Welcome to Part 1 of our ‘How To Advertise on Google’ series. The goal of this series is to educate people with any level of experience on how and why you should leverage advertising on Google. We will cover everything from why you should be advertising your business, all the way to how you can create and launch your own ads on Google. This series will tackle the basics, look at best practices to set you up for success, and provide a clear direction on exactly how you too can advertise on Google.
Have you ever wondered about how to advertise on Google? Or have you questioned if anyone even clicks on those weird ads on Google? Here at Classic City Consulting, we have spent years working on Pay-Per-Click advertising and we believe it to be a great option for businesses of all sizes. Join us for a new series, How To Advertise on Google AdWords, where we will cover pay-per-click advertising from start to finish. Your DIY Google AdWords guide begins now!
Any time you search for something on Google, you are greeted with many options to click on. What often goes unnoticed is that the first few results are almost always paid advertisements. They are easy to miss, but are accompanied by a small yellow box labeled ‘Ad’ which separates the first few results from the rest of the page. Also, along the right-hand side of the page is more paid ads.
In this example, when searching for ‘web development’ the resulting choices are heavily influenced by paid ads. The first 3 choices are all paid ads and all along the right-hand side are even more ads. This picture shows what you first see without scrolling down the page, and nearly all of it is paid ads created through pay-per-click advertising.
Can Anyone Advertise on Google?
Yes! Anyone, a business or an individual, can write their own ads and buy space on Google so that when someone searches for your business or something related to your business, your ad can appear at or near the top of the page. It’s a powerful way to advertise on a site that billions of people use every day.
To help you achieve your advertising goals, Google has a self-service advertising system known as Google AdWords. This allows you to create your own ads and buy space on Google.
Unlike other advertising mediums, Google doesn’t require you to buy a set amount of ads, pay a set price, or advertise to anyone and everyone. So why should you pick advertising on Google over other options? One word: targeting!
Target YOUR Audience (Not ALL Audiences)
Your budget may be small, but you can implement a few measures in AdWords to ensure you reach only the people you want. This is possible through the many different ways you can “target” people searching on Google. First, the different targeting options allow you to only advertise to people in certain geographic locations. You can buy ads for people in your zip code, city, state, region of the country, all of the US, or worldwide. It can be tailored to where you do business so you don’t waste money by advertising to people in California if you are a local business in Decatur, Georgia without cross-country shipping. There are even more options available to tailor your spending to even the most specific details.
- Age
- Gender
- Household Income
By employing one or multiple of these targeting options, your money will only go towards advertising to your desired audience. This is a great way to save money and give you the best chance at a potential lead or sale. Using Google to advertise gives you the power to control how your budget is spent, and who has the potential to see your ads.
How to get started?
Continue to follow our ‘How to Advertise on Google’ series which will cover: how to get started with advertising on Google, AdWords training, and advertising help on Google. Our next post will be, Google Advertising 101, a beginner’s guide to Google AdWords. We will cover the nuts and bolts behind how advertising on Google works and we will introduce some important lingo you will need to be familiar with.
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Chris LaFay