best practices for testing ppc landing pages & ad copy

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Best Practices for Testing PPC Landing Pages & Ad Copy

June 20, 2012

Larry Kim, WordStream

Carlos Del Rio, Unbounce

• Introductions

• Speaker introductions

• Best Practices for A/B Testing Ad Copy

• Best Practices for A/B Testing Landing Pages

• Q&A

Today’s Agenda

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Take Part in Live Blogging on Twitter / Google+

• Include the hashtag #wsppcabtests in your Google+ status updates,Twitter tweets,, etc.

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Speaker Introductions

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• Carlos Del Rio

– Director of Conversion Analysis & Digital Strategy

– Co-author of User Driven Change: Give Them

What They Want and A Strategic Framework for

Emerging Media

• Larry Kim

– Founder, CTO, WordStream, Inc.

– Been doing PPC & SEO for 10 years

– 3 years ago, started WordStream

– Today we’re an industry-leading provider of a PPC

Management Platform and Keyword Research

Tools

– WordStream helps people get their website found

on the internet!

Let’s learn a little about you….

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Quick Poll

How long have you been involved with Search

Marketing?

o Less than 1 year

o 1-3 years

o 3-5 years

o 5+ years

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Quick Poll

How would you describe your Search Marketing

results?

o I’m new to Search Marketing

o Who knows – I don’t measure my results

o Disappointing – I expected so much more from PPC

o Satisfactory – I’m seeing return on my investment into

PPC

o Stellar – PPC is my most successful lead/traffic

generating channel

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Best Practices for A/B Testing Your Text Ads

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Advertiser A

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Advertiser A – 14% Click Through Rate

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Advertiser A – Avg. Quality Score of 8.8

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Advertiser B

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Advertiser B – 1.3% Click Through Rate

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Advertiser B – Avg. Quality Score 3.8

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• Why Advertiser B is Struggling and Why Advertiser A

is Rocking

• The purpose of Ad Text Optimization

• What’s a Good Click Through Rate?

• How to Optimize your Ads!

In My Ad Text Presentation You’ll Get:

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What is the Goal of Ad Text Optimization?

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• Should be to try to get the highest possible Click

Through Rate. Why?

• Google rewards high CTR on keywords/ads with:

– Higher AdRank (More Exposure)

– Lower Cost Per Click (Save Money)

– More impression share

• Google punishes ads that have low CTR on

keywords/ads.

The Purpose of Ad Text Optimization

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Example Relationship Between CPC and QS

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Example Relationship Between CPA & QS

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• What about Conversion Rates & Cost-Per-

Conversion?

– It’s also very important

– Carlos will talk about converting the your clicks into

conversions in just a few minutes!

The Purpose of Ad Text Optimization (Continued)

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What is a Good Click Through Rate (CTR) for my Ads?

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What’s a Good CTR for my Ads?

• It depends on your ad position, keyword selection,

and other factors.

• Lets talk about CTR benchmarks!

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• Baseline your performance

• A free, instant PPC audit in under a minute!

• Grades your AdWords account performance based on the 8 PPC metrics that really matter

• Compares how you’re doing against other accounts of similar size (monthly spend)

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Grade Yourself! http://www.wordstream.com/google-adwords

www.wordstream.com/google-adwords

Grade Your Click Through Rate!

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Grade Your Ads!

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OK, so now, how do I optimize my Ads?

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A Common Ad Text Misconception

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“Most people think they’ve tested 20 Google ads but

they really just tested 2 ads 10 different times.” – Dr.

Glenn Livingston (via Perry Marshall)

What Ad Text Optimization is Not

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Forrest vs. Leaves

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“Forrest”

• “Creative Stuff”

– Your Offer

– Your USP

– Your Guarantee

• “Technical Stuff”

– Campaign Structure

– Ad Extensions

– (etc.)

“Leaves”

• Grammar

– Punctuation

– Capitalization

– Spelling

Our Focus for

Today!

Ad Text Optimization: Creative Stuff

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Ad Text Example

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1. Urgent

2. Unique

3. Useful

4. Ultra- Specific

Example

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Example #1

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Example # 2

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3 Tips on How To Figure out your USP / Offer

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Ask your customers!

• What is your #1 question about ____?

• What caused you to look for ____ today?

• What would you like us to help you with today?

Bob Bly’s Four U’s of Great Ads:

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1. Urgent

2. Unique

3. Useful

4. Ultra- Specific

Ad Text Optimization: Technical Stuff

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– Use specific keywords and negative keywords

– Group together closely related keywords

– Write relevant text ads and destination pages

– Repeat! (But this is actually a lot of work, so leverage software for this!)

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Organization impacts Click Through Rate & Quality Score

Use Specific Mid Tail Keywords

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Use Negative Keywords

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Group and Organize Your Keyword List

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Follow Technical Best Practices

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Leverage Ad Extensions – Pimp Your PPC Ads!

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Put it into practice

1. Capture your baseline (grade your account)

2. Identify under performing ads

3. Select one or two and replace with new copy

4. Wait…

5. Measure,

6. Repeat!!!

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Summary

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• Successful Ad Text Optimization is a combination of

3 things:

– Communicating your USP/Offer/Guarantee in a way

that stands out in a big way!

– Using all the technical best practices, like keyword

selection, segmentation, and use of advanced

features like ad extensions.

– Build it into your process!

Best Practices for A/B testing Landing Pages

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What ALL Good Landing Pages Have

1.) Headline

Buy Xena Warrior Princess Chakram

2.) Demonstration

3.) Value

4.) Support

Wow! The free shipping got her in two days!

- Happy McCustomer

5.) Action

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What That Might Look Like

1. Unique value proposition in a

concise headline

2. Image/video showing context

of use

3. Core benefit statement

4. Request for data (and fair

value item in exchange)

5. Strong Call to Action

6. Trust elements

7. Social Sharing Devices

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Start With Brainstorming

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Then Design

Include Everything Anyone Could Want

Refine

Test

Base Variations

Celebrate?!

Base -20% -32% -1%

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Now What?!

Call In The Reserves

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Brainstorm

Redeploy

Okay, Now Celebrate!

Base 25% -1% 31%

Content Test

Base Medium Short

Headline Test

Base

VS.

Button CTA Test

Base

VS.

VS.

No Button

Generation 3

27% 35% 74%

Base Conversion: 10% Final Conversion: 17.4%

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The Process

Phase One

Brainstorm Content

Design and Write

Create More Content Than You Need

Create Control Page

Create Variations

Test

Phase 2 and On

Analyze Your Results

Choose New Control

Revise Variations

Test Again

Things to Test

Headline

Call to Action

Large Images

Length of Content

Special Offers

• Unbounce

– 30 day free trial

– 50% off for 3 months with promo code WSwebinar503

– Get started at http://try.unbounce.com/with-wordstream/

• WordStream

– Grade your account

– Then get a free account assessment with one of our Search experts

– We’ll help you identify missed opportunities and more

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Thank you for attending Unbounce and WordStream’s webinar on:

How to Use Killer Landing Pages to Get Better PPC Results.

#wsppcabtests

Evaluate your text ads today!

http://www.wordstream.com/google-adwords

Learn more about Unbounce:

http://try.unbounce.com/with-wordstream Or contact us directly:

Carlos del Rio

carlos@unbounce.com

Larry Kim

lkim@wordstream.com

Your Questions

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