Adwords Call Extensions Explained
If you run a business or you’re working marketing, you probably love Google’s Ad Extensions. They are notoriously the best way to enhance your paid Google results and provide in depth search results to your site. They are also a great way to encourage people to contact your business, directly.
Now Google’s making it even easier for your customers to contact you through Call Extensions. This changes everything for companies that need to get their customers on the phone. Call extensions allows your business to add phone numbers to your ads which will increase clickthrough rates, significantly. When your call extensions show, customers can click, or tap if on mobile, the call button to call your business directly. Why does that matter?
Without call extensions customers may need to go to your site and search for your phone number or if your number is written in the ad description, they may miss it entirely. By allowing users to click/tap a button that makes a call automatically, your business will have more chances for customer purchases and engagement. You will also get the additional benefit of tracking these conversions through your ads.
How? Adwords.
Adwords will set up an automated call extension when your website has a phone number indicating it as a business goal to include getting more customers on the phone. Other additional features will be:
- Business Hours – Show the hours when your business takes calls.
- Call = Click – Clicks on your number cost the same as clicks on your headlines.
- Conversion Tracking – Count your calls as conversions by turning on call reporting in your account. This is only available on the Search Network and will use Google forwarding numbers to give you detailed conversions.
How This Can Work
Let’s say you own a travel agency, a business that relies on people calling an agent. With call extension a potential client can be searching for cruises from Boston to Italy on their phone. Just so happens you have an agency in Boston, with trips to Spain and you have an ad running with a call extension.
The user searches through Google.com and your ad grabs their attention. They are on their phone and see the call button, tapping it and ringing you immediately. This number puts them directly with an agent who is working specifically on that ad, from Boston to Spain.
Account Levels And Restrictions
There are also different places you can add your call extension which includes in the account, on the campaign, ad group, or ad level and they can run on any search campaign or group ad.
The restrictions that apply are on the Display Network, only the most specific will be used if you create call extensions at different levels. This means when you add a call extension to an ad group, those extensions may show instead of your account-level call extensions just like a campaign-level extension can override an account-level extension.
Display Network Specifics
There are different types of Display Network campaigns that the call extensions can run on.
- Strictly Mobile: Display Network call extensions only show on mobile phones.
- No Call Reporting: Not compatible with call reporting or Google call forwarding numbers.
- Invalid Campaign Types: Call extensions can not be paired with campaigns with a marketing objective of “Install your mobile app” or “Engage with your mobile app”. If it is paired the Display Network only-remarketing or Display Network only will not work.
- Device Preferences: Set your device preference to mobile preferred.
- Eligible Numbers: Vanity numbers, premium numbers, and fax numbers aren’t acceptable numbers for call extensions.
How Do I Implement Call Extensions?
First open up Google AdWords UI. Next click on the next sequence of buttons and selections in this order:
Ad Extensions tab > select Call Extension from the drop-down > +Extension button > Select a campaign and the +New phone number button ← This is where you add your company’s phone number.
Google’s Number vs. Personal Number
If you have a Google number you can add it here as well as this will give you access to call reporting which includes:
- Start and end time and date
- Status – Missed or received
- Duration of the call
- Caller’s area code
- Campaign/Ad Group
- Call Type: Manually dialed or clicked/tapped on button.
If you are not sure what a Google number is, it is a random number (provided by Google) that forwards to your business/personal line.
- Personal Number doesn’t include much so we will list what it does not include:All reporting and counting features like call type, duration, status, time, etc are not included.
No matter the phone number options, if you decide that Google’s Call Extension is beneficial to your company it is wise to set it up now as it is available to start directing customers towards your business, and we can help.
OperationROI is committed to helping your business implement Adwords Ad Extensions to improve your marketing efforts. For more information, contact us today at 1-888-277-5429 or by filling out our contact form to learn more.
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