This Post was born as a result of a question I was asked a few days ago about what my focus would be on a PPC strategy for the launch of a new product. My answer was as intuitive as it was simple, but very incomplete, and only through the necessary time and some research have I been aware of the magnitude of the absences in that response. So I decided to make this post to put my ideas in order and try to make an exercise of perspective and humility that every SEM specialist needs to do from time to time.
As a PPC pay per click strategy for the moment, in this first post, I will focus on the tools offered by Google, in subsequent posts I will analyze the tools of Facebook Ads, Amazon Ads and other platforms.
Let’s assume that the product is new and we have not done any other type of marketing action before (television, YouTube, radio … etc) so we do not have data on how the reaction of users. In this context, users do not know the product, so we do not even know how to search for that product, even if we do a Keyword Search with the Adwords planner, we would obtain related data of similar products, but we seek to publicize a product. new very specific and therefore if users looking for a “like” product find this product may increase our bounce rate by not offering what users are looking for and that could affect the quality of our Landing Page that would affect our Quality Score so why risk it?
Step 1- Market Research
You can’t build your product without that market research, and you cannot do PPC market research without a product
The first step is to identify your bulls-eye customers: the ones who are most like to buy into the functional and emotional benefits of your product. But how do we conduct that research? We cannot test a market segment until you’ve defined it, so lets do it , for example we should be able to ask the following questions:
- Which gender would be more likable to buy it ?
- How much should be their incomes ?
- There is a location more likable, big-city, little towns ….?
- This user is college-educated, how old would be, single, married….?
- Some interest in particular, sports, cars….?
Step 2 Reach and engage the Segment with Google Display Ads
Once we have the knowledge about our Targeted users, let’s reach them. A market segment is useful to you only if you can reach them reliably and affordably. And here is where I have to introduce the first PPC tool of Google; Google Display Ads. IN my opinion this is the best Option for e-commerce which are looking for Product awareness
For reach and engage the segment we need to use the tool reach estimates on Google Display ==> Reach estimates show how widely your ads may be seen based on the settings and targeting you’ve selected. Viewing these weekly estimates can help you understand the potential impact of your targeting and settings choices.
How it works: The estimates you see don’t represent the actual traffic your ads will get. Instead, they are estimates based on your settings and targeting options. You might choose, for example, a specific location or target demographic for your ad group. This choice will affect your potential reach. Reach estimates can also show you when there isn’t enough inventory for your selection, or if your targeting is too restrictive (for example, if you’ve added too many targeting methods to your ad group). You can use reach estimates to adjust your settings and targeting. For instance, you can remove content targeting if your reach is too narrow. Your actual number of impressions also depends on other factors like your bid and ad quality.
Where it appears: Reach metrics automatically appear on the right side of the screen when you begin a new campaign. You can see your reach estimates change as you alter your settings and targeting. Note that reach estimates don’t factor in all advertiser information.
Why Google Display ?
This network of Display has more than 2 million third-party websites (reach more than 90% of users on the Internet) have made an association with Google and have accepted to host their ads. Ads can be videos, text images, rich media formats, as well as anything. They offer multipurpose guidance as an option, including remarketing. You can measure your results to see which pages the ads were published on, which ones achieved the most clicks, and the sites that offered the best sales at the lowest cost.
Having said that, we have selected Google Display because we are looking for users to know the product without having to search Google, which they can not do because being “new” and not having done any previous marketing action, there is no knowledge of it, and with Google Display through its affiliate network helps us to show ads of our product to the target users who visit any web page, whether it is news web, cooking blog or forum in which these target users usually navigate or even in those pages related webs that we consider are visited by these objective users that we have previously defined
we are looking for users to know the product without having to search Google, which they can not do because (…) there is no knowledge of it,
In fact People aren’t automatically going to recognise you in the search results, and traffic via search could be quite expensive for the earlier stages of the funnel where people aren’t sure what they want just yet. You can utilise the GDN to target consumers contextually or via particular placements at a more cost effective way than bringing in new visitors via search.
I would recommend that you set a different goal for this campaign and try to gather newsletter signups or something of this nature. As display is more of a subconscious form of targeting, you might not be reaching the consumer at the right time that they need your product or service. If you can get them to fill out a form with a few details then you’ll have their data to follow them up periodically. As they have been to your site you can also then place them in a remarketing audience for future targeting.
Looks like a Good idea to start with this path to have the enough insights about the impact to the users and recollect some search terms, right ?
Wait…am I missing something ? Yes, Google Shopping….
As I said at the beginning this post came from a question which triggered me to try to fulfill my perspective about which would be the best PPC approach for the launching of a new product. In my first answer a suggest that using Google Shopping would not be a good decision for the reason I just explained above, about not having enough clues or insight about our future audience and the possible Keywords or search terms we could use.
But, what I was missing is that for the launching of a new product, the Key is to use a multichannel strategy. If you have endless amounts to spend, it would be beneficial to try and focus on all stages of the purchase cycle for your consumer so that they might see you a couple of times along their journey. Of course, the best direct response is going to come from advertising on tightly themed keywords relevant to your product or service, such as specific product names. This might not bring in enough volume for you, especially if your product or service is niche so it is key to think back to the beginning and what people might be searching for.
for the launching of a new product, the Key is to use a multichannel strategy
My tip for those with a tighter budget is to start niche with search advertising then work your way out depending on results and budget. You’ll also want to allocate some budget for a brand name campaign. This won’t spend much at first if your brand is unknown but it will grow with time.
The best feature to be allocating budget to if you’re launching an e-com brand is product listing ads (PLAs) well known as Google Shopping ads. In fact you’ll get a more eye catching ad through showing your product and you’ll get more serious shoppers as your price will already be displayed. Competition is still not as heavy on PLAs as it is on standard search so ensure to get your merchant centre account set up in good time for launching this through AdWords. If this type of advertising applies to your brand make sure you allocate a good chunk of budget towards it.
A good example of the power of this tool is on the Shoes sector, for example, when they want to launch a new model of the nike brand, for example, a user will be more likely to click on one of their Google Shopping ads even if they search for another model, since these ads are in a privileged position as we can see in the following image:
Let’s squeeze even more the potential of google shopping
- Personalized labels and priorities in PLA’s ads campaigns
Wit the personalized labels we can set up to 5 labels (0 to 4) allow you to classify the product categories according to the attributes in relation to your business (profitability, products with a large margin of profit, new products , season, promotion, flash sales, etc.).
With this tool we can bet on the news: we can attribute a specific bid to this “category” or “segment” we labeled with “new products” to get the most out of your launch offer. In fact the added value offered by Google Shopping, is precisely the possibility of segmentation (multi-attributes), which provides specific signals for the engine, in order to guide the impressions of the products according to the strategy implemented
Tipp: Before using custom tags in your feed, you can use them at first to generate an Analytics report that includes secondary dimensions of AdWords. If you notice, for example, that there is no notable difference between the results of a product in the category “summer” and a product “spring” it would not be useful to restructure your campaigns
In fact the added value offered by Google Shopping, is precisely the possibility of segmentation (multi-attributes), which provides specific signals for the engine, in order to guide the impressions of the products according to the strategy implemented.
Is that clear ? let’s see an example of how it works
Let’s assume that we are a Shes or Clothes store, and we have different clothes collection according the season: We can create a “season” label and, depending on the season, publish only those Outwears products that correspond to the “summer” season: maybe summer jackets, or t-shirts. Following the same model, during the period close to Valentine’s Day, you know that there are certain products that look better: regroup them in a bid higher than your other items during certain dates.
But..you saidsomething about priorities ?
Google Shopping priorities allow you to have control over the searches that trigger your ads and about the products shown in each campaign.
.There are 3 campaign priorities: high, medium and low. This functionality (one of the most powerful shopping in my opinion) assigns different levels of priority to the campaigns, allowing you to have control over the searches that trigger your ads and the products that are displayed in each case. You can manage the priorities in AdWords in the “settings” tab at the campaign level.
For example, with the high priority setting you show the Generics campaign first. So if there is a search on Google that matches one of your products, the Generics campaign will show up first.
On the diagrama bellow you can see an example of an structured campaign using prioritites
Final Step: Remarketing and Dynamic Search Ads
We named before, but here I’ll try to get deeper about the power of Remarketing lists for search ads and why they are going to be key for you. If someone has been to your site before via Google search and then continues their search via Google you can target that person if they search on your selected keywords. This gives you a second chance to advertise to them without them realising, this is a lot less obvious than the standard remarketing everyone is used to now! You can then target people searching at different stages of the funnel but who already know your brand. Due to the remarketing audience this type of search advertising won’t need as much budget as your main search campaign.
If you’re launching a new brand and you’re not sure which type of keywords are going to work well for you, you could give dynamic search ads a try. Google will scan your website to match up keywords people type in to the content on your site and then automatically generate a search ad headline and landing page for your consumer. You’ll have control over the line 1 and line 2 ad copy but you won’t get to see which keywords triggered your ads till after the fact. If you choose this strategy you’ll need to be really on the ball with checking your search query reports so you can weed out any irrelevant searches quickly by adding them as negatives. This type of campaign can spend money quite quickly due to the range of keywords it can pick up from your site so decide your budget and make sure you cap it at the level that suits you until you assess the results.
Don’t stop now !!! Analyze your Funnel
The conversion funnel depends on what industry you’re in. As outlined earlier, it’s really important to raise awareness of your brand through advertising on the Google Display Network. This is the best way to get cheaper new visitor traffic to your site. You can ensure it’s relevant traffic by targeting people who are contextually looking at similar products or services to your own or by targeting your chosen demographic.
But also you want to reach people who are going to give you a direct response; this is the search part of the funnel discussed earlier. You’ll then need to follow these people up with remarketing to ensure that they’re kept aware of your brand even after they leave your site.
Bonus Track: Don’t forget Video Ads
If you have a relatively new product, people might need a little more information before going to your website. Alternatively, your video visuals might be compelling and inviting enough that you want to use your descriptions to build a mystery. Either way, run a few variations of the video description or headlines to learn what level of content elicits the best response.
Review the time of day your videos are viewed and various demographics reports for possible insights about your customer and their online preferences.
The competition for keywords in Google and Bing has made paid search an increasingly significant part of the marketing budget, so finding new and affordable ways to reach your target audience is critical for the future of your marketing department. Video ads are increasing in popularity, but fortunately the CPVs are still relatively low, making this the ideal time to invest and test your video ad offerings and tap into an exciting and growing advertising platform.
Read some success stories about the launching of a new product through video ads: https://www.google.com.au/ads/experienced/success-stories/orabrush.html
This the end… until the next post.
Sorry for this looooooong post but this exercise was very useful to realize about different approaches that as a SEM specialist I need to consider for the launching of a new brand or new product.
Did i miss something ? Please don’t hesitate to write me and let me know if you would have a different approach.
Resources used for this post:
Book: THE BUSINESS OWNER’S GUIDE TO GOOGLE SHOPPING: How To Do More With Less With Google Shopping Kindle Edition