Management is a craft that is both universal, and unique. Managers must make decisions that protect their business and drive revenue. That said, one style of management is not necessarily better than any other. Unless, of course, the latter method simply doesn’t work. Regardless of how managers operate individually, experience teaches them how to make critical decisions that affect the long-term and day-to-day activities of their business. PPC management and online marketing is no exception. PPC and SEO managers work non-stop to keep their websites relevant and well ranked. That said, you’d be hard pressed to find a group of online marketing managers that do everything exactly the same. Like every other management position, they bring their own personal biases to the table. But can those biases have a negative impact when optimizing your website? Columnist Ben Middleton points out how biased habits affect PPC performance.
How Biased Habits Affect PPC Performance
Keeping with Tradition
Habits developed from years of experience tend to make people more efficient managers. With PPC and online marketing, however, those habits might actually work against you. Take Bing versus Google for example. Google tends to be the more popular target when it comes to SEO and PPC ad space. Part of that has to do with the difference in their universal event tracking (UET). The other part, however, stems from the assumption that Google carries more weight, and therefore should be given more attention. Limiting your efforts to only certain campaigns can, in the end, do you a disservice. Although Google definitely gets more traffic, failing to test Bing Ads when taking on new clients can seriously impact the traffic on your site.
Segment Campaigns by Match Type
As humans, we are never as open to change as we’d like to think we are. Once we find a comfortable way of doing things, we stick to it. Managers operate in the same way. For example, PPC managers either do, or do not segment ad groups by match type. That’s a decision that, as Middleton points out, likely stems from earlier on in their careers when they were still learning based on someone else’s own experience and biases. Whether you do or do not segment campaigns, try doing the opposite for a quarter and see if the change has any affect on your campaign. After all, it never hurts to try new things.
Formatting Ad Copy
How you write your ad copy plays a huge role in the success of your campaign. Some people KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid!) and others use very descriptive language. Unfortunately, like management itself, writing ad copy is a craft that has no universal formula. It requires constant testing, reworking, and more retesting to figure out what tends to work for your specific niche. Be sure to take your time and test out new copy that you write for Bing Ads and Adwords. You may not understand, or even like each ad that you write, but it’s important that you try and understand why it does or does not work.
Finally, always remember that your style of management is your own. As aforementioned, there is no universally correct way to run a PPC campaign. Take all the advice that you get at face value. Test it before you decide to fully dedicate to it, or implement it in your campaign.
