Writing outstanding ad copy for pay-per-click advertising
campaigns is critical if a webmaster wants to be successful.
Why waste money on clicks from people who aren't going to buy
what a webmaster has to sell? To be as targeted as possible
descriptive titles and effective ad copy are needed. Since the
webmaster is paying for each click it's very important to have
ad copy which conveys the right message to the right person.
The challenge is the small area available from most advertising
networks like Google (AdWords) or Yahoo! (Overture).
Successful PPC advertising campaigns should be made of at least
3-4 different versions of an ad for the same product.
Advertising via PPC is not a "one size fits all" procedure. A
webmaster should make sure he/she defines the right target
groups before getting into the process of writing the ad copy.
Studies have shown that if important keywords are included in
the ad title and the body the conversion rate is going to be
higher. This is going to be a challenge in many cases as the
ads in pay-per-click search engines offer limited space. Google
AdWords as an example allows for the following character limits"
Headline = 25 characters
Line 1 = 35 characters
Line 2 = 35 characters
Display URL = 35 characters
Other advertising networks have very similar limitations in
place. The art of writing successful ads is also the art of
fitting a message into these limits. The key to writing
successful PPC ad copy is to write something that will stick
out from the competition. An ad should pre-qualify the
visitors. Well written ads are clear enough so that a potential
visitor can already decide if he wants to click or if the offer
does not really apply to him. The webmaster would waste a lot
of money if the ad does not allow to make a decision if the
advertised product or service will be of interest for the
potential visitor. This pre-qualification through the ad copy
may lower the click through rate, but a webmaster will be
getting higher quality visitors in return.
Each PPC ad should be combined with a targeted landing page. A
webmaster should not send visitors just to the homepage as the
homepage could be too generic. Using the homepage as landing
page has been proven to get lower conversion rates. A landing
page should be the matching counterpart of the PPC ad. Highly
targeted and filled with keywords and information relevant to
the ad and the product a webmaster is trying to sell. The
landing page should be easy to navigate and the 'sales message'
needs to be highly visible. If a visitor needs more than 3-5
seconds to find what he is looking for, the chance to convert
the visitor into a sale is going dramatically down.