You’re live!
Want to know the best thing about a Smart Niche campaign? We’ve already run several of these
campaigns and we know how to build winners. So from day one, you are ahead of the pack. We’ll
let you know when you are live, and then it will go a little quiet for us until ...
Two Week Update - Initial Insights
Wait you’re not going to give me an update for two weeks? Yes, but we have a very good reason.
We want to keep you in the know, we really do. But there’s nothing to know yet. It is important that
we have ENOUGH data where we can confidently tell you how it is going. Trying to give an analysis
on anything prior to two weeks of data will be at the very best, a guess. We only make comments
and decisions based on statistically relevant data. If we rush the process and optimize or comment
too quickly, it will cause problems. We don’t add every single keyword searched because quantity
does not beat the quality of keywords, and we use the right match type to catch them all, regardless
if we are bidding on that exact keyword. More keywords do not mean more spend or search volume.
We are reviewing the account daily, making sure we are getting traffic at a reasonable cost and that
the traffic is relevant. This is the highest touch frequency for an account and that is what we are
focused on so that we can ensure we are on track.
Month 1 - Data Gathering
Although we start steps ahead of other agencies with our Smart Niche campaign setup, every
business is different with different offers and locations having different nuances. We’ll be learning
all the ins and outs for this specific client throughout the month. During this month you can expect
that we’ll be testing and identifying bid strategies that will work best for you. Our goal during
this month is to get our ads in the top of page position for the lowest CPC possible. Our team is
alerted daily if the account is not meeting baseline KPI metrics to ensure a speedy turnaround to
make adjustments.
Month 2 - Search Relevancy & Keyword Review
This month we focus on what your audience has been searching for and how it relates to the service
you provide. This process helps us identify new keyword trends and ad ideas based on the
searcher's intent. Are they most often looking for a quote? Are they looking for cheap help? We’ll
get these answers and add new keywords specific to your market that were not part of our
original Smart Niche campaign. We will also be identifying the searches that don’t align with our
goals and make sure we never show up for them or similar searches again. We do already start with
a very detailed negative keyword list, however, every day there are 1000’s of new search queries on Google that have never occurred before, making it impossible for us to get everything at the gate.
We will likely have added a few negatives through the course of month one, but this is a more
in-depth dive into trends. Rest assured, we will be reviewing these queries weekly and actioning
both the good and bad queries to keep our traffic as relevant as today’s news headlines.
Month 3 - Ad & Landing Page Testing
We start out ad testing and we don’t stop. In month three we’ll be reviewing the results of our initial
testing and taking what we’ve learned and applying it to new ads for round two of testing. In
addition, we take our new knowledge and apply it to our next landing page variant. Our goal with ad
testing is to incrementally improve our interaction rate by being more closely aligned with the
searchers intent and reactions to the value propositions and offers in round one. The goal with
landing page testing is to incrementally improve conversion rate by taking the same intent and
reactions and applying them to the landing page. The most impactful of the tests, which is where we
start, is adjusting the headline, call to action or hero image/videos. Landing page testing occurs
quarterly.
Month 4 - Device and Network Review
Devices perform differently. Searchers on a desktop have slightly different intent and are at
different points of consideration. In this review, we’ll be identifying opportunities to optimize the
performance on the three most common devices: computers, mobile devices and tablets. These
devices perform differently in different regions and with respect to the type of call to action used.
We utilize bid modifiers and segmenting strategies to ensure we are getting the most out of all
devices. We now have the data required to make confident decisions on optimizing device traffic
and put our best device forward.
A search campaign is comprised of two networks, Google.com and Search Partners. Straight from
Google’s mouth “Search Partners extend the reach of Google Search ads to hundreds of non-Google
websites, as well as YouTube and other Google sites.” Sometimes Search Partners perform similar
to search, sometimes they perform worse (they almost never perform better). The choice we have is
to either keep opted in to partners or opt out. Data will tell us what to do!
Month 5 - Audience Insight
How well do you know your audience? After reviewing our audience insight data we’ll know them
really well. We’ll learn (or confirm) some of the basics like age and gender, but it will also get more
interesting. We’ll get insights into what other in-market and affinity audiences your searchers fall
into. Based on this data, we’ll make optimizations and suggestions to capitalize on these audiences.
Month 6 - Competitive Landscape & 6 Month Review
We’re going to be taking a look at advertisers’ ads showing up with us in search results for our most
frequently searched keywords. We did this when we launched, but something has likely changed!
Does someone have a better offer? Is there someone new? We’ll get to the bottom of what the
competitive landscape looks like and if we need to make any change to our strategy or offer as a
result. Rounding out month 6 will be a comprehensive review of our 6-month journey and how
we’ve progressed along the way. From this review, our next 6-month roadmap will be constructed.
Any Time Optimizations
Not all optimizations are done on a schedule or have an entire month dedicated to them. The items
below are checked regularly and adjusted when the time makes sense.
● Budget pacing and optimizations - we adjust daily campaign budgets to ensure we pace our
budget as close to the calendar month as possible.
● Bid adjustments and strategy updates - we utilize Google’s bid strategies to ensure we are
getting the most clicks and leads as we can for our budget.
● Increase/Decrease ad scheduling - we may opt to extend or decrease the number of hours
we are showing your ad depending on budget limitations. If you’re limited by budget, we’ll
reduce hours. If you’re struggling to spend budget, we’ll extend hours.
● Increase/Decrease location targeting - we may opt to extend or decrease the geotargeting
we are showing your ad depending on budget limitations. If you’re limited by budget, we’ll
reduce your targeting. If you’re struggling to spend budget, we’ll reasonably expand it and
let you know.
● Keyword average CPC review - keyword CPCs vary, we monitor CPCs that are higher than
average and optimize them to be more affordable, or pause them if they are too expensive.
● Pause poor performing keywords - sometimes keywords spend and don’t drive leads, we
monitor keywords and pause them when they’ve shown no hope in driving leads.
● Negative keyword implementation - although we have a month dedicated to a deep dive, this
is ongoing.
● Display network placement exclusions - to ensure remarketing and display ads are showing
on appropriate websites.
● Ad copy assessments (between testing) - to ensure a test isn’t significantly failing ad
negatively impacting performance prior to scheduled review.
● Ad extension review - identifying messaging that is performing best and apply the
knowledge across the campaign/landing page and test new.
● Location performance adjustments - we may apply a bid modifier to locations performing
well or not performing at all to improve overall account performance.
● Device performance monitoring - although this is scheduled for a thorough review in the first
six months, this requires ongoing monitoring and optimizations to improve performance.
● Keeping up with Google - Google makes changes all the time. Some of them are changes
that affect performance and some are just changes that impact the way we manage an
account. We stay up to date and adjust what is needed in the account. Some of these
changes can be huge and may impact our timeline for Monthly Roadmap items due to their
complexity and time investment. If this occurs, we’ll let you know.
