The 5 Best Tips for Writing Great PPC Ad Copy

Make Conversions Happen with the 5 Best Tips for Writing Great PPC Ad Copy

If content is king (and everyone hears that it is – time and time again), then your PPC ad copy is the master of the universe. That’s because your ad copy is what can make or break your PPC performance. Mark Twain once said that the difference between the right word and the wrong word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug. While he certainly didn’t have PPC ad copy in mind as he spoke this, his sentiment rings true today. The right words with your ad copy can encourage your visitors to click and convert, while the wrong words can encourage them to flutter away.

Which would you rather happen?

Here are the 5 best tips for writing great PPC ad copy.

1. Grammar/Spelling/Capitalization – There is no way that you’re posting ad copy that isn’t completely spell checked (BY HUMANS), and assessed for grammar issues. We know this (or at least, we’d like to assume you do this). But here are some things to remember: If you wrote the copy, you’re not the person who should be doing the revising/editing, and if you or someone on staff isn’t trained to edit copy, you should freelance this task out.

   Trained copyeditors won’t just check for accuracy and misspellings. They’ll ensure that the message makes sense to your vast audience. They’ll also make sure that you use the right kinds of words (action words, messages wrapped in benefits, not services). And whether you use a trained copyeditor or not, one way to help your ad copy stand out is by capitalizing every word.

2. Call to action – What’s the whole point of your ad copy if you don’t have a clear call to action? The call to action is what spurs the reader into … well … action! That means your CTA should make it easy for your visitors to call or click. CTAs should offer some sort of “reward” for the action, such as “save 15% now!” or “while supplies last!” The more you make it seem like the user will miss out if they don’t act, the more effective your CTA will be.

3. Simplicity with your keywords – When using keyword insertion in your description lines, be careful to ensure you won’t be inserting any weird pairings. You have to evaluate every keyword in your Ad Group to see if they make complete sense individually as well as when grouped together. To provide an example of what might occur, broad and phrase-match keyword queries might insert the keyword from your account, rather than the keyword inputted by the searcher, which is why you want to closely evaluate your keywords and keep them simple.

4. Ad-Groups – Make your Ad Groups tightly themed so that you can easily create ads for each of your products with the power of a spreadsheet. For example, by naming an Ad Group “Brand_Product” you can then parse out the actual product name in Excel and integrate that into your Description Line 1 or Line 2. This is likely as effective as keyword insertion, however, also provides you far more control over the “final look” of the ad, and increases your chances of avoiding ads that come across as unprofessional or funny sounding.

5. Don’t be so quick to change – Promotions are a fantastic way to increase clicks and conversions. However, many people often change out ad text of a well performing ad for the new text. This could hurt that ad today and in the future. So before you change out your ad text for a promotional text, consider doing one of the following: You could “fold” the promotional ad text into your ad by dropping it into the ad group, then setting the campaign ad distribution settings to rotate for a handful of days. Or, you could use AdWord Experiments. With this, what you’d do is deliver the promotional ad text as a “test” and the standard ads as “experiments.” Or, to really minimize the impact you have on your standard ads, you can consider putting your promotions within your sitelinks.

While there are many more tips you can use to optimize your ad copy, these 5 tips are a great way to get started and remain focused. As always, it’s best to learn from experience. Continue to measure your ads, and determine which styles of ad copy are most effective to your specific target audiences. As with ads in general, your content will likely change throughout the year, as consumer behavior and thinking adapts to certain seasons.

The best way to ensure your ad copy is up to par is to seek out the expertise of professionals. At OperationROI, we know how to assess, refine, and optimize your PPC ad copy to make sure your ads are performing to your expectations. Call us at 1-888-277-5429 or fill out our contact form to learn how we can help you breathe new life into your PPC ad copy.