What Is Google Ads (Formally Adwords)?

One of the most common ways you can do this, is using Pay-Per-Click (PPC). To make things even more confusing, the Pay-Per-Click model is also known as Paid Ads, more specially Search Ads (As these are results you get when people search fo your products or services), simply because we are paying a provider, i.e. Google, in order to show our Ads (Our Business website) on Google. So far so good right? Google Ads can be used for a variety of different types of business, so whether you provide a service, such as Lawyers, Psychotherapists, Dentists, Quotation platforms, or whether you have a website where you sell items.

What’s the difference between Google Ads & SEO?

In order to understand this, we need to understand the anatomy of a Google page. When we search for anything on google, the page you see which shows a list of websites and images, is known as the Search Engines Results Page (SERP) for short. We need to understand the anatomy of  SERPs page. Let’s assume you search for The first section of “Lawyers In London” (Or “Attorneys in London” as our friends in the US will say).  You will be presented with a page that lists many websites. Lets break this down.

Paid Ads

Typically the top 4 results you see, will be Google Ads results, i.e. Paid Ads. This is usually denoted by a small icon titled “Ad” See screenshot below as an example: You will also see there are paid ads at the bottom of the page too. You will see a maximum of 3 paid ads at the bottom of the page. With Paid, Ads, regardless of whether ryou visit page 1 of Google, paid 2,3,4 or 5, your Ads will always show in the same position, giving you constant exposure to your audience

Google My Business listings

Following on from paid ads you will see Google Maps listings. This requires a different process ot be included within this section. See example below:

Organic Results

Below the  Google My Business listings you will see organic results. To get your website listed here, you need to use a process called SEO. Here, regardless of how many times users may click on the links to visit your website, you won’t need to pay anyone a penny. However, this is a long-term strategy and takes months if not years, to be listed on the first page of Google, and a lot of ongoing work. An example of organic listing on the Google page for Lawyers In London can be seen below:

Why use Google Ads work?

Think about this, ask your friend, ask your parent or guardian, ask your boss, when they are looking for a product or service online, what do they do? Where do they go? It won’t come as a surprise the answer 9 out of 10, will be Google! Not Facebook, not YouTube,  or any other platform. That itself, is a solid case as to why use Google. Other than that:

• Google has over 3.5 Bn searches per day
• A Survey by Search Engine Land in 2019 shown 63% of people said they clicked on Search Ads.
• Facebook has around 2.4bn active users per day. However they are not at the time specifically searching for your products or services. We use disruptive marketing techniques to work out what their interests may be, as well as other targeting methods, to show Ads to them which we feel they may be interested in and may click on.
• When people search on Google, and click on your Ads, they have shown an explicit interest in your product or services. They are what we call “In-Market audiences”
• With Google Ads, you have full control of your budget. You decide how much you wish to spend per day, per month, as well as how much you wish to pay-per-click!
• With Google Ads, you can have your business, listed in Google typically from within 24 to 36 hours. Got a new service you wish to promote? No problem, you could have it listed in Google Ads, same day, if not shortly after.

How does Google Ads work?

Google works on an Auction type of system. A bit like a Car Auction. You need to place Bids on how much you are willing to pay to get listed at the top of Google. It’s a little more complicated than this but I’ll touch base on this later. Essential high level steps, which we use the Google Ads platform to do are:

• • We have customers, like you, who may go to Google and type in your requirements, like “Lawyers in London”.
  • We firstly decide a daily budget. How much do we wish to spend per day. Lets assume, £100 per day for now.
  • We tell Google, all the words (known as keywords) which we wish to be found for on Google (i.e. “Lawyers in London”, “Injury Lawyers London”, “Employment Lawyers in London” etc. We then assign a Maximum Cost-Per-Click, i.e. how much we wish to pay Google, every time some one clicks on my Ads.
  • We write some Ads. This is the text copy users will see when they search for our keywords and Google shows them our Ads. Once again, an example of an Ad is as follows:

• If a user reads our Ad, decides if it is relevant to their search and they click on the Ad, at that point in time, Google will deduct an amount based on your Maximum Cost-Per-Click, from your daily budget.
• This process continues until you have either exhausted your budget for the day, in which case your Ads will simply stop showing for that day, or are no more searches, and your budget is then carried forward to the next day.
• Though a bit more complicated
• This is how it works
• We have Customers – YOU
• We have Google Ads – the Advertising Platform
• Lets assume You’re a Lawyer
• You might want to show your website at the top of the Google page for the word “LAWYERS IN LONDON”
• You Put your Keyword, LAWYERS IN LONDON into Google Ads.
• Set a Daily budget in Google Ads, Lets assume you wish to spend £50 per day.
• You then assign a BID price. This is how much you are happy to Pay Google i.e. £2 (Will be much more in this case lol)
• Finally you write up some Ads – This is the Ad Copy users will see when they search

How does Google decide how much I am charged per click?

Though I covered this point at a very high level earlier, its actually quite complex. This will therefore be covered in a future blog. He position your Ads are shown in Google is called Ad Rank. It also uses something called “Quality Score” which determine how relevant your Ads, Landing page experience, and Ad copy is, in comparison to what the user has searched for. Again, I will cover this in a future blog. However, a simple version of the formula Google uses is:

AD RANK = Max Cost-Per-Click x Quality Score

Ultimately, Google wants to ensure you deliver the best possible experience to your users.