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This is the third post in a series on Pay-per-click advertising. Lots of our clients struggle to understand PPC so they can evaluate it as an investment, compare it to traditional advertising, figure out how it works, or sometimes just explain it to their boss. The explanations can get rather complex, so I decided to make a series of blog posts to help educate clients, readers, and anyone wanting to learn more. This is the third article in the Pay Per Click Advertising 101 series.
The Control Metrics – Measuring ROI
If it’s indeed about control and ROI, then the metrics are key to PPC. And they are. There are innumerable Web Analytics tools available to help you measure and analyze the activity on your website, but the easiest to start with (for free!) is Google Analytics. Anyone who wants their website to work for their business should use Google Analytics. If you’re running PPC ad campaigns, it’s a good place to start, and here are some key metrics to watch:
- What search terms are most effective at bringing traffic to your site?
- How effective is each of your ad copy/landing page variations:
- At getting people to click through to your site?
- At keeping them on the landing page long enough to do something?
- At getting them to take your desired actions?
- How much does a PPC ad cost you to run, per day/per month?
- How many new leads has it generated for your business?
- What is the value of a new lead to your business (and how much do you pay for a lead in other forms of advertising/marketing)?
- How much additional revenue does an average new lead generate for your business?
- How much additional revenue was generated by specific PPC ads?
This list is not exhaustive, as the combination of metrics you can track is endless. But when you collect the answers to the above questions, you’ll be able to answer the BIG QUESTION: have I achieved a positive return on my advertising investment? If so, you should be asking yourself another important question: “can I afford NOT to do PPC advertising for my business?”
Look for my next posting, Part 4 of the series on PPC Advertising, called “PPC Advertising – Using Your Results to Improve Your Business.” Any questions so far? Want to share your own experience? Feel free to leave a comment below.
