It sounded good like a good idea.
Before our first daughter was born my wife and I thought we were going to use cloth diapers on our daughter.
We’d be doing our part for the environment, they’re supposed to be better for the baby, and we wouldn’t be plopping (pun intended) $1000s into the Diaper Industrial Complex. After doing our research into cloth diapers we were excited (or, at least as excited you can be about changing diapers) to go the cloth diaper route.
What sounded good in theory turned out to be not so great in practice. With the cloth diapers there were lots of leaks, they were inconvenient when we were out of the house and they required us doing lots and lots and lots of laundry.
So we changed course and went the disposable diaper route.
And that brings us to Google AdWords Express. But before I explain why, we need…
A Little Background on AdWords Express
Google’s rebranded their Google Boost program for local businesses and is now calling it Google AdWords Express.
Google AdWords Express is a ultra-simplified way for local businesses to advertise through Adwords (Google’s Pay Per Click advertising program).
AdWords is a powerful way to target local prospects searching for the products and services you offer… and you only pay when someone clicks on your ad (compare that to TV, newspaper or magazine advertising where you pay a set price no matter how many eyeballs fall on your ad or how many of those who see your ad care about what you offer).
AdWords is also a complex beast that’s hard enough for those of us who use it every day to keep up with, let alone a small, the local business owner who has plenty else to worry about.
That’s where AdWords Express comes in. You set a budget, write an ad and then Google runs things for you. Easy peasy.
Sounds great, right?
Well, like the decision about using cloth diapers, what sounds good in theory may not be so good in practice.
With AdWords Express you get simplicity, but that comes at a price. In this case, that price is control. And control is one of the biggest benefits of using AdWords.
When you manage your own AdWords campaign (or have someone manage it for you) you have control over…
- The keywords you target
- What you’re willing to pay for each keyword in your campaign
- When your ads appear (24/7, only during the week, only on weekends, from 10:30 to 1PM to promote a lunch special, etc.)
- Where your ads appear geographically (a state, a metro area, specific cities, a 20 mile radius around your office, etc.)
- What keywords you DON’T want your ads to appear for (ie. A dentist that only works with adult patients can prevent their ads from appearing when the words “kids”, “children”, or “Pediatric” appears in the search term
- Testing of different ad copy to see which one gets the best response
- Tracking of conversions to better measure the effectiveness of the campaign
Using AdWords Express, Google controls all these things. You’re largely leaving these important marketing decisions that affect the quality of the traffic coming to your website up to Google’s algorithm.
The Bottom Line for Local Businesses
AdWords is a great way to generate leads and local businesses should definitely try adding it to their marketing mix.
If you have a very small budget, then I’d definitely recommend giving Google AdWords Express a try to test the AdWords waters.
But if you’re going to spend more than a few hundred dollars a month on clicks, then learn how to manage it yourself or hire an expert to do it for you. It should end up saving you money (I’ve seen accounts where keywords cost 50{a950ddf0e7a23367a7e0f17377d3737fa8b8b1820bab9af7071f88951eb5d84e} more in Boost compared to the exact same keyword in a “regular” AdWords campaign) and you’ll ensure you’re getting the most highly relevant traffic to your website.
Otherwise you risk paying for some traffic that’s a pile of, well, the stuff that ends up in diapers (whether they’re cloth or disposable!).
