers an extra feature to ensure that your keywords are seen by the right kinds of customers and there are five different types of keyword match types. The following are just two of the match types and how they function:

Negative match: A negative match offers users the chance to express where they do not want their webpage to be displayed. Certain keywords that Google may register as productive but are not what you were hoping to have associated with your advertisement should be included in this match type.

Broad match: These types of keywords can display your keywords in any sort of order, not specified within the broad match type. This ensures that even if you have not thought of the exact word pairing or order that is likely to be searched, your advertisement will still show up.

Landing pages: The next thing to make sure is set up perfectly are the landing pages. Landing pages refer to the place where customers will be brought to from your advertisement. This is one of the most important pages on your website as it is the page that will determine whether or not your customers are drawn to complete a certain action, whether it’s reading an article, making a purchase or even leaving a comment.

Decide whether you want to optimise for PC or mobile devices: This decision rests entirely on what you are hoping to achieve and what type of business you have. The type of device you optimise for will be a large factor in whether or not the clients clicking are actually making purchases. If you are a brand that is hoping to attract people who are not in their homes and are possibly travelling and looking for certain things, like perhaps a restaurant or car repair shop, it would be best to optimise for mobile devices rather than PC.

Create your ads: The advertisements that people see are the first impression that they will get about your business and it is extremely important that you put your best foot forward and impress them with the content you provide. It is recommended that your advert be concise with a clear and direct message. This call to action will ensure that people know what to do to learn more about your product or service.

Your account should be connected to Google Analytics: For the best possible way to gain insight into who your customer base is and who is clicking on your advert, you should connect your ad account to a free Google Analytics account and measure using the Google Ads API. The information provided is extremely helpful when it comes to monitoring not only the traffic on your webpage but also how effective your content is in driving users to make a purchase or complete an action. By having this information freely accessible, the platform acts as Google Ads support model that can help you to achieve your goals!

Monitor your ads: Once the last step is complete and you have released your advertisement onto Google, you should make sure that you monitor and check back in on your Google Ads settings and account as frequently as possible. Having a Google Ads editor or a Google Ads specialist may come in handy if you are wanting to keep track of the changes that should be made according to the analytics reported. Whether it’s monitoring the metrics and analytics or seeing how much traffic you have gained, it is important to keep track of your Google Ads.

What Are The Differences Between SEO And Google Ads?

Budget

One of the main differences between SEO and Google Ads is that SEO is something that can be done without having to pay. We call the tactics that refer to SEO tactics as organic as you do not have to pay for these services. for those brands and businesses who are on a strict and small budget, using SEO to attract customers can still be extremely effective, and determined only a few main keywords, like your brands’ name, and using Google Ads to promote your advertisements only when this is typed into Google will bring your costs down. These tactics do however take much longer to implement as opposed to Google Ads.

Result Time

If it’s fast results you are after, the best tool to use is Google Ads, as SEO tactics can take time to perfect and be noticed by search engines. Due to the fact that Google Ads is something that can be purchased and then easily displayed on search engines, once you have bid on and paid for a keyword, the result time is far quicker compared to SEO.

Permanence

While SEO is something that once built up will be an effective way to draw in traffic, as soon as you are no longer paying for your Google Ads account, these advertisements, and the traffic gained from them, will soon disappear. This impermanence is something that negatively impacts your traffic and can cause a massive difference in the number of users who make their way to your page in a very short amount of time. While SEO is something that takes a bit longer to build up, once it is built and functioning effectively, all you have to do is monitor and make adjustments as the markets change.

Feedback

With Google Adwords, tracking information and data is extremely easy as there are ways to connect your ad to Google analytics and monitor the different metrics affecting your advertisement and traffic that makes its way to your webpage. Having this information on hand is extremely beneficial and it can help you not only monitor your traffic, but it can also determine whether or not your content is driving sales.

Top Place Guaranteed

When using Google Ads, you have to bid on certain keywords and phrases, once you have bought the rights to these keywords and phrases, you are guaranteed to have top placement on Google. When it comes to SEO however, even if you are currently in the top placement spot, you still have to monitor and update your SEO to keep up with the changes to Googles algorithm and the market. This means that a top place is never guaranteed and it can be snatched out from under you if a new brand or business comes along with better SEO than your own.