You’ve linked your AdWords account and your Google Analytics account. Well done! Now is your chance to explore how useful this can be. How might you apply information on customer website activity to improve your AdWords campaigns?
On AdWords: Columns > Modify Columns > Google Analytics > Add all Columns > Apply
Bounce Rate: This is the number of times visitors arrive on your landing page and leave without browsing. It’s an indicator of how relevant your ads are but also prompts the question: why are they leaving so quickly?
Percentage new sessions: This shows you which keywords are attracting new customers, allowing you to adapt your bid strategy accordingly. For example, if your goal is to create leads, you’ll want to know which keywords are attracting new prospects and which are attracting repeat customers. If your sales funnel is pretty long, you will be aiming to attract prospects more than once so you’ll want to know exactly which keywords they are using to find you. Information on new sessions is also useful in identifying keywords to compile a remarketing search list.
Pages per Session and Average session duration: Using this information you can tell how long your customer spent on your website and whether or not they found relevant information.
On Analytics: Admin > View > Goals > + New Goal
Why import goals? Firstly, doing so means you won’t have to implement a new AdWords Conversion Tracking Tag on your website; you can use your existing Analytics instead.
Secondly, it will allow you to create more specific goals. You might regard a customer who visits a particular page of your website as a conversion, but visit duration can also be deemed a conversion. If your customer spends more than a specified time on your website, or visits more than a specified number of pages, or takes an action, such as playing a video – these can all be regarded as conversions.
On Analytics: Admin > Property > Remarketing > Audiences
As with Goals, you can use an Analytics Tag as a remarketing tag, without having to implement a separate AdWords tag.
You will also be able to easily adjust your remarketing list according to audience, demographic, behaviour, time, and traffic source. By studying your audience on Analytics, you will be able to define precisely who your customers are and how they behave. You can easily find out what interests them and reach them with these topics.
Smart List: A Smart List is a remarketing list generated by Google Analytics to maximise your conversions. Google Analytics will use your data to discover which users are most likely to convert. You can use this list to reach a maximum number of prospects if you don’t have time to create your own customised remarketing list.
Auto Tag your ads: There is no need to add a tracking URL to your ad when you link your AdWords and Analytics. The information is automatically shared between the two Google products.
Segment User behaviour: This area of Analytics shows where your customer lands and where they leave. Why is this information helpful? Knowing where in the sales journey you’re losing customers will allow you to adapt your remarketing message. For example, if your customer leaves at the mention of delivery fees, knowing this will allow you to introduce a special offer on delivery when remarketing to that customer.
Acquisition report: Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is a way of using search engine advertising to generate clicks to your website. Using your acquisition report, you will be able to see where in your sales funnel PPC is most effective. Is it bringing customers? Are these new or repeat customers? Using these metrics, you can measure how your PPC campaigns are performing compared with other channels, and adapt your AdWords Budget accordingly.
Conversion report: Using this report, you can track how your customer reached a particular goal. Was PPC responsible for the first contact by the converted customer? Or was it responsible for the last one? How many channels did the customer use before converting?
For example, if you have a number of products, the conversion report can show what part PPC played at different stages of the sales funnel. If PPC played a big part in moving customers along the sales funnel for a particular product, you can adjust your budget for the ad group or keyword accordingly.
Find the keywords at the end of the funnel: This will pinpoint keywords that lead to conversions so that you can increase your bids on them. It also allows you to add relevant keywords to your campaigns instead of wasting money on generic keywords that are expensive and generate no return on investment.
In a nutshell, using Analytics helps you to accurately identify your audience. As a result, you can send out a more relevant message, and allocate your budget more effectively. Of course – as with all platforms – it’s up to us, the marketers, to transform insights from Google Analytics and AdWords into action and ultimately, profit.