Find out how to increase leads and sales for your business using by following this guide, which lists the most effective tips for Google Adwords PPC advertising

1. Tips to Increase Leads with
Exceptional
GOOGLE
ADWORDS
10
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2. You can end the feast or famine cycle with a
well-crafted AdWords campaign by following
these 10 exceptional tips to increase PPC
leads:
Like most advertisers looking to increase leads from their digital
marketing strategy and PPC campaigns, you will be familiar with
the “feast or famine” cycle that over 90% of businesses struggle
with online.
This is when all the work comes at once and there is great inter-
est in your services, but that is quickly followed by periods of
drought, when lead count is low and you have no work coming in
because enquiries and sales are low. And this process contin-
ues over and over again, and can cripple your business.
The inevitable result is that your business goes through unpre-
dictable periods and it becomes harder to plan your lead-gen
strategy and do any sales forecasting.

3. SET THE
RIGHT BUDGET
01
Step

4. SET THE
RIGHT BUDGET01
Step
PAGE 04PAGE 04
Budget setting is often one of the most challeng-
ing actions when setting up AdWords campaigns.
And it also happens to be one of the most
error-prone features of campaign launch and man-
agement
To truly make a success of AdWords advertising
and increase your leads and profitability, you need
to plan your budgets according to the different
stages of your campaign’s lifecycle. For example,
a newly launched campaign will naturally have a
test budget to assess initial interest and perfor-
mance, while reining in on spend. This will normal-
ly be set at the lowest possible amount, while
getting sufficient clicks and impressions to make
a judgement on likely success.
There is nothing wrong with such a strategy, and
when executed well can mean great future results.
However, from my experience and having worked
with thousands of clients over the years – the
launch budget remains the lifetime budget for
many advertisers. Many are reluctant to adjust
budgets upwards, despite all the green signals
giving the go ahead.
When your campaign has reached a reasonable
ROI level, it is time to up the game. Increasing the
budget should be the next step, and this should
be sufficient enough to help you see a difference.
So a monthly launch budget of £1,000 will not
see any significant change by increasing it up to
£1,200. The minimum should be a 50% increase
in most cases, to something like £1,500.
One of the biggest factors to underperforming
accounts is low budget allocation because of
advertiser reticence.
A low budget will prevent your campaign from
reaching its true potential. And one of the
reasons is that you are effectively preventing
your ads from appearing for high converting
keywords and search terms that only appear
when you cast your advertising net wider.
So, be bold and take that next step, and make
your AdWords budget work for your business. t

5. SET YOUR
BID STRATEGY
FOR SUCCESS
02
Step

6. 02
Step
PAGE 06
SET YOUR
BID STRATEGY
FOR SUCCESS
CLOSELY LINKED TO BUDGET SETTING IS BID STRATEGY. WHY?
Because your bid strategy or tactics will often be determined by your
budget– and vice versa.
There are two main types of bidding options in AdWords:
For example, an automated strategy like Maximise Clicks is often the best bid strategy to begin with,
and is usually the most ideal when you have a low budget. The AdWords system will work to get you the
most possible clicks for your budget by setting the right bids.
However, you have the option to put in a bid cap, but this is not always wise because it hinders the
AdWords machine learning system from getting you the most clicks, and that are likely to convert
Automated
Manual

7. PAGE 07
Set your bid strategy for
success
Manual bidding does exactly what it says on the tin; you set the campaign, ad group and keyword bids
manually, and adjust them manually, based on performance. This gives you greater control of course,
but can be laborious when we are taking of hundreds and even thousands of ads, keywords, ad groups
and campaign. Avoid it if you can! Especially at the beginning, when you have no ad Rank, no quality
scores, and have little idea of what the optimal bid is.
The bid strategy you use is one of the biggest factors to the quality and count of leads you receive. In
fact, most advertisers need to be in the top positions of the ad results to get a decent number of leads.
Most people looking for a plumber, solicitor, electrician, management consultant or any other profes-
sional or tradesman aren’t likely to look beyond the top 3-5 positions. And they are more likely to go with
the first one they visit because it becomes the benchmark for others.
You have a far greater chance of exploding your leads and enquiries by being in position 1 and some-
times 2. And as mentioned earlier, this is closely related to your budget allocation. You are unlikely to
make a success of your campaign if you manage to get to position 1 but have a low budget. You will
quickly blow all your budget.
Automated bidding includes many bidding strategies, including:
Maximise clicks
Target search page location
Enhanced
Maximise conversions
Target outranking share

8. USE
BID MODIFIERS
03
Step

9. 03
Step
USE
BID
MODIFIERS
And this tip links nicely with the one above and
also to tip one “set the right budgets”. You see,
creativity is a key part of success with AdWords.
You are unlikely to make any headway if you are
not regularly testing new creatives, optimising
keywords and search terms, modifying bids and
so on.
And this is especially applicable to bid modifiers.
The aim of bid modifiers is to maximise any good
performance and minimise poor performance for
features like devices, locations, demographics
and so on.
So if you find that mobile traffic is performing
better for your local services, you can increase
bids by 30% to increase exposure and clicks.
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10. USE
BOTH SEMANTIC
AND SYNTACTIC
KEYWORDS
04
Step

11. USE
BOTH SEMANTIC
AND SYNTACTIC
KEYWORDS04
Step
Semantic refers to the meaning of a user’s search and is related to broad match type keywords that
match to a wide variety of queries that are based on the user’s intent. So a broad match type keyword
like AdWords expert will appear for searches like:
AdWords expert (exact)
AdWords specialist (synonym)
Expert in AdWords (with other words)
AdWords experts (plural)
And so on
Syntactic, on the other hand, refers to the order of the words in a user’s search or close variations of the
specific words in that search, and relates to exact match, phrase and modified broad match types.
These three match types will only match to searches with the exact same words but in different order at
times, such as:
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12. Because over 15% of search queries each day on Google have never been searched before, broad match
keywords (semantic) gives you the greatest chance of capturing a wide range of long tail searches that
are semantically relevant and will lead to a high lead volume.
Use both semantic and syntactic
keywords
[AdWords expert] –
this exact match will only trigger the search term:
AdWords expert
+AdWords +expert –
this is modified broad match type and will trigger searches that contain these two words in any order
and with other words; so searches such as:
“AdWords expert” –
this phrase match will only trigger searches with these two words in this same order but with other
words before or after, like:
AdWords expert Milton Keynes
Find AdWords expert
Local AdWords expert in Milton Keynes
AdWords expert
Expert in AdWords
Look for AdWords expert
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13. ADVERTISE ON
WEEKENDS
AND EVENINGS
05
Step

14. 05
Step ADVERTISE ON
WEEKENDS
AND EVENINGS
One reason why advertisers turn off ads over the weekend or in the evening is to reduce spend and
perhaps allocate that money to weekday activity. This is fine, especially if you’ve found that perfor-
mance is low during the times and you are getting lower ROI.
However, consider this – many people will search outside working hours and check out various suppli-
ers, and decide whom they will contact on Monday or during working hours. So without an active ad
outside of these hours then you are likely to lose some valuable leads.
One major advantage of running ads outside of normal working hours is that CPC rates tend to be much
lower and can be, at times, 50% cheaper. That means you will often have a better cost per conversion for
this traffic.
Another major advantage is that people who search for professional services outside of normal hours
are usually business owners and decision makers in small firms, and they will have the final say on
which supplier they pick. Targeting the decision maker is always difficult but it is easier when you run
ads on weekends and evenings – and you will see an amazing ROI from your ads.
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15. USE
PRE-QUALIFIER AND
POST-QUALIFIER
KEYWORDS
06
Step

16. USE
PRE-QUALIFIER AND
POST-QUALIFIER
KEYWORDS06
Step
Keyword research is fundamental to running
successful AdWords campaigns that will help you
bring in many qualified leads. However, most
advertisers get this very important task wrong.
Most advertisers look for and bid on high traffic
keywords that have high CPCs and low conversion
potential because they are naturally generic in
nature.
The key to running effective campaigns is to
target long tail keywords primarily and also have a
range of head keywords that are highly relevant
and have high traffic volumes and not too expen-
sive CPC rates
An even more effective way to target long tail
keywords besides using broad match is to use
pre and post qualifiers. So, you would make a list
of keyword combinations and merge them
together to create hundreds or even thousands
of keyword lists.
Say you sell virus protection software and you
want to find highly profitable keywords that will
convert to sales.
First, do a search for all the various types of malware threats. This is what you
are likely to come up with:
Virus
Trojan
Adware
Browser hijacker
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17. Next, using a merging tool like www.mergewords.com, you will merge these two lists and produce
hundreds and even thousands of keywords that you can group into ad groups and bid on.
Next, make a list of all the adjectives and verbs that people will use to search as
they look for ways to remove malware. This is what you are likely to find:
Remove
Delete
Removal
Cleaner
And so on…
Remove Virus
Remove Trojan
Remove Adware
Remove Browser hijacker
Delete Virus
Delete Trojan
Delete Adware
Delete Browser hijacker
use pre-qualifier
and post-qualifier keywords
So, you could build hundreds and even thousands of keywords, like:
A tool that can help you combine your keyword lists is www.mergewords.com
This is effective keyword research and you will
find the results to be amazing. In fact, this is the
strategy that the best PPC experts use.
You can do this with your services or products
and you will easily beat the competition in your
reach, costs and profitability on AdWords.
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18. USE
“TARGET OUTRANK
COMPETITOR”
BID STRATEGY
07
Step

19. USE
“TARGET OUTRANK
COMPETITOR”
BID STRATEGY07
Step
Of all the competitor bid strategies, this is the
most important for countering your competitors
bid position strategy to achieve a higher position
in the ad results. Its one and only aim is to outbid
a specific competitor and achieve a better posi-
tion for keywords that you both appear in.
However, you can use this strategy to outbid all
competitors that are appearing for your search
terms and keywords by going after the rival that
appears at the top constantly.
You may know who this competitor is for your
niche by doing searches on Google for multiple
keywords, but you will do far better by checking
the auction insights report that shows you your
average position against your competitors for a
sample of your competitors.
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20. use “target outrank competitor”
bid strategy
Now, how accurate is this report? It’s very accurate actually, and I’ve seen amazing results, with many
clients achieving 1.0 positions within hours of implementing.
As mentioned earlier under the tip “set your bid strategy for success”, gaining top positions and position
1 to be exact is one effective way to increase leads and sales, and gain greater credibility. Websites that
are at the top generally are perceived to be better and to be more trusted.
And most people have a bias towards the site they visit first, and that becomes the benchmark for all
other sites they visit. Your competitors would often have to provide a much service offer to beat you on
customer acquisition if you are the advertiser that they visit first.
Also, most searchers will not look beyond position 3 and will request a quote or proposal from the top
2-3 advertisers only. So, make sure you are at the top and use the target outranking strategy to make
that happen.
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21. USE
AD COPY TO
PRE-QUALIFY
VISITORS
08
Step

22. USE
AD COPY TO
PRE-QUALIFY
VISITORS08
Step
Many adverts on Google are very vague about the benefits that potential customers get from their prod-
ucts or services. And that’s mostly because they talk features, features, features alone.
Features are basically what the product or service is, but benefits are what it does for the customer.
Everyone wants to know “what’s in for me”, and that should be explicit in all your ads.
Most services or products have really one big benefit that people are looking for, and tens or even
hundreds of features. So, you have very little character space in your ad to mention all the features, and
many people will click through just to learn more if you only talk features. Whereas, having that one big
benefit or two, if necessary, you will target the right audience and disqualify many others that could cost
you a lot from wasted clicks.
It helps to pre-qualify visitors and prevent non-potentials from clicking your ads out of curiosity. This will
save you a lot of money and will boost your ROI.
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23. OPTIMISE
LANDING PAGES
FOR SUCCESS
09
Step

24. USE
PRE-QUALIFIER AND
POST-QUALIFIER
KEYWORDS09
Step
Crafting great ads is one piece of the puzzle. You also need great landing pages that will convert visitors
to customers.
The reality though is that most advertisers fail miserably at creating a great user experience for visitors.
Do I have a call to action and is it ‘above the fold’?
What is my page and website loading time?
Is there a contact form to make it easier for people to contact (especially mobile visitors) – and
not just an email address?
Have I included all the benefits to cover all customer segments?
Is there a response mechanism at the end of the page that people can use after reading and
viewing the content?
Bad landing pages are evident in all kinds of ways:
High bounce rates
Poor quality scores
Low conversion rates
Low page engagement
Wasted spend
And the list goes on
Few returning visitors
There are many things to consider when setting up or reviewing landing pages,
including:
With well-crafted landing pages, you are well on your way to achieving
your lead targets.
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25. SETUP
A REMARKETING
CAMPAIGN
10
Step

26. 10
Step
SETUP
A REMARKETING
CAMPAIGN
Visitor
Your
Website
Visitor
Leaves
Visitor Return
To Your Site
Your Ad On
Other Sites
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27. If there is one area many advertisers are seeing mediocre results, this is it. Remarketing is usually an
afterthought, and no wonder it never brings in those all-important leads that it is capable for.
When you consider that over 90% of website visitors will not convert on their first visit, it becomes imper-
ative to have a solid strategy to retarget them and continue the conversation. You see, on average, a
person will visit a website at least 4 times before converting, and if you are only exposing them to one
advert and not retargeting them as they visit other platforms then you are missing a great trick.
Setting up remarketing is easier than ever, and this can be done in analytics and AdWords without
updating any code.
So there you have it. My 10 solid tips to end the “feast or famine” cycle and bring in a good, steady
stream of leads and enquiries all through the year.
Setup a remarketing
campaign
Author: Mike Ncube
Web: www.mikencube.co.uk
Email: info@mikencube.co.uk
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