When your biz is online it can be overwhelming trying to figure out how best to get your products in front of the right people, at the right time (with the right credit card details, am I right?)
With Google Ads there’s an extra layer of complexity because there are SO MANY different types of campaigns for you eComm legends, who no doubt have an amazing product to sell.
Understandably it’s easy to fall into the trap of wanting to try them all – or feeling so overwhelmed you don’t know where to start.
So, let’s cut straight to the chase.
This is the way you should prioritise your spend in Google Ads:
- Shopping ads – these are usually the best campaign types for eComm businesses. And, you don’t need to do any keyword research (which is a huge win). Shopping campaigns show your ads when someone has purchase intent, and is searching on Google for products like yours.
Make sure you have some great images and that your titles would make sense to someone who has never heard of you before (i.e. no fancy jargon or brand terms that don’t describe the product). - Search ads – which are the ads you’re probably most familiar with. Those text based ads that sit up the top of the Google search results page.
To effectively execute search ads you want to be targeting really relevant keywords, so that qualified traffic is coming through to your site (with the goal of placing an order, of course).
We also love “brand” campaigns which bid on your brand name. These are great for a couple of reasons; they protect you from competitors bidding on your name, display authority, allow you to control your messaging and also feed the Google machine with information about people who shop with you. - Display remarketing – getting back in front of people who have been to your site is generally considered a good thing but this will be a small portion of your ad account. First focus on nailing down your Shopping and search strategy, as these will be the bread and butter for eComm.
Sometimes with eComm brands remarketing works really well, and other times? We use it only when there’s a new collection drop or big promo happening.
You won’t necessarily know which camp you fall into until you try it but if remarketing doesn’t work for you, don’t stress.
And that’s it! The high level outline of what an eComm ad account looks like.
As you start to become more profitable with your ads, you can test out other things to see if there’s anything missing from your magic sauce (hello, YouTube).
But until then there’s no need to go all guns blazing in the hopes you randomly hit the target (spoiler alert – this strategy pretty much NEVER works).
This post is brought to you by Kaity Griffin, Google Ads whiz, Kardashian aficionado and kombucha lovin’ lady from Melbourne, Australia.
When she’s not wrangling two muddy kids, she’s knee deep in ads land, working with clients like Snuggle Hunny Kids and Kettle & Fire.
She also teaches businesses and marketers how to profitably use Google Ads so you can kiss goodbye overwhelm and tech-overload when it comes to running paid ads.
If this post has put a fire in your belly for Google Ads then you may be keen to check out Kaity’s signature 12 week Google Ads course, Profitable Promotion. The deets are here.