Experts predict that global advertising and marketing spending will reach $1.74 trillion by the end of this year — a 7% growth since 2023. And, considering there are 40,000 Google searches per second and that the average person uses social media for 143 minutes per day, it's no surprise that most successful brands employ search and social networks to reach their audiences.
However, while organic marketing strategies may work wonderfully — both for growing brand awareness and engaging audiences — they often fall short when attempting to reach consumers in the mid-to-low stages of the sales funnel. In these cases, the best way for businesses to attract clients is to invest in PPC campaigns.
So, whether you're looking to boost sales, raise brand and product awareness, or capture new leads, here are the top simple yet effective tactics in paid search and paid social. Let's dive in!
Conduct Keyword and Competitor Analysis to Uncover Advertising Opportunities
How do you develop an effective paid advertising strategy? Well, the process doesn't differ much from any other marketing tactic you may already be using to grow your brand.
Essentially, the road to success is paved with in-depth research.
Provided that you understand your target audience — their demographic info, online behavior, and their pain points (which your solutions promise to solve) — it's time to start planning your strategy for getting prospects to notice your brand. Obviously, the way to do this is to know what your potential customers want to find when they go online.
According to statistical data, the most popular reason for using the internet in 2023 was finding information (with 60.9% of users going online for this purpose). So, if you want to attract clients, you need to make sure your ads appear when prospects go online to conduct their research.
If you want your ads to appear in Google Search, the best thing you can do to ensure efficiency is to identify the right keywords for your campaign.
In addition to opting for logical search terms — like targeting "healthy pet recipes" if you run a pet-related business such as TrustedHousesitters — it's a good idea to explore additional ways to catch your target audience's attention.
Source: google.com
For instance, if you're an ecommerce retailer, you might wish to do something similar to Greenhouse Emporium. As an online retail store for greenhouse gardening, this brand regularly runs ads for some of its most popular products. For instance, knowing that consumers searching for a specific greenhouse model most likely want to complete a purchase, Greenhouse Emporium created a series of sponsored ads that lead directly to relevant product pages.
Source: google.com
To maximize your marketing success, it's also important to know what your competitors are doing. Not just so that you can create paid advertising campaigns that will outperform theirs. Knowing what your competitors are doing will also help you uncover opportunities to attract an audience segment they may have overlooked.
For example, if your main competitor isn't active on TikTok — which is the go-to product research platform for 33% of consumers — then that's an opportunity for your brand to create paid campaigns for the social network and reach a segment of the millions of people using the app daily.
For instance, Nomad Eyewear invests heavily in paid social campaigns, knowing that its most famous competitor brands aren't doing the same. The results are fascinating, and not just because they reached tens of thousands of TikTok users. More importantly, they generated a ton of brand awareness on a platform heavily frequented by people wanting to invest in fashion and accessories.
Source: tiktok.com
Direct Traffic to the Right Landing Pages and Don't Underestimate Optimization
The second most important strategy to ensure your paid campaigns work is to choose the right landing pages to pique your audience's interest. After all, knowing that 44% of people find social media ads irrelevant to their wants and needs, you must position your business as one that understands what its target audience requires.
So, don't allow your advertising endeavors to appear generic and be overlooked by your prospects (and suffer low click-through rates). Instead, do your best to optimize ads to benefit your potential customers.
Ultimately, nothing frustrates consumers more than being promised one thing and then given something entirely different. To avoid that faux pas, practice adequate expectation management. More importantly, boost on-site conversion rates by directing paid traffic to highly optimized landing pages on your website.
First and foremost, try to send traffic to a page relevant to the person who clicked on your ad. For instance, if you look at the Bariatric Fusion sponsored post advertising high-protein meal replacements, it's logical that the brand's audience expects to be taken to a product collection page where they can shop for bariatric protein shakes and powders.
Source: facebook.com
Secondly, do your best to optimize your landing pages and ad copy to complement and mirror each other. For inspiration, check out how Vidpros advertises the same user benefits — both in its Meta ads and on its homepage — promising top-tier editing, fast turnarounds, and on-demand revisions to guarantee its target audience comprehends the value of investing in the brand's services.
Source: facebook.com
Finally, keep search intent in mind when developing your paid campaigns. For instance, if you know your target audience populates the bottom stages of the sales funnel and is performing a search to buy a product, consider investing in Google Shopping Ads with special promotions and codes to encourage conversions.
For example, a brand like Vinyl Status knows what product its target audience is most likely to search for. That's why it creates Google Shopping ads targeting specific keywords — like "custom stickers for trailers" — attracting buyers who want to complete their shopping journey as quickly (and budget-friendly) as possible.
Source: google.com
Perfect Your Ad Copy and CTAs
No matter how much you're willing to pay for a click — whether on Google or social media — you won't attract customers unless you learn how to compose killer ad copy and CTAs that resonate with your audience.
Admittedly, you could rely on visuals and search terms to capture your prospects' attention and hope they click through to your website. However, if you want to get the biggest bang for your buck (and avoid spending unnecessary funds on inefficient paid campaigns), you need to learn how to perfect the written aspects of your ads.
In general, when aiming to capture people's attention and inspire them to consider a solution, the easiest way to do it is to directly address their pain points.
If you know that your buyers care about specific product features — as Transparent Labs understands that its audience wants pure and effective vegan muscle-building supplements — then you need to use that knowledge to ensure your PPC ads attract website traffic and result in conversions. This brand always gets straight to the point with its ad copy. In the example below, Transparent Labs asks followers whether they know what's in their supplements, understanding that ingredient and dosage safety is a priority for most health and fitness enthusiasts.
Source: facebook.com
For a slightly more advanced approach to proving that your brand has the ideal solution to their needs, don't just address your audience's pain points. Instead, use headlines and site links to deliver compelling value propositions and invite potential customers to act immediately.
For inspiration, check out the Google Search Ad for Wrike. You'll notice that the brand aims to capture consumer attention by pointing out that its solution has a "free version available." If you look closer, you'll also see that the first site link includes an invitation for prospects to watch a demo. Finally, the ad copy states that users don't have to download any software, making this an excellent example of a business using well-optimized ad copy to show how it understands its audience's needs.
Source: google.com
As you work to create the perfect ad — whether for search or socials — don't forget that it's not just product features that make a difference when convincing consumers to purchase.
Research shows that consumers prioritize shopping experience as much as product value and quality. So, knowing that 82% of online buyers consider free shipping a crucial factor when choosing what retailers to buy from, it's no surprise that SomniFix dedicates the most prominent part of its Google Search Ads to promising free shipping in the USA.
Source: google.com
Or, if you understand that winning over customers in 2024 requires you to offer free returns (with over 50% of shoppers actively avoiding brands that charge for returns), then you might do something similar to Simply Beach and use customer experience advantage to make your PPC campaigns more effective.
Source: facebook.com
Employ Remarketing
One of the most commonly overlooked aspects of paid advertising is that consumers don't purchase products immediately upon discovery. Instead, buyers move through the sales cycle at a slow pace, often needing as many as eight or more touches to decide what product to invest in.
For this reason, your paid search and paid social marketing strategies need to take into consideration that seeing a single ad for a product (no matter how relevant or impressive) won't be enough to convince prospects to convert. On the contrary, you must ensure that your target audience sees your ads multiple times. That way, you'll improve brand and product recollection and awaken your prospect's curiosity. More importantly, you'll slowly build familiarity, positively impacting people's purchase intent.
Fortunately, the solution to this challenge is relatively simple — you need to invest in retargeting ads. These allow you to re-engage consumers who haven't converted on your site. They're also a great way to present potential customers with the right type of content at the right time.
For inspiration, check out Cāhmpo Haircare on Facebook. Understanding that consumers seek out different content formats throughout their shopping journey, the brand uses social proof and discount codes to re-engage people who have visited its site in the past but haven't yet made a purchase.
Source: facebook.com
Analyze Results and Adjust Accordingly
The only way to guarantee success with paid search and paid social is to track your marketing strategy's performance and adjust accordingly.
So, whether you create PPC campaigns for Google or simply sponsor posts on social media, try your best to set them up correctly from the beginning. Use the analytical capabilities of your chosen advertising platform. Add any necessary pixels to your website. And closely monitor performance to identify opportunities for improvement or underperforming search terms/ads.
Yes, paid advertising can be time-consuming (in addition to often requiring a hefty budget). But if you use it to reach your business goals as well as to learn more about your audience, then it can be a marvelous resource for elevating your organic marketing tactics.
For example, a simple Google Ads campaign can help you identify customer pain points. It can allow you to test headings, USPs, and CTAs that you can later add to your landing pages. Creating multiple ad variations on social media can help you choose the most compelling photos for your ecommerce product pages, giving you valuable insights that can help you truly improve your site and maximize conversions.
Final Thoughts
As you can see, you don't have to employ complicated tactics when running paid advertising campaigns. In fact, the simpler the strategy, the more effective it will be in helping you reach your goals.
The five methods outlined in this article are an excellent start you can easily adopt in your advertising efforts. So, don't hesitate to give them a try and take inspiration from the examples included on the page. And, of course, do your best to make each of these tactics your own by adjusting them to fit your brand's needs.
