Google Ads Management

Make Google Work For You

Google Ads (formerly Google AdWords) is an online advertising solution that allows you to promote your products or services on Google Search, and through video with YouTube. Done right your business will show up on the search engine results page (SERP) at the moment your ideal customers are looking for products and services like yours. You are in charge of your daily budget spend with Google, by choosing what you wish to pay when someone clicks on your ad.

- Search Ads

The most common paid ad type, it's the ads that show at the top of a search results page on Google, although such ads are labelled as such, it's not always obvious, the results are visually not much different to organic search results. Using "keywords", you can use Google Search Ads to reach potential customers who are searching for a specific product or service. Even for a business that already dominates the organic search results for their brand name, the paid ad results will appear first on the page, making it pretty much essential to at least be bidding for keywords containing your brand name. Because if you don't, your competitor might well do so, thus taking business that could and should be yours.

- Mobile Ads

With over 60% of users accessing the internet on a mobile device, including searching for products or services, ensuring that your Google Ads are mobile compatible is more important that ever before. Mobile ads come in multiple formats, including text and image ads designed to be user-friendly on smaller screens. You can also run “call-only” ads that prominently feature your business’s phone number, encouraging people to call you with one click. Mobile ads are your ticket to appearing in front of people who are already on the go, looking for information, and often showing intent to make a purchase NOW.

- Display Ads & Image Extensions

Display ads can help you promote your business when people are browsing online, watching YouTube videos, checking Gmail, or using mobile devices and apps. Including visual content is a powerful way of promoting a brand, and display ads are generally much cheaper than those targeting the search results page. Image extensions, and in some cases video, can be incorporated into standard search ads to improve the visual impact, important in a competitive space, where standing out can mean the difference between success or failure.

- Video Ads

With Video ads, you can define what action you want people to take, such as visiting your website, or your YouTube channel. You can choose who you want to see your video ads, which will appear before, during, or next to related videos or in search results, based on location, interests, and a variety of other factors. You only pay when someone chooses to watch at least 30 seconds, views the entire ad, or engages with your ad like clicking to call you or to visit your website. Here are a 2 good reasons to consider video ads: YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine after Google, with 30 million users watching 5 billion videos every day. And 70% of viewers bought from a brand after seeing it on YouTube.

- Shopping Ads

Google shopping ads allow you to sell products to the shoppers who matter most, the ones looking for what you offer NOW, whether they’re at home, on the go, or in-store. You’ll only pay when they click through to your website or view your local inventory. You’ve probably seen Google Shopping Ads in the past, they often appear within a search query for a product in Google. Here’s an example of how such ads might appear, when looking to buy “Jordan sneakers.” It's necessary to sign up for a Google Merchant account in order to set an online shop, so it's a little more complex than the methods described so far, but for the right product it can be hugely profitable.

- Measurement

Of course, without measurement, all the effort and expense doesn't count for much. It's essential to know what visitors to your site are doing and how they interact, especially if you are paying for them to visit. Correctly linking your website and your Google Ads with Google Analytics makes it possible to do just that. Tracking where your visitors came from, which ad they clicked, which keyword they typed into Google to find your site, which pages they visited and whether they actually buy something or make contact with you is all possible when it's correctly set up.

I've been managing Google Ads and Google Analytics for years, and was one of the first individuals to be certified as a Google Ads Professional in South Africa. I'll make sure that you reach exactly the right customer for your product, at the right time and in the right place.