Is PPC worthwhile for a product with no search volume?
-
I'm working on a PPC campaign for a client who provides a luxury service. He has very little search volume in general, and there's one product that has no volume at all.
I'm wondering if it's worthwhile to run a campaign for this product using the general keywords. I estimate that 95% of the population has no intention of using our service and can't afford it even if they did.
For example, say we're a concierge doctor service. When people search for 'medical doctor' or 'medical treatment' they are looking for doctors, and we probably could help them, but they won't want us when they could go to the doctor's office down the street and pay a fraction of the price.
Obviously I'd tailor the keywords so it would be as relevant as possible.
Yay: If my ads are clear, then whoever clicks them is interested in my product, so my money is being well spent. I'll just have a very low CTR.
Nay: Spend the money on advertisement tailored to the target market, both people with existing interest, and those who would want it if they knew we existed.
Yay or nay?
-
Higher QS means you get more clicks for the same amount of money. Too many people accept automated suggestions to up the buy. They should focus on improved QS first. It's all a matter of well the trigger words, ads, and landing page relate to each other.
-
True, about Google Adwords. Although, that isn't my only source.
I can always run a test campaign just to see the number of impressions I get on the keywords I've designated as 'zero search volume'.
And why is QS so important?
-
Wow, I guess you're right. I'm gonna get started on moving heaven right about now.
Too bad, there are quite a few people between me and heaven.
Thanks for the in depth answer.
-
One challenge that you have is that insurance companies and medical groups already offer these services to control costs and direct patients to in-house services.
-
I say nay....at least for now...and at least on the basis of the limited information you were able to provide.
I have two clients in exactly this situation. Let's say one is in the health and wellness business and the other is in the gourmet food business.
I agree that tailored keywords are important. But I'd move heaven and earth on an organic search strategy for several months before even attempting PPC. By that I mean super-premium, high quality editorial content or interactive features -- and a handcrafted link-building strategy that targets MSM outlets. We're talking commissioning articles from established writers or paying for interactive apps.
I'd also encourage your client's very top execs to grovel for links from their partners, suppliers, clients. The idea that approval can happen at the "web guy" or even marketing dept. level is comical. You have to pretend you're just the "tech guy" -- even if the stategy is all yours. Then you fight like hell over "billing" -- a bit like Hollywood.
I'd also invest a lot of effort into reviews and recommendations, both on-site and on third party sites.
All that said, YMMV. It all depends on the industry and the client and the competitive landscape.
I have one client who offers a super-premieum service -- for whom I've implemented an Adwords cmpaign. The CTR is miniscule. So is the cost. ...about $9 a day. And it's paid off big.
But I just use the CPC as a supplement to other stuff. My overarching point is you should try other stuff first.
-
If your ads have a lot of impressions but low CTR then your keywords will end up having very low Quality Scores. I would try using keywords that are relevant to your business even if they have low search volumes. The AdWords keyword tool is not 100% correct and your business needs only those few who are looking for these special services.
Maybe a more thorough keyword analysis would reveal keywords that have slightly higher search volumes.
If you use more generic keywords and your ads show that your service is special then:
- your ads will have low CTR
- your keywords will have low Q.S.
- if users click on the ads but realise the difference on the website then your landing pages will have high Bounce Rates and we're back to low Q.S. again
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
PPC - Fixing the campaign so ads always rank in positions 1 - 3
Hi everyone, I have more of a SEO background than a PPC one so excuse me if this question seems simple. I have inherited a Google Adwords campaign and want to accomplish the following Fix the campaign so the ads only appear in positions 1 – 3. The campaign came with a relatively good structure. Is there some way I can fix the settings to accomplish this? Conversion rates are high but quality scores vary from 6 -10 Thanks
Paid Search Marketing | | Carla_Dawson0 -
PPC seems to have had a seriously negative impact on organic rankings?!?
We've been targeting a keyword on behalf of a client for the last few months. The page had good content and had been steadily climbing the rankings. It reached a position of #12 and then suddenly dropped off. Within 2 weeks it was out of the top 50 and is now around the 10th or 11th page (useless). This drop off matched exactly with the cleint switching on a low level PPC campaign, driving traffic from this specific keyword. The stats on this have shown a really high bounce rate (so we'll need to ask some other questions about content) - but could this be the reason that organic stats have taken a hammering? If Google associated people landing n that page from that keyword (even though its paid) as not finding relevant content, I'm assuming this could have a negative impact on the organic rank? Any Thoughts Welcome....!!!
Paid Search Marketing | | Purestone0 -
Does sitewide SEO affect PPC Quality Score?
When evaluating a PPC landing page for Quality Score, does Google evaluate the other pages that the landing page is linked to? For example, if we have a well optimized page on the site for "Widgets", can it outscore a well optimized PPC landing page that is isolated in a "disallow" directory with no links into or out of the page? I'm not sure if I am making myself clear...
Paid Search Marketing | | CsmBill0 -
Google Analytics Matched Search Query Not Working
On Google analytics for our clients when you check the Matched Search Query under Traffic Sources > Overview, it says "There is no data for this view.". I have Google searched it and i am not finding my answer to why this is not displaying my information. On my personal analytics account when i clicked on matched search query it displays exactly what the person searched when it trigered my adwords ad. I have no idea why this account doesn't display the same info when it appears to be setup in the same way. Example: If i am broad match targeting the keyword "outdoor sports", and someone searched "Canadian outdoor sports for kids" It would show exactly what they searched under Matched Search Query. Anyone know how to resolve this issue?
Paid Search Marketing | | VITALBGS0 -
PPC Landing Pages and Rel Canonical
Hi Mozzers! Our company has hundreds of PPC landing pages which are essentially request a quote forms. We also have a request a quote form on our website that is for regular traffic. Currently we just added the "noindex" meta tag to all our PPC landing pages, but I think we can improve this. Should we remove the "noindex" tag, and instead add a rel canonical link pointing to our "main" request a quote form? Thoughts?
Paid Search Marketing | | Travis-W0 -
SEOMOZ of PPC?
Hi The site I'd been following over the years last updated in May, so it's clearly not the authority it once was, I know there's a PPC post here about once a month but I was wondering where do the PPC brigade spend most of their time? My work is 50/50 atm but was once much more PPC focused, is there an SEOMOZ equiv. in the Paid Search world?
Paid Search Marketing | | xoffie0 -
Google PPC Quality Score (adventures in)
We have one keyword that brings our site the most visitors. This keyword is the brand name we carry. We have several years of tracking it in Adwords. For some extended time, this keyword [exact match] has averaged 19 cents per click, 2.7 average position, 4.5% click through, and a quality score of 7/10. We wanted more clicks. We could think of what was needed to increase the quality score. Sure, we could change the meta tag title and the adwords title to be the same as the single word keyword, but this would be less informative. We decided to keep these titles as phrases which include the brand name. First change we made: we increased the bid. After all, it was profitable for the two ads above us, right? We increased our bid from .50 to $1.50. Effect? Average position increased to 2.3 from 2.7. Click through increased from 4.5% to 4.9%. Cost per click went from .19 to .51. The incremental cost for each sale was......well really really high.....this didn't work. (oh, we rank #2 organically. Our organic CTR dropped from 3.2% to 2.9% with this change as well) Reversed back to where we were and decided to focus on the quality score. We realized that the keyword was part of an add group with about 20 other keywords. This word was important.....lets put it in it's own ad group. We then made an "exact" copy of the ad and started up a new ad group. Paused the old keyword. We very quickly realized that the quality score on this "same" keyword was now 4/10. That was odd....lets give it a few days......quality score drops to 3/10 and no longer qualifies for first page. What was different we wondered? AH! We capitalized the first letter of the word. Changing this took the quality score up to 6/10 instantly. hmmm, we thought capitalization didn't matter? Seems it did. We now wait to see where the quality score goes. Saga to continue....
Paid Search Marketing | | EugeneF0 -
PPC Billing
I'd like to add PPC as a service for my company. However I'm at a loss as to how to charge for it. I've received cold calls from those "SEO guys" charging $200 for PPC services. But I doubt that they're very profitable or even ethical. For you PPC guys, are you billing hourly on top of the campaign, and how are you outlining this for your customers? Thanks!
Paid Search Marketing | | WilliamBay0