Supplementing Paid Search Advertising with Product Listing Ads
January 11, 2013
Product Listing Ads through Google AdWords and Merchant Center offer a great way to boost your click through and conversion rates, but they aren’t easy to set up and require a lot of information from you.
By now, most business owners are familiar with pay-per-click advertising using Google AdWords. Paid advertising on search engines allows a new business to appear on Google immediately while it builds up natural, organic popularity. It can also jump-start a stagnating business with fresh traffic that wouldn’t have otherwise found their way to the website.
Traditionally, AdWords was limited to paid search advertising in the guise of text ads that appear on the search engine and display ads which are either text or banner advertisements on Google’s network of advertising partner sites. These ads usually generate an approximate 1% click through rate. This means that out of every 1,000 people who see your ad, 10 of them will act upon the advertisement and choose to view your website.
Once a user arrives on your site, you will have to convince them to make the desired conversion through your web design, like a sale or a phone call. Let’s say that your conversion rate is 10% of those who land on your website. This means that out of 1,000 search engine visitors who see your ad, you’ll make 1 sale.
Up until now, we’ve been talking about ads that tell the user why they should buy your product or service. However, sales should be about showing rather than telling, and that’s exactly what Product Listing Ads do. They show search engine users exactly what they want to see so they can make a purchasing decision right there on Google. They are more likely to be further along in the buying process when they arrive on your website.
With Product Listing Ads, you can expect a much higher click through rate of around 3%. These 30 people of every 1,000 will have a better understanding of your product based on the image, description, and price included in the advertisement, and they will be more likely to buy from you once they arrive on your website. With the combined increase in click through and conversion rates, you could increase the number of conversions per 1,000 impressions by 5 or more times simply by running Product Listing Ads in conjunction with your existing text advertisements.
It’s easy to sell Product Listing Ads to a business that is already using AdWords, but the setup of these ads gets a little tricky. You’ll need to set up a Google Merchant Center account, add a snippet of code to your site in order to verify ownership, upload a product feed, sync your Merchant Center with AdWords, and create your Product Listing Ad campaign. You’ll also need to wait for Google to approve all your Product Listing Ads.
iOVA Communications has the expertise and experience to set up successful paid search advertising for your business using Product Listing Ads, along with management of your entire Pay Per Click campaign through both AdWords and Microsoft AdCenter to take advantage of Bing and Yahoo search engine users as well. Contact us today if you need any consultation or management work on your AdWords or Product Listing Ad campaigns!
