What Is PPC? Digging Into Pay-Per-Click Marketing

Whether you’re new to PPC marketing and want to learn more or already have plans to use PPC to promote your business but don’t know where to begin, you’ve come to the right place! Welcome to PPC University, a comprehensive series of guided courses designed to teach you everything you need to know about PPC and how to make it work for your business.

Already using Google Ads for PPC? Find out if you’re optimizing your campaigns effectively with duPont Registry Digital.

What is PPC?

PPC stands for pay-per-click, a digital advertising model where advertisers pay a fee each time their ads are clicked. Essentially, you’re paying for targeted visits to your website, landing page, or app. When done correctly, the cost per click is minimal compared to the value derived from the click. For example, if you pay $3 for a click that results in a $300 sale, you’ve made a significant profit.

PPC ads come in various formats, including text, images, videos, or a combination. They can appear on search engines, websites, social media platforms, and more.

Search engine advertising, also known as paid search or search engine marketing, is one of the most popular forms of PPC. It allows advertisers to bid for ad placement in a search engine’s sponsored links when someone performs a search related to their business offering. For instance, if we bid on the keyword “Google ads audit,” our ad for our free Google Ads Performance Grader may appear on the search engine results page (SERP) for that specific search or a related one.

We’ll cover more about search ads shortly.

How does PPC advertising work?

While PPC advertising varies across platforms, the general process is as follows:

1. Choose your campaign type based on your objective.

2. Refine your settings and targeting, including audiences, devices, locations, and schedule.

3. Set your budget and bidding strategy.

4. Input your destination URL (landing page).

5. Create your ad.

Once your ad is live, its placement, timing, and cost per click are determined algorithmically based on your budget, bid, campaign settings, and the quality and relevance of your ad. Platforms offering PPC advertising reward advertisers who create relevant and trustworthy pay-per-click campaigns with higher ad positions and lower costs.

To maximize your profits from PPC, it’s essential to learn how to do it right.

What is Google Ads?

Google Ads is the most widely used PPC advertising system worldwide. It enables businesses to create ads that appear on Google’s search engine and other Google properties. Each time a search is initiated, Google selects a set of winning ads from its pool of ads to display on the search engine results page.

The “winners” are determined based on several factors, including the content, page quality and relevance of their keywords and ad campaigns, as well as the bid amount. We’ll explain this further in the next section.

How PPC works in Google Ads

When advertisers create an ad, they select a set of keywords to target and place bids on each keyword. For instance, if you bid on the keyword “pet adoption,” you’re indicating to Google that you want your ad to appear for searches related to pet adoption (learn more about keyword match types here).

Google utilizes formulas and an auction-style process to determine which ads appear for a given search. If your ad enters the auction, it receives a Quality Score ranging from one to 10, based on the ad’s relevance to the keyword, expected click-through rate, and landing page quality.

Your Quality Score is then multiplied by your maximum bid (the highest amount you’re willing to pay for a click) to determine your Ad Rank. The ads with the highest Ad Rank scores are the ones that get displayed.

This system allows winning advertisers to reach potential customers at a cost that fits their budget. It operates like an auction.

How to do PPC with Google Ads

Utilizing Google Ads for PPC marketing is highly valuable because Google, as the dominant search engine, generates massive amounts of traffic, resulting in numerous impressions and clicks on your ads. The frequency of your PPC ads appearing depends on the keywords and match types you select. While success in your PPC advertising campaign depends on several factors, you can achieve significant results by following these steps:

1. Bid on relevant keywords: Develop comprehensive PPC keyword lists, organize them into targeted groups, and craft compelling ad text.

2. Focus on landing page quality: Create optimized landing pages with persuasive, relevant content, and clear call-to-action tailored to specific search queries.

3. Improve your Quality Score: Google’s rating of the quality and relevance of your keywords, landing pages, and PPC campaigns. Higher Quality Scores result in more ad clicks at lower costs.

4. Capture attention: Engaging ad copy is crucial. If you’re running display or social ads, eye-catching creative is also important.

How to conduct effective PPC keyword research

Keyword research for PPC can be time-consuming but essential. Your entire PPC campaign revolves around keywords, and successful Google Ads advertisers continuously expand and refine their PPC keyword lists. If you only conduct keyword research once, when launching your first campaign, you’re likely missing out on valuable long-tail keywords that are low-cost, highly relevant, and capable of driving significant traffic to your site.

Check out our comprehensive guide to keyword research here. In summary, an effective PPC keyword list should be:

1. Relevant: Your bid keywords should closely relate to the offerings you sell, ensuring clicks have a high chance of converting.

2. Exhaustive: Include not only popular and frequently searched terms in your niche but also long-tail keywords. These specific and less common keywords account for a majority of search-driven traffic. Additionally, they are less competitive and, therefore, less expensive.

3. Expansive: PPC is an iterative process. Continually refine and expand your campaigns, creating an environment where your keyword list constantly grows and adapts.

To discover high-volume, industry-specific keywords for your PPC campaigns, use duPont Registry Digital SEO services to find keywords for your PPC campaigns.

Managing your PPC campaigns

After setting up your campaigns, regular management is crucial for maintaining their effectiveness. Active account management is a strong predictor of campaign success.

Continuously analyze your account’s performance and make the following adjustments to optimize your campaigns:

1. Continuously add PPC Keywords: Expand the reach of your campaigns by adding relevant keywords to your PPC strategy.

2. Add negative keywords: Exclude non-converting terms as negative keywords to enhance campaign relevancy and reduce wasted spending.

3. Review costly PPC keywords: Evaluate expensive, under-performing keywords and disable them if necessary.

4. Refine landing pages: Tailor the content and call to action on your landing pages to align with specific search queries, boosting conversion rates. Avoid sending all your traffic to the same page.

5. Split ad groups: Improve click-through rates (CTR) and Quality Scores by dividing ad groups into smaller, more relevant segments. This approach helps create targeted ad text and landing pages. Learn more about account structure here.

Get started with PPC

Ready to begin your PPC journey? Learn how to set up a Google Ads account with duPont Registry Digital.

If you already have a Google Ads account, we recommend using our services to identify areas for improvement. In just a few days, you’ll receive a customized report analyzing your performance in key areas, including click-through rate, Quality Score, and account activity.