PPC 101…
Pay-Per-Click (PPC): So, you’ve been running a pay-per-click (PPC) campaign on Google and you need help analyzing the data against your competition. In this article, we’ll discuss how to use your PPC data and metrics to gain insight into your competition and understand what your main competitors are doing.
Google offers an auction insights report that allows you to compare your ad performance against your competition. In the auction insights report, you can find missing opportunities for improved performance. You’ll learn how your competitors are affecting your campaigns performance. Are you costs-per-click affected by the number of competitors bidding on the same keywords? Are competitors bidding on your brand name and should you do the same?
The following metrics are used by Google in the auction insights report. They are impression share, overlap rate, outranking share, position above rate, and absolute top of page rate.
Impression share is calculated by the number of impressions your ad received divided by eligible impressions. Eligibility depends upon quality score, bids, and your targeting settings. An impression share of 30% means that out of all the times your ad could have shown, it was only shown in 30% of them. In other words, you lost 70% of your potential traffic.
Overlap rate is a metric used by Google to explain how often someone sees your ad and a competitors ad. A high overlap rate means that the keyword or phrase is very desirable amongst your competition. For example, if you see that a competitor in your auction insights report is displaying a 70% overlap rate, this means that 7 of the 10 times your ad is shown, an ad from your competitor is also shown.
Outranking share tells you know how often your ad ranks higher on the Google search page than your competitor’s ad. According to a study, the top result on Google search receives 33% of the traffic compared to 18% for the second result. To increase your ads outranking share, focus on improving your keywords, targeting methods, and ad copy.
Position above rate indicates how often a competitor ad appears in a better position above yours on the search results page. For example, if your position above rate is 71%, this means that your competitor’s ad appeared higher in the search results 71 times out of every 100 times. To rank higher on the page than your competitor, start with optimizing your bidding strategy.
Absolute top of page rate shows the percentage of impressions that received the top slot on the Google search results page. This can help you understand how often your competition is winning against your ads.
Looking at just one of these metrics may not help you draw the conclusions you need. It’s advised that you look at two or more of the metrics to grasp a better understanding of what your competition is doing and how those firms are behaving. With all of that said, here’s the good news: Dynamic Wave Consulting can throughput this complicated Google ads process for you – resulting in leads within “1” business week of your ad launch date! Schedule your FREE PPC Consultation at www.dynamicwaveconsulting.com
Guest Author – William Kirkpatrick, MBA