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Posts Tagged ‘People’

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The Clean Bathroom Approach to PPC Ad Copy

Thursday, May 9th, 2013

 

We naturally believe in the principle of internal consistency. It may not make sense in every situation, but we believe it anyway.


If you walk into a restaurant’s bathroom and it’s filthy, you wonder how clean — or disgusting — the kitchen is, even though it’s unlikely that the same people who clean the bathroom also work in kitchen. Or at least one hopes that it’s unlikely!


Well, the same principle of internal consistency applies to PPC Ad copy. Take a look at the following contest, and with that principe in mind, see if you can’t pick out which ad outperformed the other:





So, assuming that the search Keyword was “Turquoise Earrings” the ads are fairly similar, with Ad A offering more specifics to strengthen the “save” claim and Ad B strengthening the free shipping claim with “on all orders.” But frankly, neither of those is the deciding factor here


The deciding factor that put Ad B ahead on Click-Through Rates was the internal consistency between the headline offer of “Turquoise Earrings” and the body copy describing them as “Beautiful & Authentic.” Because when you’re talking about natural stone — especially a natural stone that’s often over-dyed and imitated — a claim of “authentic” is naturally what you’d expect to hear. It’s internally consistent with the offer, thereby making the whole ad more persuasive and believable.


And that’s why Ad B won the contest AND a spot in today’s WIn of the Week column.


 

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Posted in Ad Text Tips, Ad Writing Techniques, Copywriting, Paid Search, Win of the Week | No Comments »


Are Your PPC Ads a Joke?

Monday, May 6th, 2013

 

When you’re telling a joke, you’ve got to hold the punchline until the end. It’s the surprise punchline that gets the laughs. Works great for comedy, but it’s lousy for PPC Ads.

When people scan search results, they’re looking for immediate confirmation of relevance — will this result take me to what I want? — that can be effortless confirmed as they sweep their eyes over the results for, oh, just slightly longer than a nano-second, I suppose.


And that means the keywords and trigger words need to be as high up and far to the left of the ad copy as possible. At the front of the headline, at the front of the first line of body copy. That sort of thing. A PPC Ad isn’t a joke — don’t save your keyword “punchline” until the end!


With that principle in mind, the rather confusing results from this test start to make a lot more sense:




If the keyword is cookware, you’d think ad copy that focuses exclusively on “Cast Iron Pots, Pans, and Dutch Oven Sets” would alienate a lot of people who are in the market for stainless steel, copper, non-stick, and most other kinds of cookware. In other words, you’d think that the cast-iron exclusivity would sink the winning ads performance. But oddly enough, it didn’t.


So what happened?


The winning ad used “cookware” earlier in the headline, and in the first line of copy, AND used the confirming add-on words of “Pots, Pans, and Dutch Oven Sets.” When searchers glance at that ad, they instantly know that it’s relevant to their search, and may even overlook the “Cast Iron” part.


Compare this to the losing ad, which delays the use of the keyword to the end of the headline, doesn’t use cookware at all on the first line of copy and uses no other trigger words or confirming language. This ad is sort of a joke, in that it saves the trigger words until the end, making it harder to scan for relevance.

And how much difference does this really make? Well, for this test, it was a 49% increase in Click-Through Rates — which is no small difference!


So take a tip from the boosters: don’t save those keywords and trigger words for the end — put them high and to the left in your copy and use them generously throughout your copy. Because your PPC ad copy is no laughing matter.


 

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Posted in Ad Text Tips, Ad Writing Techniques, AdWords Ad Best Practices, Copywriting, Paid Search, Tips From The Boosters | No Comments »


But Is That What THEY Think Their Problem Is?

Friday, March 22nd, 2013

 

People often don’t recognize problems. What they recognize are symptoms.


And which symptoms are most pressing and important to them, aren’t necessarily the concerns that are most important to the organization.


What problem X means to an employee might have a lot more to do with the fact that he has to put in a lot of unpaid overtime or his next promotion has been jeopardized, than with the real nature of the problem or the best fix for that problem.


So when companies advertise solutions via PPC, they need to keep all that in mind. Specifically, they need to ask themselves:


  • How does the searcher see this problem?
  • What symptoms are most important to them
  • Will they recognize my labels for the problem as being valid
  • Will they recognize my solution benefits as relevant to their lives and careers


And so forth. If they don’t ask that, they run the risk of writing ineffectual PPC ads. This Win of the Week contest is a great example of that:




So picture this: you’re a sales manager, and something has forced you to reevaluate how you handle your Incentives and Commissions for your team. Ok, now think, what is most likely to have brought you to that kind of reevaluation?


Answer: Poor, or at least disappointing performance from your sales team.


So… knowing that, which PPC Ad do you think best speaks to your perceived symptoms and concerns?


Yup — Ad B, with its messaging around “Reward Your Sales Team Right.” And that’s why it managed to nearly double Click-Through-Rates over Ad A, boosting them by a solid 94%.


Now, I’m sure the advertiser thought that automating and systematizing sales incentives was what the prospect OUGHT to have cared about. But that’s not really what the prospect thought his problem was about, is it?


So make sure your PPC Ads speak to what your prospects THINK their problem is.


 

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Yes, A Little Thing Like That DOES Matter!

Thursday, December 27th, 2012

 

Sometimes people look at a small tweak and think, could a little thing like that really matter all that much?


Well, yes. Emphatically “Yes!” Little things like:


  • Moving keywords form the end to the front of phrases
  • Moving key persuasive elements from the second line of body copy up to the first
  • Moving key elements from the first line up to the headline
  • Adding or removing small adjectives and modifiers
  • Including a Call to Action vs. skipping the CTA
  • Fitting in an extra use of a key search term, and
  • Swapping out synonyms to spin spinn different connotations


These things can all matter a great deal. Sometimes not, but on average, yes, these little things improve performance, but you won’t know until you test them. And here’s a perfect example:




Here’s what you should notice:


  • The key search term “VX Pro” is at the beginning of the headline for the winning ad, and at the end of the headline for the losing ad.
  • The key term “VX Pro” platform is repeated again on the first line for the winning ad, and a more generic, related set of terms is used on e first line of the losing ad.
  • The winning ad ends with an imaginable Call to Action while the losing ad is totally missing a Call to Action.


Of course, if you’re really an ad copywriting pro, you won’t even consider these things “Little” anymore. They’ll seem more like proven best practices, instead, which is actually what they are. And testing them out on your ads should form a key part of your ad optimization strategy.


So, yeah, these “little” things really do matter!


 

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Posted in Ad Text Tips, Ad Writing Techniques, Copywriting, Paid Search, Tips From The Boosters | No Comments »


Are You The Right Choice? How Will They Know?

Thursday, October 18th, 2012

 

When making a larger purchase, some people want to do all the research and be their own experts, and some people want to find an expert they can trust and rely on the expert’s judgement.


The first set of people are classic comparison shoppers who are most concerned with getting the best deal. And as deal shoppers, getting their business today does not lead to having their business tomorrow. We call them transactional shopppers.


The second set of poeple are more concerned with wasting their time or making the wrong decision than they are with price. And earning their trust today does lead to having their business tomorrow. We call them relational shoppers.


As you might guess, relational shoppers are the more profitable customers to acquire. And yet, PPC Ads tend to ignore this dynamic, because they tend NOT to focus their efforts on people worried about making the wrong choice, chosing to go after deal and bang-for-buck feature shoppers instead.


Today’s Win of the Week is a nice example of this. Knowing that, see if you can spot the winning ad:




So… which line of copy do you think is most apt to engage relational shoppers:


  1. “Follower & Engagement Analytics” or
  2. “The Most Complete Analytics Tools You’ll Ever Need!”


If you guessed “B,” you got it right, with Ad B, expertly penned by Booster Writewords, more than doubling CTR with a 166% increase over Ad A.


Why?


The relational shopper may or may not know what kind of twitter analytics she’ll need, so the “Follower & Engagement” part might just confuse her, while the “Most Complete…You’ll Ever Need!” claim would sound very reassuring to her ears.


And even the comparison shoppers would be eager to see just how complete the analytics package really is. Either way, Ad B will win more clicks, but in the case of the relational shopper, the ad will also win a higher CR as well.


So what kind of shoppers are your ads written for? And what kind of customers are you getting as a result?


 

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Posted in Ad Text Tips, Ad Writing Techniques, Copywriting, Paid Search, Win of the Week | No Comments »


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