The PPC accounts we create for our clients are important to us, we invest so much time making sure every detail of the settings are correct, we want to make sure the ads are perfect as well as the ad copy tests that we run. With all this investment of time, and adding new ideas, and better ad copies, we may often think that by adding to the account we are making it better. However, this isn’t always true. There is huge benefit in taking a step back and performing an overall audit on the accounts you have been working on. To perform a complete PPC account audit, there are a myriad of factors that you need to look into, however, this article’s focus in on Ad Copy Audits.
What is an Ad Copy Audit?
To explain, an ad copy audit is simply taking a look at the ads you have in each ad group, looking at the statistics for each ad, and deciding what ads are performing well, and which aren’t. When you begin an ad copy audit, it is always important to decide on the date range you are wanting to look at. A range of about 6 months is a good period of time to look over. You will then want to gather all the available statistics over that 6 month period. Once you’ve done this, you will have a whole lot of data next to your ad, all of this data can seem rather overwhelming, but keep in mind that this is just for you to look at overall to see how a specific ad is performing. The statistics you really want to spend a bit more time focussing on is Impressions, Clicks, Conversions and CTR.
I’ve Got All the Information, What Do I Do Next?
Once you have all the information, take a look at the ads you have in a particular ad group and ask yourself, “Do I have enough ads?” “Do I have too many ads?” “Are my ads grammatically correct?” “Am I using the correct punctuation in each ad?” “Are my ads sending the correct message?” “Are my ads repeated?” You may find that an ad is repeated in an ad group, giving you two of the exact same ads in one ad group. Once you have asked yourself these questions, and you’ve decided that your grammar is spot on, you have the correct punctuation and that your ad is sending the right message, you can start looking at the statistics you have gathered. As stated previously, looking at the statistics can be hugely overwhelming, and you may not know what some of them mean, that is alright, as there are only a handful that are going to help you determine which ads you are going to keep enabled and which ads you are going to pause. Keep in mind that you can have as many ads as you want in an ad group, but that just means that you could be spreading the traffic going to that ad group quite thinly. A good amount of ads to have in each ad group is probably either 3 or 4 ads. This may seem a rather small amount, but then keep in mind that the traffic you are getting won’t be spread too thinly, and having 3 or 4 excellent ads is more beneficial than having 10 ads that are repetitive.
You now want to have a look at your statistics. Have a look at your conversions and clicks. We all want conversions, and as many of them as possible, therefore the ads that are converting well, keep them the way they are. The ads that aren’t converting, have a look at them and see the number of clicks they are receiving, as well as their CTR in comparison to the other ads in a particular ad group. If an ad is still receiving a good number of clicks and the CTR is reasonably good in comparison to the other ads, then keep that ad and potentially check the user journey that you are sending your traffic along. However, if you discover that you have ads that aren’t converting, there aren’t a good number of clicks, the CTR is low and there aren’t that many impressions, then possibly pause that ad. By pausing ads that aren’t receiving the desired amount of traffic you are wanting, and aren’t converting, you are able to redirect traffic to the ads that are performing well, and that may mean more conversions in time.
How Often Should an Ad Copy Audit be Performed?
This is entirely up to your discretion. Perhaps every 6 months to a year would be beneficial. Performing an ad copy audit is never a wasted task, anything that can improve performance is always beneficial.
Performing an ad copy audit may seem like a daunting task at the start, especially once you start looking at the statistics, but when working in PPC, the challenge is to always improve what we are doing to achieve the optimum performance for your clients. Our job in PPC operations is never done, and there is always a lack of time to do all the things we would like to do. However, remember to always look for ways to improve the accounts you manage, and a simple way is to perform ad copy audits which enable you to make sure your ads are relevant and performing well.
Want to do an ad copy audit but don’t have the time or expertize? Kaomi Marketing are Adwords Specialists?