Advantages of Bid Management Tools

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ROI bid management tools are by far the optimal choice for a tracking solution for do-it-yourself marketers. Why? Because they're exclusively designed for search engine advertising. These tools enable marketers to micromanage their paid listings while reducing the hours needed to improve their performance.

Paid Placement and Paid Inclusion Integration

Not only are their tools specific to paid listings, but some bid management firms help launch advertisers' campaigns on both PFP and Trusted Feed programs. Marketers specify the search engines to be included in their campaigns . Then, bid companies might assist with any or all parts of the campaign setup: keyword analysis, ad listing copywriting, and URL generation tracking (and web page optimization for Trusted Feed because remember, inclusion programs are for crawler-based search engines). This is in addition to optimizing the listings by adjusting bids (and subsequently your positions ).

Early Notification of Paid Listing Errors

Smile if this has happened to you ‚ you're running a keyword search in the search engines and spot your ad listing, or your client's. You know that it's not an expensive term so you click the ad listing to check it out. Um, it's a broken link. Or, it's pointing to the wrong landing page. Ok, you're not actually smiling; you're totally freaking out. How long has this been going on? How many wasted clicks did you, or your clients , pay for? Your stomach is turning like you're on the spinning tea cup ride at Disneyland. All is not well.

Sure, search engines might catch a broken link and send you an automated email identifying the problem listing. But unless you're checking an ROI report constantly, looking for good and bad spikes in CPA numbers , a paid listing error might go unnoticed for weeks. If you don't run an ROI reporting system in-house, a bid management tool with this feature enables you to spot anomalies immediately. Better still, if there's a broken link or other issue, a bid maximizing tool lowers the position of your listing because it won't be converting. You won't be burning cash paying for that #1 position. This is a solid cost-savings benefit for marketers who only periodically verify their campaign performance.

Tip

If you have access to web analytics reports , check your "404 error" data, which may indicate broken paid listings.


When I worked at an agency that enlisted Did-it.com's services, my Did-it.com representative emailed me after he noticed one of my client's weekend sales had plummeted. With a little investigation, I discovered that the client moved their web site to another agency a few days earlier. The tracking code wasn't in their new site's sales confirmation page; that's why no sales were being counted. Nobody at the agency I worked for was aware that this client planned to leave; the personal alert from Did-it.com revealed this. Sometimes, it takes both man and machine to detect advertising (and business) blunders.

Automated Bid Management Based on CPA Targets

What's the number one reason to hire a bid management solution with ROI optimization? Their solution adjusts your listings based on CPA goals. No search engine marketing campaign should be evaluated based on the number of clicks or the CPC rate. That's all rubbish. Unless you exclusively sell advertising on your web site and simply need "eyeballs," then your search engine marketing goal has little to do with traffic. It's about attaining new customers at the lowest cost-per-customer.

Would you like to buy keywords based on your customer acquisition cost targets? Well, you can. Using services offered by Did-it.com and GO TOAST, for example, you can set $15 as the most you're willing to pay in search engine fees for a sale. The bid and associated position for each ad listing will be increased or decreased based on the sales performance.

Keep in mind, though, that you might have to increase your CPA maximum if your position ends up being significantly lower than your competitors '. If your per-order goals are not high enough, your listing won't win a top spot ‚ or the bulk of the traffic. If $15 places you at position #11, perhaps increasing your allowable CPA to $20 means that your listing jumps into a Top 10 spot, delivering more traffic and subsequent sales. Don't increase your per-order goal if it's not profitable. Simply be aware that if you set an aggressive CPA number, your competition may force you to re-evaluate it.

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Search Engine Advertising. Buying Your Way to the Top to Increase Sales
Search Engine Advertising: Buying Your Way to the Top to Increase Sales (2nd Edition)
ISBN: 0321495993
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2004
Pages: 155

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