Optimize Your Google Ads Campaign Limited By Budget

Graphic depicting Pay Per Click and Google Ads campaigns are an inexpensive way to reach new interested audiences.

You’ve heard it time and time again: Google Ads are an inexpensive way to reach new interested audiences! That sounds fantastic on the surface but what many consider “inexpensive” is not realistic when it comes to the marketing budgets of many small businesses. If a small business is lucky enough to invest in Google Ads, they often quickly deplete their funds thanks to rising ad click costs caused by competitors bidding on the same keywords. Although it seems like a no-win situation, that’s actually not the reality. Fortunately, Google Ads’ targeting and reporting features can help small businesses like yours maximize its limited budget.

Key takeaways to successfully run a low-budget Google Ads campaign:

  • Understand that Google Ads allows small to midsize companies to participate alongside the bigger companies and large corporations regardless of budget constraints
  • Properly structured Google Ads accounts must track conversions, utilize keywords, implement a schedule to maximize budgets, target local audiences, develop a bid strategy, make adjustments when necessary and connect with previous site visitors
  • Speak with a PPC marketing expert to receive a free marketing evaluation

 

Build a Better Account Structure

When a system is disorganized, it’s not going to run properly. Same logic applies to Google Ads accounts. Properly structured accounts with tightly themed ad groups with relevant keywords not only help ensure that the searches that trigger your ads reach the appropriate audiences, they also keep your quality score high which results in low cost-per-clicks and better ad positioning on search results pages. If your business has an existing Google Ads account, we suggest auditing your campaigns to ensure they are properly structured for maximum relevancy.

 

Track Your Campaign Conversions

In the Google Ads universe, conversion tracking allows your business to identify its best, and worst, performing campaign components like keywords and paid ads to improve return-on-investment (ROI). Businesses that use conversion tracking data to advise campaign optimizations make more informed decisions and manage their campaigns and budgets more effectively. For example, you can easily remove non-serving keywords and replace underperforming ads that are costing you money without losing any valuable leads.

 

Add Negative Keywords to Your Campaign

Here’s one negative practice that’s actually a positive. Negative keywords are keywords that prevent your ads from appearing in search engine queries unrelated to your business. When you add negative keywords to your Google Ads campaign, it helps you avoid wasting your budget on irrelevant clicks. A good Google Ads practice is to regularly review the search terms that are triggering your ads and identify the query patterns that you should exclude from future campaigns. This will help focus your ad spend on clicks that are more valuable to your website.

 

Create a Google Ads Schedule

That old adage “Stick to the Schedule” definitely pertains to Google Ad campaigns! By creating a schedule that determines when to run certain ads on specific days and/or at prime hours of the day, you can better allocate your ad spend budget. Helpful hint: Designate your ads to run only during business hours or create a schedule based on historically high-performing times to ensure you get the best return-on-investment (ROI) from your ads

 

Use Location Targeting For Local Campaigns

Another great way to reach your intended audience and maximize your budget is to limit the geographic reach of your campaigns to increase targeting. You can easily do this by determining the regions your business serves, then add those locations to your campaign by state, city, zip code, or other available options. To help you pinpoint the physical locations your customers are seeing your ads, we recommend Google Ads’ user location report. If your ads start to frequently appear outside your targeted locations, it’s best to review and adjust your campaign settings to prevent any unnecessary spending.

 

Keep Keyword Bids Low

This is the part that trips up many small businesses. Since Google Ads campaigns involve bidding on keywords, many businesses use an auction-style highest bidder wins strategy. That’s a sure-fire way to quickly spend your entire budget – and not see any valuable results. One of easiest ways to manage a limited-budget campaign is to lower and maintain lower keyword bids. This strategy helps stretch your budget throughout the day. However, there is a catch. While lower bids give your ads the opportunity to show more frequently, they may also sacrifice top-of-the-page placements every time your ads show. That’s why those good quality scores we mentioned earlier are so important. Those scores not only help support lower cost-per-clicks, they can also improve the position of your ads on the search engine results page.

 

Make Bid Adjustments

Another way to get good results on a limited budget is to make frequent bid adjustments. This practice enables your business to show its ads more or less frequently depending on how, when, and where a search occurs. There are many ways to find the answers to these questions. A quick, easy way to see if one ad is out-performing another on a particular device (computer, mobile, and tablet) is to review your website traffic and determine which device is drawing the most visitors. Then you can make a bid adjustment for that particular device. You can also add negative bid adjustments to avoid spending your budget on underperforming devices. Locations, ad schedules, demographics, audiences, and other targeting features are also eligible for bid adjustments.

 

Try Remarketing Lists For Search Ads

Want to target audiences who have already visited your website? Remarketing lists for search ads (RLSA) allows you to create a campaign that reaches those customers. This incredibly resourceful list lets your business customize its ads to appeal to previous site visitors who did not complete a purchase or perform any other action like sign-up for your email list. If your business has an especially restrictive budget, adding a remarketing audience will help limit the reach and spend of your ads.

By offering these opportunities, Google Ads makes it possible for small businesses to have a place at the marketing table regardless of budget size. Managing a low-budget campaign, or any profitable PPC campaign, requires constant monitoring and vigilance; in other words, it requires a whole lot of time. But an effectively structured and strategically optimized Google Ads campaign is a worthy investment for your business

Reach out to Results Repeat today about a free marketing evaluation and learn more about what PPC marketing can do for your business!

Subscribe Now!

Get the latest blog articles from Results Repeat delivered right to your inbox!

    *

    *

    *


    By submitting this form, you agree to receive marketing communications from Results Repeat. You can unsubscribe at any time. See our Privacy Policy for more details.

    Want to Learn More?

    Schedule a Free Marketing Evaluation

    Contact us today to get started!

    Other Posts