Hello Friends........
Why am I getting tons of traffic but no sales from my Pay-Per-Click ads? I'm spending almost $600 per month on Pay-Per-Click advertising with very poor results.
The ads bring in plenty of visitors, but no one is buying. What can I do to keep from going broke from all those useless (and expensive) clicks?
Thanks
For the sake of simplicity, I'll assume your PPC is with Google.
No matter what your budget is set to, Google will try to spend it and so it will show your ads as much as possible to get every click. That being said, your problem won't really ever be "getting" the clicks, it's getting clicks from people who really want your stuff. Targeted people, etc...
Let's say you have just one ad running for shoes and the ad takes people to your shoe site. Google will spend your whole budget driving traffic to your shoe site. The problem is most of these people will be lookyloos, not serious buyers.
One possible fix is to create 5 ads or more instead, and each one with much more targeted keywords. Running shoes, hiking shoes, etc...
This targets more specific, from lookyloos shoe shoppers to people looking for running shoes.
If that isn't targeted enough and you still aren't making sales, turn those 5 ads into 15 ads that target very specific products. Waterproof low cut hiking boots, etc... This targets lookyloo hiking shoe shoppers to specific shoppers who want water proof low top boots specifically.
You might say, well if I'm that specific, I might not get any traffic! Well that's OK, you aren't paying for it! In other words, the traffic you ever DO get, will be looking for your very specific products, and Google will be doing their darndest to get the 15 ads in front of as many people as possible. And when you have more ads covering a larger range of specific keywords, it will automatically drive the better sellers.
The idea is not drive lots of traffic, it's too expensive for that and there are other SEO ways to do that. The idea is to get buyers looking for your stuff.
Don't be afraid to build ads for one single individual product, or specific categories that are not very general.
In summary, you actually need to design your campaign so that fewer people find you! As odd as that sounds, it's the only way to get serious buyers. Don't spend $600 a month just driving people to your generic shoe site. Spend $600 a month driving people looking for specific colored shoes, sizes, designs, styles, types, etc...
Don't be afraid to tweak your campaign daily or weekly. I suggest that you let each change run for one solid week. Then take a good look at the details; does it work better at night or day hours (in your time zone)? Does it work better on a weekend? Certain hours of the day? Is one keyword getting all the exposure but not generating sales? Adjust the keyword, remove it, make it more specific. Don't think, "this keyword gets a lot of traffic, it must be good!" It's not good, cause it get's no sales, and Google keeps using it because it keeps getting clicks!
There is a science to it, but you must keep adjusting and changing, see what works.
Good luck!
What Guy said is correct on the surface. Underneath is a different story. I have an ad campaign for the homepage of the small site I manage and ads for 5 other landing pages. The landing pages are more specific than the homepage, as Guy advises.
The problem is that the keywords for the homepage rank higher than those for the other landing pages, making its costs per click (CPC) much lower than those of the landing pages. It is much more cost effective to bring traffic to the homepage, despite a possibly lower buying rate. The landing pages have low ranked keywords so they don't attract traffic, buying or non-buying. The better tactic, which I try to do, is to use the homepage to direct traffic to the other more specific landing pages.
The problem is that the keywords for the homepage rank higher than those for the other landing pages, making its costs per click (CPC) much lower than those of the landing pages.
I'm not sure I understand. More generic terms cost more because more people are bidding on them. Highly specific terms are cheaper because fewer people bid on them. You seem to be saying high ranking keywords cost less. I don't think that's it unless I'm missing something.
In other words, I think "shoes" would cost more (to beat out all the bidders) while "brown low top hiking waterproof boot" would cost next to nothing cause who is bidding on something so specific anyway. Yet I think you are saying it's the other way around. "Shoes" would be a cheap high ranking term while the other phrase would be expensive?
Pay per click is one of the promotional methods that i have not tried before,i have heard so many good and bad stories and reviews about ppc and i dont want to try it now cos my advertising budget is very small.One thing you must know is that ppc is expensive and should be used when one know the ins and outs of it before putting your money there.
If you have lots of traffic without much results or sales it simply mean you are getting just traffic and not targeted traffic,i think you should understand that both are not the same thing cos both dont have the same value.
You will need to check your keyword research very well and understand the keyword(s) that are producing those traffic,from there i think you will be able to use target keywords that can give you the desired results.
Another great advantage you have now is to research very well to know the keywords that are producing that traffic so that you can then look for the kind of product or services that they really want.
Well,don't lose courage,you can have double profits or result after you do your keyword research very well.
I'm not sure I understand. More generic terms cost more because more people are bidding on them. Highly specific terms are cheaper because fewer people bid on them. You seem to be saying high ranking keywords cost less. I don't think that's it unless I'm missing something.
In other words, I think "shoes" would cost more (to beat out all the bidders) while "brown low top hiking waterproof boot" would cost next to nothing cause who is bidding on something so specific anyway. Yet I think you are saying it's the other way around. "Shoes" would be a cheap high ranking term while the other phrase would be expensive?
That sounds perfectly logical. Ask Google why they are not being logical. Of the keywords I have for my home page 6 or 7 have quality scores of 7 and 8 out of 10. The CPC is dependent on the click-through-rate and the quality score. The relatively high quality score yields a low CPC. The keywords on the other landing pages have quality scores of 3 and 4. This leads to high CPCs. The CPC for my other landing pages is almost 4 times higher than for my homepage.
The means of achieving high quality scores is a separate and extensive topic that I won't address in this post. I only know it is only weakly related to the specificity of the keyword or keyphrase.
yes,i think so too,i have to add too here that the right keywords will definitly bring quality traffic.some times too,the landing page of the site need to be reviewed too as that too may cause somebody not to take action after clicking an ad.
... if the majority of your search engine marketing budget is being eaten up by "visitors" that spend less than a second on your web page then chances are that your ads are being clicked through by "Internet visitors" deriving from Adsense marketing networks. This practice sucks up your money and generating revenues for the owners of the web pages that your ads appear on. Don't allow the search engine to place your ads on all its "network partners" (as is the default I think).
canadafred,i think that is another good advise,they just visiting visitors and not action visitors,action visitors would want to know more about what you offer.
... if the majority of your search engine marketing budget is being eaten up by "visitors" that spend less than a second on your web page then chances are that your ads are being clicked through by "Internet visitors" deriving from Adsense marketing networks. This practice sucks up your money and generating revenues for the owners of the web pages that your ads appear on. Don't allow the search engine to place your ads on all its "network partners" (as is the default I think).
I also think that is very good advice. I checked the settings on our Adwords account and we were participating in all networks. The non-search network (ads on the pages of websites) had the highest number of impressions, the lowest click-through-rate (CTR), and the highest cost per click. The Google search network had the highest CTR and a much lower CPC. I decided to opt out of the non-search networks.
I think another method to look at is the email list,he should try to build email list from all those traffic that are coming from the ppc ads,from there he can research more and promote to his list
May be the description that you have added is not catching the visitor attention... Try putting some call to action statements!
I have discovered that call to action is very important,visitors most times try to follow instructions they find on the site or article when they find out that the information or tittle is interesting.So in this case there is need for one to try to change and look for another call to action statements that will look serious and important.
donot waste you money on ppc .use seo services and sell exallent product to increse your sell
Though i have not been using ppc,but i have seen some people doing it well,so i dont think there is any thing wrong with that,my advise here is ,if u must use ppc make sure you target your ads very well,try to offer some free stuffs to make your visitors want to take more action.
Also try to bring relevancy in your keywords and ad copies and try to increase your quality score..
I think too that there is need for the starter of this topic to check and research his keyword very well.
Ifeanyi.
after spending $600 you didn't getting sell really upset.
If you are getting huge traffic it's positive . Now i think you have to analyse your visitor how much time they stay in your site. Which is your targeting keyword. Is your key word can make lead & sales ? Think about it. Your landing page design & content have to deal visitor smartly. Compare other top sales generating keyword. Find out your landing page weakness.
There are several reasons why it could be:
1. Are your products priced fairly?
2. Are you targeting the correct keywords?
3. Are you spending too much per click?
4. Should you spend your budget on SEO vs PPC
I think it is due to not choosing right keyword.Otherwise Google pay per click is very effective.
An expert is needed for doing PPC. Because money matters a lot in PPC. So, better hire a professional for doing this. You will give that $600 for a fruit ful work.
If you're getting tons of traffic, then I think you should only use PPC for seasonal promotions instead at that stage.
With PPC advertising the lead conversion rate is poor because it's not targeted. People who are occupied with PPC websites are most likely not interested to check out the advertisements. In that case you ll need to reconsider your way of advertising.
With PPC advertising the lead conversion rate is poor because it's not targeted.
If I used PPC to advertise nuts on a forum frequented by squirrels, wouldn't that be targetted? The few networks I'm aware of provide ways to target audiences.
People who are occupied with PPC websites are most likely not interested to check out the advertisements.
That's not the OP's issue. The adverts were receiving too many clicks with little or no conversions.
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