Adwords - again!

Time for a quick update on my AOL Adwords campaign - problems I encountered, and how I've set about fixing them.

Despite my previous work on my campaign, I wasn't getting the clickthroughs I needed and my tweaking wasn't having the desired affects. I also discovered that too much tweaking could affect my Adwords history, which could be detrimental to how Adwords judges my campaign, keywords, etc.

Sanj Mirchandani, the Publisher Manager at TradeDoubler, has been really helpful and came back with some honest advice about my original landing page - that it was:

1. too general - cluttered with lots of information about AOL packages, without really focusing on a core offer
2. designed for SEO, NOT for Google Adwords (Sanj pointed out I should design different pages for SEO and PPC)
3. text-heavy
4. unlikely to convert - with too few calls to action

So I tweaked my Adwords campaign to:

1. focus on only four Ad Groups, with each focusing on one particular aspect of the AOL broadband offer
2. get rid of non-converting keywords
3. focus on keywords and ads that would bring in people actually wanting to buy broadband
4. switch on Content Network on my campaign
   
5. put a lower limit than previously on the default maximum cost per click
   

And created four short new landing pages (one for each Ad Group - see one here) with:

1. new images relating to the offer - including the famous AOL free wireless router!
2. brightly coloured headings and buttons - calls to action that really stand out (and link) - using a package called Webstyle
3. content containing my best keyword phrases
4. AOL package details and Buy buttons above the fold
5. small, keyword-heavy AND relevant sections of copy below the fold

So far clicks are significantly higher, and my cost per click is going down.....

I think the main point I learnt from this exercise was that a Google Adwords page should be designed differently to an SEO page - it sounds obvious but it is easy to forget when you are in an SEO mindset with H1 and H2 tags, link text, etc.

By Sarah, UK Broadband Finder