Improve Sales With Ad Testing
Search engine marketing is the most potent form of advertising available today. The best part is that you can advertise to people who are actively searching for the products/services you offer.
And why should your client advertise on Google? According to Statcounter, the first and the most convincing place in Search Engine Market Share Worldwide report for the last 12 months is held by Google, followed by Bing and Yahoo!. Comparing to August 2019, Google has lost less than a half percent of its search engine market share, making that 92.05% in August 2020.
Still, success in advertising on Google doesn't come that easy. Countless companies face setbacks because they cannot improve their sales; in fact, they're wasting large budgets in Google ads only to not see results. They have no strategy or systematic approach to what they're doing, and they don't use analytical insight to cash in their efforts.
To become successful, you have to have the knowledge, to test like a maniac and realize it takes time to scale up your (client's) business.
And you probably do have all the above skills, yet you have hit a wall and don't know what to do to increase sales. Not to mention you're operating in an insanely competitive market and/or you have a modest budget.
A tool that will give you a boost toward your goal in advancing sales numbers is, of course, A/B testing.
As the process of making small variations to your ad campaign, A/B split testing helps you recognize if the changes you want to implement will have a positive impact on results. You rely on the gathered data to make a fair analysis of what you should and should not tweak in your ad copy.
As you know, a strategic A/B testing is a tremendous technique with considerable gains. By exercising split testing as a continuous step in your ad optimization, you will enhance your ad quality. This will further push customers' right buttons and boost conversions.
However, sometimes this method alone can't do the job.
So what can you do to further improve your client's conversion rate?
Include remarketing and combine RLSA campaigns and A/B testing.
While display remarketing is highly used and most often associated with remarketing in Google Ads, a remarketing list for search ads (RLSA for short) is a feature that allows you to customize your search ad campaigns for people who have previously visited your website.
If you haven't used RLSA so far, you might not fully understand how you can apply it to reach your sales goals.
Other than adjusting bids and broadening your keywords, what else you can do with RLSA is to customize ad text.
Let's say you own a handmade jewelry store. If somebody searches for handmade jewelry, but they don't know your brand (you are "Abby's handmade jewelry"), then they won't search explicitly for you but rather perform more general queries. They may search for "handmade jewelry" or "unique rings for women."
Maybe they don't convert on the first visit because they aren't ready to buy and/or just start looking into their options. They will most likely do multiple searches before they decide on buying.
When users who have previously shown an interest in Abby's shop search for jewelry again using Google, you can display a different text ad customized based on their website's behavior.
There are higher chances of connecting with your remarketing audience and capturing a sale as RLSAs give you the power to talk to your potential customers next time they type a query that triggers your ad.
With RLSA, you can display a customized text ad for your hot traffic.
If you are advertising high-ticket products or have long sales cycles, RLSA campaigns are excellent to use in such cases.
Some of the remarketing lists that you can create to target with adjusted copy and bids are:
-All homepage visitors
-Visitors of a specific product who didn't add an item to their cart
-Visitors who added a particular item to their cart (visited cart page)
-People who downloaded a free resource etc.
Remember that you need at least 1000 people in your remarketing audience before Google lets you run RLSA ads.
The fact that you need to get to a minimum of 1000 cookies (users) before you can serve tailored search ads, Google justifies as a method to protect the privacy of people who make up your list.
When you set up your RLSA, remember to keep testing.
By testing your ad copy, you will maximize the chances of getting the highest possible click-through rates and conversion rates, which means more profit.
It goes without saying that you have to know your products and numbers to determine whether you're profitable or not.
When you achieve a higher conversion rate without spending more on ads, assuming your traffic is constant and with only variable cost changing, your math will show you an increase in both revenue and profit.