Every professional PPC company knows that lead generation PPC campaign performance can be hard to analyse as owners of lead generation business are not interested in direct sales that can be quantified, but are instead looking for new prospects that might become new customers after a trial period. However, I have some good news for you. PCC is actually a great tool for lead generation as you can appear on page one and be seen by people who are looking for what you offer. You just need to follow a few tips and avoid a few mistakes to get the best from your lead generation PPC campaign.
The first thing to define when starting a lead generation PPC campaign is the type of leads you are looking for. Are you expecting your prospects to fill in forms, download a whitepaper or subscribe to a newsletter? You should clearly define your potential leads and assign separate leads tracking to each of them.
Are you tracking your leads properly? To track form submissions, registration, or downloads on your website, you should create a separate ‘Thank You’ page on your website to which prospects will be redirected after performing the intended action. You’ll need to set up the tracking code on that Thank You page so that only real leads are counted. (If, in error, you set up the tracking code on the form submission page itself, it will count as a lead any visit on that page, whether or not visitors actually fill in the form). Another advantage of the Thank You page is that it can increase brand awareness since you can add information here about your products or services.
Track phone calls using Google forwarding number. Google provides a unique phone number that’s displayed with your ads. If a potential customer calls this phone number, AdWords will route the call to your business phone number. You’ll then be able to see detailed reports about calls generated from your ads.
So now you are getting leads but you shouldn’t stop there. Are those leads totally relevant? Many of them will be spam (customer support inquiries, personal phone calls or irrelevant requests). Analyse your phone calls and form inquiries and separate relevant leads from spam so you can optimise your PPC campaign accurately so you’re considering only relevant leads. Start using a CRM system to record who has contacted you and why.
Make it easy for prospects to reach you by displaying your phone number prominently. Use call extensions so your phone number appears in your ads. You could also try Click-to-Call ads or even provide live chat on your website.
You shouldn’t direct prospects to your home page but to a specific landing page. Prospects shouldn’t wonder whether they have arrived at the right website; your landing page should directly relate to your ad.
It should answer your customers’ questions.
Here are a few key points to keep in mind for your landing page:
And as for any PPC campaign, you should create different landing pages (change colour, invert messages) and test them to see which one works better.
Don’t forget that customers don’t like being surrounded and trapped by companies’ advertising messages. They are more and more aware of marketing and more and more reluctant to share information with companies that will end up sending them spam emails 7 days a week. Don’t expect them to share information with you just by asking (unless they really support your company and are convinced by your services, in which case they are most likely already your customers). Always give offers or rewards in exchange for information: whitepaper, download, discount, or free trial.
Along with your landing page, your ad copy should also be optimised. You should already identify and answer your customers’ needs in your ad texts so that there is a good chance they will click on it. Don’t forget to highlight any unique service you offer and include call to actions (with words such as ‘start’, ‘get a quote’, ‘call’, ‘download’ or ‘register’).
The number one rule for any PPC campaign applies to lead generation: only well-structured PPC campaigns will be highly performing with top quality scores, higher CTRs and lower CPCs. Organise your campaigns in tightly themed ad groups with relevant keywords, directing to relevant landing pages (ideally one customised landing page for each single ad group).