So you’ve setup your own Google AdWords account. With AdWords, there is always room for improvement so we hope you won’t take offence when we tell you that… your account is not perfect.
We would even go so far as to say that of the AdWords campaigns we audit, we see an average of 45% of the budget being wasted. This is a huge amount and is a real shame for businesses. So what can be done to plug this waste? An audit of your account is a great place to start.
What is an AdWords Audit?
Put simply, an AdWords audit is a delve into your campaign to find areas for improvement. In this post, we tell you what to look at in your Google AdWords account so you can get a better feel for what is going right or wrong.
Who Should Perform the Audit?
This is a tricky one. If you are experiencing a particular issue in your account then it may make sense to work through it yourself or call Google’s help desk on 1800 812 558.
However, if you are looking for a complete overhaul of your account then it might be beneficial to outsource the audit to get a ‘fresh pair of eyes’ on proceedings.
How Do You Perform an AdWords Audit?
Let’s dive in. While there are many many variables that you could look at first, our experience tells us that the following approach is the most effective:
Look at the Correct Date Range
It’s paramount that you are looking at the correct data range when performing your audit. If you’re trying to diagnose a specific issue we recommend setting the time window to approximately 3 months.
However, if you are intent on doing a comprehensive audit, we recommend a year’s data or ‘All Time’ to get a clear picture of the performance of your campaign.
Conversion Data
Why are you running your campaign in the first place? What would you like to see happen? By tracking conversions in your campaign, you can accurately calculate your return on investment.
For example your conversions might be the following:
- Contact Us Form Completions
- Click to Calls
- Emails
- Product Purchase
These conversions can be setup within Google Analytics and then brought into Google AdWords.
It is of huge importance that these conversions are imported correctly to ensure that you are working towards optimising for these goals.
Campaign Settings
The campaigns settings are where you can make a huge impact to your campaign. Here are some of the main things to look out for:
Campaign Type
What is the type of the campaign?
A search campaign should set be to Search Network only and should contain All Features.
Campaign Locations
Look at your locations; are you targeting the correct areas?
Remember, locations can only be set at the campaign level, so if you want to run ads for different locations we recommend running these ads from separate ‘location specific’ campaigns.
Campaign Devices
Select devices under the Settings heading to see if there is any ‘Bid Adjustments’ on mobile devices. Bid adjustments allow you to vary your bid according to device, location or time of day and represent a powerful way to optimise your campaign.
Campaign Naming Convention
When looking at a list of your campaigns, the first thing to ask is if the naming convention makes sense.
Are the campaigns listed 1-20 or are they named to reflect the content of the ad groups within the campaign?
Ad Groups
Provided your campaigns are setup correctly, the next step is to look at your ad groups. The things to look at in your ad groups are:
- Do each of your ad groups contain tightly themed keywords?
- Is there a maximum of 20 keywords per ad group (we often have significantly less than this)?
You want to make sure that there each ad group is not too far reaching as it will make writing ads too difficult.
Keywords
You want to check the match types of the keywords. What is the percentage of keywords that are broad vs phrase vs exact match?
If the keywords are running on predominantly broad match, is there enough negative keywords to ensure that the campaign is targeted enough?
Ads
Let’s start with the basics by checking the spelling and grammar. Following that, make sure it’s relevant. Does the content of the ad match the keywords that you want your ad to appear for AND match the content of the page? Is there a strong call to action on the page?
Conclusion
At VROOM Digital, we perform extremely detailed AdWords audits before starting work on a campaign. Our level of expertise puts us in a strong position to maximise the number of enquiries and sales in your business.
If your business could benefit from increased online leads and sales, then give us a call on 01 531 1777 to see how we can help.
