by The Universe is full of myths.
From the Milky Way to Planet Earth. From Rocket Science to Human Body. From Traditional Marketing to Digital Marketing
Perhaps you shouldn’t be surprised if I tell you that there are certain myths regarding PPC as well.
Today, PPC has emerged as a powerful tool in terms of increasing your website traffic, reaching out to the potential customers, increasing your ROI and the list goes on and on.
Despite fetching so many benefits, PPC is sometimes seen with a suspicious eye.
Many misconceptions revolve around its working, its benefits towards big, medium and small businesses.
Some misconceptions were cleared during the course of time.
But some misconceptions grew and took the form of myths which created confusion in the minds of marketers regarding PPC.
Here, we have revealed 10 myths about PPC so that your confusion is cleared away and you can better differentiate between a myth and a fact.
Myth No. 1: Being On The #1 Position Is The Most Profitable
This is not completely true.
No doubt that being on #1 position gives your ad the best visibility and maximum exposure.There can be more conversions while being in the #1 position.
However, this does not always happen.
[bctt tweet=”Being in the #1 position can actually cost you more than you think.” username=”adstriangle”]
You might end up spending more than what you are actually generating.
The first position brings in lots of searchers who are probably only searching and have no intention of making a purchase.
By clicking on your ad, which is by far the first ad in the SERP, they spend some part of your PPC budget and if they don’t convert, you have simply wasted that part.
If your business goal is to create brand awareness, doubtlessly being #1 is a great position.
But if you are more inclined towards making conversions, be a little cautious with the #1 position.
Also, keep experimenting with ad positions to see which position works best for you and lets you achieve all your desired business goals.
Myth No. 2: You Can Set and Forget The PPC
Unfortunately, many marketers think that they can create campaigns and ad groups, set bids, and budget, target keywords, make ads and simply walk away.
Sounds very easy, isn’t it?
But it is a big NO! NO!
[bctt tweet=”Repeating the fact that PPC is NOT a set and forget the thing.” username=”adstriangle”]
If you want to make the most of the investment that you are spending, you need to continuously monitor and test various elements of a PPC campaign rather than leaving all of it alone.
Make changes in the campaign as and when needed, target and test different ad copies, constantly monitor the ads and keyword performance, include negative keywords, adjust the bids.
Since the search engine algorithms are constantly changing, therefore, your ads also need to adjust according to it because only then you will stay in the competition.
Just because PPC requires dedicated time and effort, many businesses choose to outsource their business to PPC agencies that can devote proper time and effort to the management of PPC campaigns.
Myth No. 3: PPC Is Too Expensive
PPC can be expensive but not always.
Maybe there are times when things do not work out for you and you face a loss but that does not mean that you should never try it.
Maybe once or twice the cost of PPC was much more than your expectation, but that certainly does not mean that you are going to bear a loss every time.
You have to be patient and give PPC campaigns enough time to give you the exact results you are looking for.
[bctt tweet=”PPC is flexible and allows you to set maximum daily and monthly budget for your campaigns.” username=”adstriangle”]
After you set your budget, there are negligible chances of overspending unless you change your budget.
If some keywords are being too expensive, you can re-define the keywords and also adjust the bids accordingly.
By linking the keywords, ad copy and the landing pages, you can convert more and more visitors, thereby generating revenue and reducing cost.
You can also start targeting more specifically and make your PPC campaigns cost efficient.
Myth solved here is that you have full control over your budget and you are the only one who is going to decide over the ad spend.
Myth No. 4: No One Clicks On PPC Ads
Trust me on this if no one clicked on PPC ads, they would have drowned way before.
However, there are a lot of people who still believe that no one actually cares about PPC ads. And hence do not click on them.
There are millions of businesses at all levels (whether small, medium or large) that are associated with PPC advertising and hence are making huge profits.
And further, imagine Google that earns a large part of its revenue from PPC advertising.
Let me tell you that when a visitor clicks on a paid ad, the advertiser then has to pay Google an amount.
Therefore, Google would not have been one of the most profitable digital companies in the world hadn’t anybody clicked on PPC ads.
[bctt tweet=”Your ads won’t be ignored if they are directly relevant to your target audience.” username=”adstriangle”]
Many internet users do not know the difference between an organic ad and a paid ad, hence all the ads in Google receive clicks irrespective of it being an organic ad or a paid ad.
Myth No. 5: More Keywords Leads To Better Performance
Absolutely incorrect!
This is one of the most powerful myths that has created utter confusion regarding PPC among the marketers.
Having more keywords can certainly get you more impressions and clicks but it does not guarantee more conversions.
Do not forget the fact the ultimate goal of a PPC campaign is to generate more conversions rather than impressions and clicks.
Do not overstuff your campaigns with keywords. Measure the relevance of the keywords with respect to your business and then target the keywords.
Moreover overstuffing your campaigns with keywords will only burn out your budget without giving you much time to generate a satisfactory ROI.
Constantly measure the performance of your keywords and bid high for the top performing ones and bid low for the nonperforming ones.
[bctt tweet=”Ensure that you specifically create targeted ads that correlate with your target audience.” username=”adstriangle”]
After determining your business goals and marketing budget, control your keywords so that they are within the budget limit.
Myth No. 6: Test Ads All The Time
It is correct to test different elements of PPC campaigns to measure their performance. But testing all the time is not justified at all.
[bctt tweet=”You should always take your time to develop a testing plan.” username=”adstriangle”]
When you are testing your ads, decide beforehand whether you want to pause that particular ad or leave it running.
Also, give your ads a considerable amount of time to showcase their talent of attracting more visitors.
Just because a certain ad fails to attract visitors does not mean that it is useless.
There comes the time to test as to what factor is making it unattractive or what is the cause behind the ad not getting sufficient clicks.
Let your ad reach at least a score of 100 clicks before making any final change.
By this, you will get to know the true outlook of the best performing ad.
By being impatient and pausing an ad too early, you could possibly pause an ad that had a potential of getting outstanding results for you.
Myth No. 7: PPC Affects The Organic Position
The explanation for this one is pretty simple.
PPC has to do nothing with your organic position.
The traffic that is generated from the organic ranking is free while that generated from PPC campaigns is paid.
If your organic and PPC ads are super relevant to the search queries, then both your ads will be displayed by Google.
[bctt tweet=”PPC has no correlation with your SEO ranking either positively or negatively.” username=”adstriangle”]
Myth No. 8: PPC Is Not Required If Organic Rank Is High
Having a high organic rank is great however also having paid ads can double your results when it comes to increasing traffic and generating higher ROI.
A lot of people still have the mindset that PPC and SEO are enemies and work against each other.
The reality is little different. PPC and SEO work best when they are combined.
They result in increased visibility and exposure, gets more qualified traffic, maximizes the conversions.
It is obvious that free is better than making a payment for having your ads displayed.
But is it also important that your ads are displayed before the right target audience. And for this reason, you need to have PPC advertising even if your organic rank is high?
[bctt tweet=”With PPC you can target a broader range of keywords that widens your audience exposure.” username=”adstriangle”]
There are some people who would automatically neglect the paid ads and skip to organic ones and vice versa.
So having both the organic ranking and paid ads is the perfect combination to get your desired business results.
Myth No. 9: Google Is The Only Search Engine Worth Advertising On
Certainly not important.
Google is definitely a leader when it comes to PPC but it is NOT THE ONLY advertising platform.
Yahoo and Bing are other search engines that are worthy enough for PPC advertising.
Although a number of searches in Yahoo and Bing are relatively low than Google they clearly can not be ignored.
For some accounts, Yahoo and Bing have even worked better than Google in getting more conversions and generating higher ROI.
The Cost per Click in Bing is comparatively less as compared to Google.
This means that you can get a good amount of qualified traffic by spending less.
[bctt tweet=”You should at least give a trial shot to Yahoo and Bing in accordance with your PPC campaigns.” username=”adstriangle”]
And who knows you may get a surprise by their performance.
Myth No. 10: Turn Off The Account At Night As No One Is Searching For Them
Gone are the days when the customers were confined to opening hours of the day.
Online advertising can literally be done 24/7.
By only sticking to a particular time of the day, you could possibly lose a lot of traffic.
Switching off your accounts at night thinking that no one would be searching for it is a really bad idea as you certainly let go the potential customers.
Just because you are sleeping doesn’t mean your potential customers are also asleep.
You can use Google Analytics to see what are your peak times to show the ad.
Abide by that and schedule your PPC ads according to the peak times.
[bctt tweet=”While serving international customers, target them according to their time zones. ” username=”adstriangle”]
Given any reason, if you are inclined towards turning off your account, make sure that you conduct proper research are also backed by solid data.
As everybody knows that the internet is not restricted by hours and is 24/7 available, make sure to take full advantage of that.
Conclusion
Do not get deceived by these myths and be smart enough to get your PPC campaigns be productive for you.
I really hope that I’ve helped some of your confusions regarding PPC. And have also helped you to debunk the PPC myths that were the reason these confusions.