“If you aren’t using these features, you should be.…. We explain the how, the why, and provide some food for thought“

Remarketing:

This feature is designed to recapture and convert prospects who have previously visited a website and allows you to recapture them with targeted advertisements. You benefit from being able to market to a highly targeted list where conversions are more likely to occur.

*Leverage Tip: Write new ads and a new landing page made specifically for retargeting customers. Why didn’t they buy the first time around? Address the subconscious buying concerns that may have prevented them from converting the first time around. Test different variables like being more clear about shipping costs or provide some testimonials to get them to buy now.

Broad Match Modifier:

Broad match keywords will trigger any searches that contain your keywords in any given order, singular or plural variations, synonyms, any misspellings or relevant variation. But what, specifically, does Google consider to be a relevant variation? This vague interpretation and dependency on Google’s algorithm to determine a relevant variation of your keyword is a powerful feature for increasing traffic, but only when you’re ready for it. Hence, the Broad Match Modified feature. By adding a (+) sign in front of your broad match keywords, you will still have the flexibility of showing up for misspellings, singular and plurals, and phrases in any given order as long as your keywords are included in the search. The big difference here, though, is that you omit showing up for what Google classifies as synonyms.

*Leverage Tip: Start your campaigns off using Broad Match Modified keyword instead of Broad Match keywords. Once your campaign is optimized and only when you feel it necessary to look for new keywords and increase traffic, then you can play with Broad Match and see what kind of stuff Google will show you for.

Adwords Call Tracking:

Adwords call tracking can be setup at the campaign level by adding a call extension and selecting to add a dynamically generated forwarding number provided by Google. Businesses conducting lead generation, B2B, professional services, or E-commerce transactions of high value can really benefit from call tracking where conversions are less likely to occur directly online.

*Leverage Tip: Use adwords call tracking to track the response rates from your display and retargeting campaigns by assigning them a unique Google forwarding number.

Search Funnels:

Search funnels are a hidden gym in Google Adwords. You may not have noticed it when optimizing your account and that’s because it’s cleverly hidden under: Tools and Analysis > Conversions > Search Funnels. Aha! Often times, a user will search more than one time and click on various ads when searching for a product or service. Often times a user will conduct multiple search queries and click on multiple ads from you, the advertiser.  What this report will do for you is enable you to see the search path that your users took before they converted on your site. Another benefit of the search funnels feature is the ability to see the time lag between the first time they clicked on your ad and the time when they ultimately converted. You will be surprised how many people don’t actually convert on day one.

*Leverage Tip:  Just because a high traffic keyword may not appear to have any conversions, doesn’t mean that it didn’t play a part in bringing awareness to your existence before the user converted later on a second search. Clicks that help or assist in helping to convert a user are known as assist clicks or the process of analyzing this data can also be referred to as attribution modeling. For this reason, you may want to double check your search funnels before pausing a keyword which may not appear to have conversions when in actuality it is playing a critical role in assisting the ultimate conversion.

Keyword Auction Insights:

Keyword auction insights is a feature found at the keyword level under Keyword Details > Auction Insights.  Auction insights is a neat tool you can use to check your ego and how you fare against the competition. So how do you stack up against your competitors for a single keyword in a search bidding auction? This tool lets you see impression share, average position, and other stats and how you compare in relation to other advertisers bidding on the same keyword.

 *Leverage Tip:  If your impression share is higher than your competitors but their average position is still higher than you, then they are simply outbidding you. Knowing this, you may want to raise your bids or strategically lower them depending on your goals.