Essential Pay Per Click testing tips for beginners

Being visible online is vital for small businesses, and one quick win is to run a Pay Per Click (PPC) campaign to get visitors to your website.

Testing is a fundamental aspect of successful PPC advertising and will help you avoid wasting money on ads that aren’t working. If you are a novice to PPC advertising, here are some fundamentals to bear in mind as you start testing your ads.

Make sure you have enough data

To get meaningful results, make sure you have enough data to go on before making a decision. A good rule of thumb is to wait until you get about 100 clicks before analysing your results.

If you are only making small changes then you’ll need to run your test for longer before you can be sure of your results.

Test ad copy more than anything else

The vast majority of your testing should focus on testing the copy in your ads. The words you choose should entice people to click your ad.

The headline is the most important aspect of your copy because people may not read the rest of your ad. Mentioning the key benefits of your product in your headline will help persuade people it is worth buying. Compare how ads with different benefits perform to see which ones matter most to customers. You also want to try and make some emotional connection with your potential customers. Consider their likes and dislikes writing copy that will connect with them.

Your call to action is another crucial piece of copy to test. You can try out more forceful wording like “Buy Now” or a more subtle variation which simply says “Shop Here”.

You could use longer ad copy to address any barriers that might prevent people buying from you. Include information that will act as a trust signal, such as social proof, or highlighting a media mention by saying something like “As Featured in The Sunday Times.”

Test landing pages

Of course, it’s no good having a killer ad only to have people click away the instant they see your landing page. So, make sure you test creating an effective landing page.

Don’t shy away from big redesigns either because they could be exactly what you need to make a real impact.

Try testing landing pages with different types of rich media, such as videos or picture backgrounds. Once more, your call to action is key here, so try using different wording for it and moving its position on the page. Including trust signals like social proof and media mentions are also still relevant.

Whatever you do, don’t forget to make sure your landing page works well on the devices your buyers tend to use.

Optimise for mobiles

You should absolutely be testing how to make your ads more effective for users on mobile phones. You can do this in a number of ways but one simple one to try is including copy that says, “Browse our mobile-friendly website.”

You can also test stripping away elements that will affect your load time on mobile phones, like large images. Consumers typically expect a page to load in two seconds.

Copy heavy information is a turn off on mobile phones, so keep your ads short and to the point. Headings are even more important on mobile phones – so be sure to test making these as persuasive as possible.

Pay Per Click testing can make a real difference to the success of your ads and this article only covers a handful of ideas to get you started. Don’t lose heart if you don’t land on a winning ad straight away, you will still learn valuable lessons you can use to optimise your ads.

Alex Jones, Digital PR Consultant, Adzooma