Unlocking the power of PPC Services

PPC services are services providing assistance with any pay-per-click platform.

What are PPC services?

PPC can be misconstrued as solely applying to paid search, however, paid social advertising is also a pay-per-click model. The pay-per-click model is a form of online advertising where businesses only pay if their ad is clicked. It is essentially a way of buying visits to your site.

Key Components of PPC Services

Key components of PPC marketing services include:

Keyword research (for paid search channels).
Campaign set-up.
Bid management.
Ad creation.
Landing page optimisation.
A/B testing.
Remarketing.

To run really successful campaigns you should be doing all of these on your PPC platforms.

Why Invest in PPC Services?

PPC has faster visibility and can act faster to get clicks to the site. In the instance of getting clicks quickly to a site, PPC can be more cost-effective as it is not as heavy a time investment compared to SEO. PPC services can complement a strong SEO strategy. Whilst an SEO strategy is being finalised, PPC can be up and running and finding additional keywords that get you those clicks. Understanding the value of PPC and SEO together can maximise a website's visibility and overall performance.
PPC can go further than clicks to the site and can be optimised for conversions, cost-per-lead, conversion value, or even return on ad spend, so it can be a good investment whatever your goal.
Also, as you only pay for clicks, if users don’t click, you don’t pay. However, having your ads appear can also work as brand awareness when appearing as display ads or appearing for generic search terms.
PPC also allows you to compete against other brands, increasing your market share and allowing you to stay competitive.

Investing in PPC services can help you scale your business in a manageable way. Unlike more traditional forms of advertising where you have little to no control over how many people see your ad and interact with it, with PPC you can target and manage the number of people who see, click, and convert from your ad. So it’s not too much and not too little, getting the “just right” amount. Having more control assists in helping to grow your business in a manageable and sustainable way.

Pros and cons to PPC

The pros of PPC include its precise targeting through keywords and audiences, so you are seen where you want to be:

PPC is flexible, and you can change targeting and budget easily.
You also only pay for performance, as you only pay for clicks.
Google also enacts fewer changes or less drastic changes to its paid ad space, in comparison to SEO.
In comparison to more traditional forms of advertising as well as SEO, PPC services are quick to set up, which allows for speedy results.
With PPC marketing services, all you really need to do is approve the ad copy and keywords, there is no need for costly or expensive creatives.
Ads can be changed easily, without much impact on what you pay or additional internal costs.

The cons of PPC are that you are at the whim of Google's CPCs and advertising rules:

You are only really liable to Google’s CPC changes, which recently have been reported to have increased by up to 13% year on year.
PPC requires continuous spending. Once the budget is depleted, the ads stop running, leading to an immediate drop in traffic.
Successful PPC management often requires specialised knowledge and skills. Without expertise, businesses may struggle to optimise their campaigns, leading to a waste of budget.
Competitors or malicious actors can deliberately click on your ads without any intention of making a purchase, leading to wasted ad spend. While platforms like Google Ads have measures to detect and prevent click fraud, you could mitigate this risk by considering IP blocking.
Text-based search ads offer limited interaction compared to more immersive content marketing strategies like videos or interactive social media posts.

Using a digital agency vs PPC agency or company

Marketing should be holistic; therefore, working with a digital agency has benefits over working with a PPC-exclusive agency. It allows for cohesivity over all marketing streams and channels, which helps to create stronger brand recognition and thus a sturdier brand. Rather than a business that solely focuses on pay-per-click management services only, which can be siloed from what you or your other agencies are doing. Digital agencies can also help with landing page requirements and website improvements which are necessary for a PPC campaign to perform well.

A digital agency can work better than in-house marketing teams as it is expensive to hire experts in every marketing field, so companies often can’t and then have to suffer. Digital agencies can hire experts in every field of marketing, and companies can almost rent out the amount of marketing time they need from these experts to make it more cost-effective for them. Digital agency staff are hired for their expertise, so keep up to date with the latest developments in marketing. Hiring a digital agency can allow you to focus on being experts in your industry. The combination of your industry expertise and a digital agency can make for a really powerful partnership.

Case Study: Cambium

The Cambium Group was faced with many challenges due to the wedding industry crisis during Covid-19 which reduced search volume and overall wedding gift lists interest significantly.

Through their research and analysis, our acquisition team advised and targeted a niche audience of engaged couples to achieve high conversion rates via paid social strategies.

Our advisory collaboration has helped their brands see a 50% rise in PPC generated registrations and 468% increase in social registrations. Read the full case study to uncover the strategy behind the success.

Considerations

PPC is right for you if you want fast, actionable results.
PPC can be a good first step into marketing due to its low costs and controllability.
PPC works especially well if you have a good understanding of your customers and audience.
PPC can provide results without the long-term investment of hiring staff.
However, you should eventually consider a holistic approach across all marketing channels to improve efforts.