Bing Ads: definitely new and improved!

Bing Ads has recently implemented some key changes that make it more like Google AdWords. Although the company used to strive to differentiate itself from AdWords, they have been working for the past year to mimic Google’s platform more closely. In fact, you can now import your existing AdWords campaign into Bing Ads. Here are some reasons why you may want to run a PPC campaign on this platform.

An alternative to enhanced campaigns

When Google made a structural change for its enhanced campaigns, it created quite a stir among some marketers. Individuals running their campaign were forced to adapt to the structural change, and they lost an element of control as a result. In some cases, this led to a lower return on investment for companies, which understandably didn’t always sit well. Bing Ads differs because you can choose to use an enhanced campaign or stick with the old structure instead.

Higher return on investment

Since there are fewer users on Bing Ads, there is less competition. Consequently, they tend to be cheaper in almost every area, and you can expect to run your campaign for considerably less money than on AdWords. This means an attorney in New Hampshire, for example, can reach a reasonable percentage of their geographic demographic and achieve the highest possible return on investment.

New features

The top vs. other column feature shows where your ads are positioned and provides you with keyword performance reports. There is a learning series that helps beginners acclimate to Bing Ads and streamlines the educational process. Also, there is the search and filter in the opportunities tab that helps you optimize your campaigns on this platform.

These changes have brought about some definite improvements. However, it’s important to remember that Google still dominates the search market and is likely to for the foreseeable future. That’s why it’s ideal to experiment with different possibilities to produce the most return on your pay-per-click advertising efforts, whether that means running campaigns on one or two different engines.

The AdWords bulk upload feature can save you lots of time!

Google AdWords has released a new feature that allows website owners to save time working with multiple keywords. Lawyers and legal marketers can now add, remove and edit many different keywords at once.

This will enable Huntington, Indiana family law attorneys with PPC campaigns to make sweeping changes to their Google AdWords accounts without using other tools to upload and refine reports. With the new system, you can download a keyword report directly to your AdWords account and pause and unpause keywords as needed. You can also change the settings for particular keywords. For instance, you can change a set of phrases from broad match to exact match and then set bid values for all of those phrases at once.

How the new feature works

Bulk editing is achieved with spreadsheet functions and logic. You can download an editable keyword report by clicking the box that says “Editable” on the AdWords report download page. This provides you with a CSV, TSV or Excel document with information about each of your keywords. You can then make your changes in the spreadsheet by making changes to the “Action” column. Google has a keyword change upload guide with tips for how to make these changes.

Once you’ve made your changes, simply save the file and go back into Google AdWords. In the left navigation window, click the “Reports and uploads” link, then click the “Uploads” tab. You can then navigate to where the file is saved and upload it to deliver those changes to all the keywords in your AdWords account.

Limitations

Keep in mind that there is no way to cancel or reverse changes once you submit a bulk upload. You should therefore always save a copy of the original downloaded editable spreadsheet so that you can revert your changes if they don’t produce the results you were hoping for. The only other way to reverse changes is to go through line by line and manually change each keyword back.

Regardless of these limitations, the new bulk upload feature will save time for lawyers and legal marketers with comprehensive SEO strategies who want to more simply and effectively manage multiple keywords.

A quiet policy amendment in Google’s flagship advertising program stands to significantly change the Internet marketing efforts of legal professionals. Starting this month, Google will no longer approve paid-search AdWords ads that feature a telephone number. This could be a significant change for law firms and sole practitioners who are used to getting calls from prospects who respond to paid-search ads.

Google’s new pay-per-click (PPC) strategy

Although Google has stated that the AdWords policy change is meant to provide a clear, accurate and consistent experience for Internet searchers on desktop computers and mobile devices alike, the move seems to be geared towards maximizing the profit potential of each PPC ad. Google searchers looking for workers compensation lawyers in Sacramento will no longer see phone numbers on the paid search results; instead they will have the option to click on a button to either be connected to the PPC landing page or reveal the phone number.

If the searcher is using a smartphone, the call will be connected as long as the advertising law firm or attorney is using Google’s call extensions, which offer lawyers a way to track the effectiveness of their AdWords campaigns. If the searcher is using a desktop browser that lacks click-to-call functionality, the telephone number will be revealed with a click. Either way, the advertising attorney’s PPC budget will be charged for one click.

Although PPC AdWords campaigns are designed to drive traffic to websites, legal professionals often included their telephone number for the convenience of prospects who browse with the intent of speaking to someone at a law office; they enjoy not having to click through to get to get a phone number and they might even dial on the spot. This practice has been eliminated with Google’s policy change, although many searchers will also enjoy the click-to-call feature.

AdWords has long been a favorite analytics tool for legal marketers to use to determine the best keywords for PPC advertising and organic search content. Google recently updated the search terms report provided by AdWords to enable marketers to find groups of common search terms related to their particular field.

This update will prove to be invaluable and save lawyers a lot of time doing search term research. For instance, catastrophic injury lawyers can search for all the terms related to the phrase “wrongful death” and see how people are using that term as part of a larger keyword phrase. As most legal marketers know, longer search terms are becoming more widely used to target increasingly savvy Web searchers.

Seasonal advertising

This search term filter can also be used for seasonal advertising and content creation. For instance, taxes are going to be different for the 2013 year than for the 2012 year. As tax time approaches both this year and next year, tax lawyers can look up search terms like “2012 taxes” to see the specific questions people have on that topic. They can then target their advertising campaign to coincide with those questions around the tax filing deadline.

Content inspiration

This new feature may prove to be a useful inspirational tool for lawyers wondering what to write about in their next blog post. It helps legal professionals find out the specific personal injury queries for which people are trying to find information on Google. By tailoring the next blog post to meet the needs of searchers, your post will get more traffic and rank higher on SERP pages, exposing your blog to a larger audience of potential clients.

If you haven’t yet looked at the new search term filter feature on Google’s AdWords, give it a try today!

Google recently released Enhanced Campaigns to enable Internet marketers to target mobile devices within the same AdWords campaign. Certain ads might be better designed for smartphones and tablets, while others may work better for desktops and laptops. It has been heralded as a game-changer for companies such as law firms seeking to market to the rapidly growing mobile customer segment.

Things you might have missed

While many law firm marketers (and techy lawyers) are aware of the most common features of Enhanced Campaigns, there are several potential uses you may have missed. These include:

• Mobile app promotion — One of the frontiers for law firm marketing is the development of mobile apps. For instance, a Mobile child custody lawyer could market a custody management app to drive business to his firm. Enhanced Campaigns enables one-click installation of mobile apps from AdWords mobile advertisements. All you have to do is use the “App / digital content ad” option when setting up a new ad.
• Mobile conversion tracking — One of the better features of AdWords is that it comes with a built-in analytics tool to let you know how well your marketing campaign is doing. What you may not know is that Enhanced Campaigns does the same thing for mobile conversions. It features a wide variety of conversion data such as appointments or purchases made over the phone, leads generated on the phone and completed at the computer, app downloads, and more.
• Call extension scheduling — While you may know that you can place ads with click-to-call options for people using smartphones, you can also instruct Google to only place those ads during your firm’s business hours. Outside of business hours, the ads can provide links to your website or to send a message requesting more information. This is smarter advertising at work!

Enhanced Campaigns could be just what you or your firm needs to break into mobile advertising. To get a handle on the fastest-growing Internet marketing segment, give Enhanced Campaigns a try.

Expect to see more and more marketing campaigns incorporating paid social ads in 2013.

Recent studies indicate that paid social ads may be the next frontier for online marketing campaigns. Ever since Facebook and other sites have begun to improve their advertising focus, social media ads have been a key purchase for lawyers and legal marketing firms.

Like most online ads, social ads are based on each user’s recent search and browsing history. This means that they are targeted to your desired audience on Facebook or other social media sites. If you want to get in on the latest trend, be sure to take this recent Vizu study to heart.

Details from the study

The study from Vizu, a Nielsen company, is full of useful statistics indicating the rising prevalence of social ads in marketing campaigns, including:

• Social media is integrated by 51 percent of advertisers in offline marketing efforts. It is used by 66 percent of advertisers in online campaigns.
• Paid social ads are most commonly used in mobile (40 percent), video (46 percent) and online display (83 percent) media. Offline social-related ads are also used in print ads (52 percent) and in conjunction with TV campaigns (32 percent).
• According to the study, the primary purpose of social advertising was branding, with a 45 percent margin reported by surveyed participants. Whether you are a Brooklyn business lawyer or other legal professional, branding plays a critical role in improving customer awareness and helping your firm stand out.
• Only 16 percent of the surveyed respondents said that their campaigns were direct response related.

Where social ads are going

One concern for advertisers has to do with finding the proper metrics for measuring the success of social ads. While advertisers are still using them, the lack of uniform or effective tools to measure return on investment (ROI) prevents social ads from being a larger part of marketing campaigns.

While things like brand lift and sales lift are typically used as marketing metrics, current social ad online metrics include pins, likes and click-throughs, none of which are universally employed or effectively studied. Still, it is clear that social media is on the rise, and proper measurement tools must be put in place before it really takes off as a business marketing tool.

The Content Marketing Institute recently released an article with a helpful metaphor for two competing types of marketing. The article compares content marketing and SEO practices with buying a car or home and pay-per-click (PPC) practices with leasing a car or renting a home.

Buying vs. leasing — the basic metaphor

In the debate between buying and leasing marketing materials, content marketing consists of producing engaging blog posts, articles on other sites or other content to draw customers in and convince them that you are an expert in your field. On the other hand, PPC advertising consists of purchasing advertising space and paying each time someone uses it to get to your website.

When you use content marketing, you invest in the full content as well as its location or locations. As a business law attorney in Tulsa, you might, for instance, produce content about the legal implications of mergers or buyouts as part of your online marketing activity. You make a large up-front investment but don’t have to pay for it again. When you purchase PPC advertising, you are leasing space for your content. You pay significantly less for each customer to view your site, but you have to pay each time.

Benefits of buying and content marketing

When you buy, you create value for yourself that you can use again and again. The same page on your blog may generate new visitors on a regular basis. Once you’ve created that content marketing, you can use it as many times as you like. The main downside is that you have to invest the time and/or money in creating it. Another potential downside is that you have to invest in the webspace; when you make use of PPC, you can spread your content to a wide variety of sites across the Web.

Benefits of leasing and PPC

While it may seem that buying is always better, there are instances where PPC can be more effective. Because you don’t have to pay as much and because you are partially paying for the wider range of locations offered by PPC providers, you may be able to reach a wider audience. Similar to how you can often afford a better car on a temporary basis if you lease rather than purchase outright, you might get better results temporarily from PPC. However, if you are planning a long-term marketing campaign, content marketing is generally better.

Final thoughts

Experts recommend that you use both content marketing and PPC in your marketing efforts. Depending on your personal views toward buying and leasing, you might prefer one style over the other and focus more on that.

Learning the basics of impression share can help you hone your PPC campaign’s effectiveness.

Impression share is a new web marketing term that is used to describe the effectiveness of a PPC ad campaign. It is written as a percentage of the views that visitors have of your ads divided by the potential views across all all eligible traffic given your keywords and keyword information.

This information is useful for a number of reasons. You can use it to track how well your campaign is doing and where you need to improve. Impression share is just a number, but if you are an injury attorney in Tampa, you can conduct some analysis to dig into your impression share data and understand where you’re losing market share.

How to measure and improve impression share

Lost impression share is divided into two types of IS — IS due to budget and IS due to rank. There are several options you have if your impression share number is not high enough. You can:

• Research new keywords and expand to find new markets
• Expand your firm’s networks through social media
• Provide information in different languages
• Expand your reach to nearby counties and municipalities
• Audit ad copy for full approval to run from your AdWords or other PPC account
• Improve your advertising budget

Some of these options are more easily achievable than others. For instance, if you simply need to top up your AdWords account, you can do that with a single click. If you need to do keyword research, you may need to spend a little more time. Many of the tactics you can use to improve your search ranking can also be used to improve your impression share.

By thinking about your impression share, you can achieve a greater measure of control and improve your understanding of your market.