7 Wrong ASSumptions About PPC (Pay-Per-Click) Advertising

When we consult with small businesses and nonprofits, the mere mention of Pay-Per-Click Advertising (PPC) as an option is almost always met with a handful of wrong assumptions about PPC and why they shouldn't/couldn't/wouldn't think about, including:

1. It's too expensive
2. We don't sell/accept donations directly through our website
3. Our process for closing a sale can take months
4. Our target market is very small
5. I can't compete with larger advertisers
6. No one clicks those ads
7. It's too time-consuming and complicated

1. It's too expensive

False...Next.

Just kidding... but really, it's not too expensive.

• Your Budget Is Your Decision, $100? $1,000? $10,000? You decide.

• You decide exactly how much to spend, right down to a daily basis
• When you reach the end of your budget for the day/week/month, the ads simply stop showing, so you do not incur any more charges
• You decide on how much to bid on a keyword or phrase
• You likely spend more on newspaper, trade show, direct mail, radio, etc... than you need to spend on PPC to get better results!!

Cheap & Measurable Compared To Traditional Media Choices

Have you looked at your other media expenditures (newspaper, radio, trade shows, direct mail, etc...) lately? You pay the newspaper whether someone reading the paper sees your ad or not. You pay the radio station whether someone hears/pays any attention to your ad or not. You pay graphic designer, printer, and post office whether someone reads your direct mail offer or not.

With PPC, you ONLY PAY when SOMEONE CLICKS your ad and ends up on your website. The rest of the time that your ad is shown, you are getting FREE visibility (impressions). Imagine if you only had to pay the newspaper when someone clipped and brought in one of your coupons!!

When compared to other marketing methods, pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is easily the most transparent with the abundance of data available. With PPC advertising, we can tell whether the spend on a single click was fruitful in getting a client/customer/donor to take the desired action. There're no print deadlines, and we can change your ad, second-by-second if need be.

Example Client Story

We work with a VERY small business client that was spending roughly $900 per month on newspaper and radio advertising for their store with everything from big coupon call-outs to FREE offers. After 6 months of advertising, they only redeemed 1 coupon. Is it possible that others saw the advertisement and were driven to the store? Sure! How can you tell though? You can't, effectively anyways. That means you don't really know how effective your advertising investment was. That stinks! After 6 months, they had spent $5,400.00 on advertising and got one confirmed sale from it. No bueno!

They have since gutted their traditional advertising budget in favor of web marketing tactics, including PPC. It's been more effective and less expensive! That's a win-win.

2. We don't sell/accept donations directly through our website

Does your newspaper ad accept credit cards when a prospect sees your special sale? Of course not! Does your mailer auto-fill your prospective donor's contact details and walk to the mailbox? Nope!

While a conversion such as a purchase or donation are the most obvious ones that come to mind. They most certainly are not the be-all, end-all! Would it be beneficial to get a prospect's email address to stay in front of them? Would it be a good 1st step to have a prospect contact you to get the ball rolling? Would it be useful to get a prospect to Like you on Facebook, Follow you on Twitter, Circle you on Google+, or Follow/Connect with you on LinkedIn? Would it be helpful to offer a digital resource in exchange for a prospect's contact information?

If you don't sell/accept donations directly on your website, have to think beyond the sale, and think of how you can nurture a prospect into buying over time.

3. Our process for closing a sale can take months

Your's too? Guess what, you can/should still start this process online, through PPC. PPC can get the leads through the door to your salespeople, so they can begin that long sales process. You may even find that your website can be used to trim the fat on your sales process and close deals sooner.

Example Client Story

One of our powdered metal manufacturing clients makes components that require a lot of back and forth between the buyer and their in-house engineers. Through Pay-Per-Click and an online quote request form, this client can get the ball rolling much faster by asking for all of the required information on the quote form. It's also less invasive to the prospect, so they are much more likely to fill out the form, versus pick up the phone and call.

4. Our target market is very small

All the better for your budget! Traditional marketing methods tend to blanket a large group of people. Direct mail may work, but you are forcing your way in front of the prospect. PPC puts you in front of the buyer when they want to see you. All without any mind-reading powers needed!!

Additionally, a small market means you can reduce your budget considerably. If you have a small, select group of buyers you can use the sophisticated targeting tools hone in on only your true prospects. Parameters such as demographics, location, and interests. If you know that the bulk of your prospects are in Detroit, Michigan, we can target only that area of the country, or have a higher level of investment in that area of the country.

Example Client Story

We have an immediate care client with locations around the country. This client's prospects are looking for an urgent care facility near their current location. Showing an ad to an urgent care facility 1,000 miles away doesn't make much sense.

With this client, we can use each of their facilities as center points and only show ads to folks that are within a 10 mile radius. Because we are only showing the ads to prospects within this small geographic area, the PPC budget doesn't need to be very high.

5. We can't compete with larger companies' advertising budgets

That's why you HAVE to make your ad-spending count and know exactly what you're spending, and exactly what's coming in as sales because of it. Additionally, as a smaller nonprofit or business, you are typically much more agile when it comes to making changes to your marketing efforts. It shouldn't take months to make changes to your website or ads.

Because your cost-per-click for keywords and phrases is not based solely on what your competitors are willing to pay for the same keywords and phrases, you can actually spend less and rank above your competitors. This is because Google evaluates your campaigns, adgroups, keywords/phrases, their corresponding ad-copy and the page that the ad directs a user to produce a quality score for each ad. If your quality score is higher than your competitors', you can pay less than they pay, but still have your ad rank above theirs.

Often larger companies have so many keywords/phrases that they are paying for that they don't manage their accounts as well as we are able to. When it comes to getting the best bang for your buck, we are specialists! We know what it's like to watch every dollar spent on marketing to ensure it is being used as frugally as possible.

Example Client Story

We have an education client that wanted to advertise in a big-name national magazine, so they took out 2, full-page ads in the magazine and spent over $100,000.00 to do so. How many leads did they get from that huge investment? Not 1,000, not 500, not 100, not 50, and not 1. They didn't get a single lead from their investment. They now focus their marketing investments online with much better results. Many small business and nonprofits do this same thing on a much smaller level in local magazines or newspapers with the same or similar results. The newspaper or magazine will make claims about brand awareness and the average number of times someone needs to see an ad to take action, encourage you to stay the course. While there certainly can be truth to some of what they pitch, most of our clients want to see immediate results.

6. No one clicks on those ads

False. Just because YOU don't click them, doesn't mean no one clicks them. If no one clicked those ads, Google wouldn't be the behemoth that they are. You may need to just trust us on this. They clicked, A LOT! That means you get excellent quality visitors to your site, A LOT!

7. It's too complicated and time-consuming

It doesn't have to be. Especially if you enlist the help of professionals like us. We do the keyword/phrase research, build out your complete campaigns and manage budget for you. You sit back and take orders or donations!!

Comment Below With Your Yeah, Buts... :)

We'd be happy to discuss any questions you have. Feel free to drop us a line in the comments or give us a shout!