← The Paid Search Podcast | A Weekly Podcast About Google Ads and Online Marketing
The Paid Search Podcast | A Weekly Podcast About Google Ads and Online Marketing
3 Reasons Your Google Ads is Wasting Money (Episode 499)
00:26:42
Loading summary
Transcript1 lines
- [00:00]
A
Foreign. Hello and welcome to the paid search podcast. My name is Chris and today I'm going to give you three reasons why your Google Ads is wasting money. I'm going to make this episode concise and focused on something that I see happening a lot in Google Ads and hopefully it'll be very specific to what you're experiencing and will help you. That's the goal of every episode I do here. So if you, if you like this kind of content, you find it to be useful and you're trying to make money or manage clients in Google Ads and this helps you. So be sure and subscribe. It is helpful for me to know that people like the content and appreciate it and if you can give it a rating, that's what I'm here for, is to help you with Google Ads. Let's get started with the most important thing. Whenever it comes to wasting money in Google Ads, it is my number one. And I'm going to give the number one that's actually number one. So I'm not going to do the typical podcast thing where, you know, the best is at the last. I'm going to start with number one right at the top. And it is the keywords that you are paying for in Google Ads is not what you think you're paying for. That's where I'm going to get started here because you see 50 clicks on a keyword and I'm going to tell you the reason your Google Ads is not working, why it's wasting money is because those keywords are not actually getting what you think they're getting. You're not paying for what you think you're paying for. So I'm going to get into that in one moment right after I tell you about optio.com PSP. This is an exclusive offer. You can try my favorite tool in Google Ads management for free for 28 days. This tool will help you get more done fast in Google Ads. It helps you with every aspect from ad copy to keywords to bidding to budget negative keywords. It helps you from beginning to end. This is an exclusive offer. 28 day free trial. That's optio.com PSP that's o p t e o.com PSP for the free 28 day trial. All right, let me, let me give you an example of why your keywords are leading to the most waste in your Google Ads account. So what I have pulled up in front of me, you can't see it, but I'm, I'm looking at it on my screen is A recent audit I was doing on an account, and this company was paying for a specific keyword and trying to gather people looking to hire, looking to bring in a realtor to sell their home. Right? They want help selling their home. So what do you do? You hire a Realtor. They can help you get out there, get listed. Right? Pretty straightforward. There should be tons and tons of searches. So the advertiser puts in the keyword realtor companies. Makes sense, right? If someone searches and goes to Google and types realtor companies, then you know that that's a decent chance that they're looking to hire a realtor. Not the greatest keyword, but we'll get past that. Let's look at why this keyword literally spent $0 on the search Realtor companies. Okay, so to be clear, I'm about to read the actual searches that led to this advertiser paying money. Okay? They put in the keyword realtor companies. And here's what people typed and then spent this advertiser's money when they clicked on the ad. Okay, all of this is happening in Google Ads, right? There's. I'm not talking about anything else. This is not on YouTube or mobile apps or anything like display, network, or search partners. I'm talking about google.com. you put a keyword in. Here's what they got. They got multiple clicks on Realtor. It's not even a real English word. It's C O, M, C, T. I don't even know what that is. Compti. I don't know. Maybe it's the location. I'm not sure. But that is not the keyword Realtor company. That is something else. The next one is for sale by owner and then a city name. All right. In Connecticut. The next one is Anchor Real estate. Sounds like a competitor. Okay, so I've now named the top three things that were typed and this advertiser spent money on for the keyword Realtor companies. Have you heard me say that they spent money on the word real? The search, the actual search, Realtor companies. No, no, they didn't. Because the keyword that they designated does not determine the traffic quality that they receive. Okay, so there's a reason I'm doing just three points. There's a lot of reasons why people waste money in Google Ads, but there's a reason I'm doing just three points because I want to hit concise, egregious reasons why Google Ads is wasting your money. This is by far number one. Your keyword does not represent the quality of traffic that you're receiving. What you need to do is review the actual search terms that are being typed by the searchers. So let's continue. The next one down is Caldwell Realtor. That's a competitor. Right? That's not what they wanted. That's a realtor company, but that's not what they meant. They wanted to have the search realtor company and show up when people search realtor company. Right. Because they are a realtor company. They're trying to reach people that want a realtor company. Nope. Next one. Coldwell Banker Realty. Again, a competitor. This is a major issue with many campaigns is that the keywords don't drive the keyword itself. They drive not only something that's not the keyword, but it's a competitor that's also interested in driving traffic from that same search. So why would you pay for a competitor that has already acquired this client or, you know, the client's already interested in this other realty company. Why would you pay for that? Right. The next one down, Eagle Eye Realty. The next one down, Eagle Eye Realty listings. The next one down, East Hampton, Connecticut real estate. Next one down, Essex, Connecticut real estate. Glasgow Berry Real estate. Lakeside Real estate. Near me. I could go on. I want to, I don't want to make a mockery of this because I think you get the point. This keyword costs money. Every single one of those words I said cost the advertiser money. Did they actually get a, a click on realtor companies or realtor companies near me or anything like that? No, they did not. So again, I say the number one reason why your Google Ads campaign is wasting money is because the keywords that you intend to get clicks on are not a representative of the quality of traffic you are receiving. So what do you do? Well, you don't just pick better keywords. There is a strategic process to choosing the right match type, adding negative keywords, monitoring your search terms, making sure that these keywords don't get out of bound from what you're looking for, managing your bids to make sure your bids, which we're going to get into bids in a second, make sure your bids don't get out of hand so that you're paying astronomically high CPCs, you know, astronomically high cost for these searches that are not what you intended to get clicks for. And this is real money. I mean, I mean this money could have easily paid for an employee, a salesman to go knock on a door. I mean, this is real money going to advertising. That is not efficient. It is wasting Your money, and it's a serious problem. Okay, so number two, let's jump to number two. The second most common reason that Google Ads is wasting money. Already hinted at it. Your bidding strategy is leading to very high CPCs. Now, there is a reason for this. When you are setting up a Google Ads account, Google very subtly presents options to you and makes some of them default. One of the most common default settings is the bidding strategy. And the first one that it usually starts you with is a bidding strategy called maximize conversions. So if most people have a problem with getting the wrong traffic because the actual searches that are triggering their ads don't represent the traffic they want, they don't look like the keywords they typed. Now, on top of that, consider this. Maximize conversions and other bidding strategies that offer no cost control incentive. A Google Ads account cannot manage the cost per click with maximized conversions. You cannot tell Google, don't spend more than $5, $10, $50, $100 on one click. You can't tell Google that They there is no such thing as cost per click management of your of your bids with maximize conversions or even, even other things more friendly things like Target CPA or Target roas or maximize conversion value, any of those. There is no cost control system built in. So now you're not getting the right traffic and you're paying astronomical CPCs cost per click. Your cost per click is astronomically high. Okay, so I have an example. I have an example of another account that I was looking at because I wanted to get practical examples. And you know, I have a screenshot. I'm looking at this account. The average cost per click was about $21, $25. I'm going to read you the actual cost per clicks that were coming through. Starting with the most expensive. They paid one click for $83. They paid for another click that was $74. They paid for another click that WAS $71. Another click they paid was $65. Another click was $53. Another click was $52. I understand that the average cost per click was $20, but in this instance, this client can only spend about 60 to $80 a day. I don't remember exactly what the budget is. Maybe it was 100 a day, I can't quite remember. But basically, you know, a few of these clicks that I've already listed in the $50 range are cutting out 50% or more of their entire budget gone in one click. Did these get conversions? That's not the point. You know, how good were these clicks? That's not the point. The point is, is that these clicks are far beyond the scope of probably what it's worth. You're under the impression that your average cost per click is $20, $15, $30. But in reality, when you actually look at the search terms and look at the actual cost per click data, you'll be astounded. If you're running certain bidding strategies, how much your cost per click is, how much I can tell you I have seen instances where it is in the multiple of hundreds, $200, $300 and up. I absolutely have seen it many times and it happens more often when you have large budgets. So those of you that have large budgets, thousands a day. This is absolutely happening. If you are allowing a bidding strategy that has no cost per click management aspect attached. So how can you control it? Well, you can use bidding strategies that have a ceiling cap that some that have a capacity to cap bids in some way. Manual bids. Does that maximize clicks? Does that Target CPA kind of does that. It mostly does that. I'll give it that. But it's not technically a CPC management. It's more of a conversion conversion management system which affects the cpc. But maximize conversion value, maximize conversions. Those two are most commonly used. I find when people are setting up their Google Ads account, they're very commonly chosen because they are presented first and they have no safety net. There is no cost per click management for those and it is very destructive. It leads campaigns to be extremely wasteful. Okay, so we're on to the third one now. And this one is. I had to decide what my third one was going to be because there's a lot of reasons why people waste money in Google Ads. And this is what I decided on. I think this is it because in the end, it all starts at the beginning. And when you're building a Google Ads campaign, you are presented with a screen, right when you, right after you create a new campaign and name it, the next thing you do is choose a goal. There are seven goals. Total sales leads, website traffic, app promotion, awareness and consideration, local store visits, or custom goal. Those are the seven. Let me say it as plain as I can. Picking a goal does not influence whether that goal is achieved. Choosing leads as a goal in Google Ads does not, you know, mean that you're going to get leads. It is, I would say, mostly, you know, like, mostly ineffective at actually managing the control of, you know, the quality of your traffic. These goals have no direct influence in the success of your Google Ads campaign. Let me, let me, let me explain why that Is because it seems odd. You know, Chris, why do I choose a goal in the first place? And in order to explain this, I have to go back to, you know, what a goal is designed to do. Goals are chosen not because it reflects the success of a Google Ads account. It is directly linked to the recommendations that you're given and in Google Ads, after you set up the account. So Google has all these recommendations that pop up, you know, whether you should use one bidding strategy or another. So if I set up a Google Ads account with the goal of leads, the recommendations I'm going to get are going to be guided towards someone who wants to acquire leads. So it's going to encourage me to add a phone number. It's going to encourage me to use maximize conversions. It's going to encourage me to use maybe target CPA at some point. It's going to encourage me to use wide geographic targeting, you know, specific things. Perhaps a Google Ads lead form is going to be on there because I have chosen to as my goal to be leads. So that's a problem because recommendations mean nothing. I mean, that, that does not affect how your keywords perform. It doesn't affect how your, your bidding strategy manages your bids. Because this exact same campaign could be built the exact same, same, same way. And maybe I chose website traffic as my goal. Now Google's going to give me suggestions that is different from the exact same campaign with a different goal built from the beginning. So now website traffic is going to be focused on all kinds of stuff. Like, you know, it's going to encourage me to use, maybe maximize clicks. It's not going to tell me anything about setting up a conversion tracking system or are using conversion value optimization or, or putting a phone number in, right? Because my goal is to get traffic that is, you know, just as much traffic as I can get the right people, right? I just want to get traffic, you know, which by the way, is a, it's a bad goal. But regardless, the point is whether I choose sales leads, website traffic, or any of the other seven, it means nothing to the actual performance of the account. It does not affect how well my campaign is going to do. So this is a problem because now we're at a point where, you know, you build the campaign, you follow the instructions, you choose a goal that has no influence to the performance. You choose a bidding strategy that's put before you based on that goal, which has no influence. And then this bidding strategy emphasizes just getting traffic at a unmanaged cost per click. And then to cap it all off we have keywords that don't get the intended traffic that you're looking for. This trinity of crap is why your campaign wastes money. It's because the system reinforces goals that don't mean anything towards a bidding strategy that is unmanaged and uncontrollable for keywords that are driving traffic that is providing no value for your business. And I say no value very lightly. Of course there are some searches that are worth it, that are good, but everyone wants to spend less and get more, right? I mean, that's the point. You want to spend less on Google Ads and get more, get more conversions. I want to be more efficient. I don't want to spend more money and get the same. I want to spend the same money and get more or spend less money and get the same. Right? That's what we're looking for. So how do you set yourself apart from this? How do you set, how do you set aside all the wasteful things you know, how can you get in the right mindset to make sure that you're not wasting money? How can you make the right decisions so that you're not wasting money in Google Ads? I'm going to tell you, I'm going to tell you in just a second. Optio.com PSP is still available. It is still an option if you'd like to try this amazing software that I highly recommend. It can help you get more done in Google Ads. I really work a lot with Optio. You know, they, they, they communicate a lot with me about changes and things they're doing and plans. And over the past year they've been a little quiet. And I found out why recently. And I can tell you there are big changes coming. The tool is growing and becoming even more expansive and powerful. The announcement towards that is coming soon. Can't tell you quite yet, but I can tell you the tool is getting even better and you're gonna like it. Optio.com PSP for the free 28 day free trial. All right, so how do we get in the mindset? How do you get in the mindset of not wasting money in Google Ads? You have to have your priorities straight. Put step one in, in the right place. You put step one as step one. Your goal in Google Ads starts with the biggest problem that I discussed as point number one. What was point number one? Your search terms. Your actual traffic, not your keywords, not your cost per click, not your goals. The number one thing you do in Google Ads to begin with at square one is get the Right traffic. You have to get the right traffic. Getting the right traffic for your business leads to qualified traffic coming to your site. Qualified traffic has a higher likelihood of converting, calling, purchasing, buying something, whatever you want done on your site. They have a higher chance of doing that because they're the right people for what you're selling, what you're offering. Now we have something to work with. Now we have a goal that we're acquiring. Not because I chose an option in Google Ads, not because I chose a bidding strategy that says we're going to maximize conversions. No Google Ads success comes with putting step one first, and that is qualified traffic. You get qualified traffic. That's phase one of Google Ads. Get the right search terms. When every single thing you pay for 90%, 90% of your search terms should be qualified. Now, that's it. I say that like that step one, like it's easy to do, it's not easy to do. But that is step one. Once you achieve that, you bring traffic to your site that's more likely to convert. Now we move on to step two. Phase two of Google Ads is to reach your cost per conversion. Right? You start getting conversions and you start to achieve your Google Ads conversions in step three, right? Your cost per conversion is now moving down. It's getting better. Instead of $200 CPA, it's now $100 CPA. Now it's a $50 CPA. Now we're talking. Now we're actually making money. Starts off at a 100 ROAS. Now it's a 200. Now it's a 300. Now we're making money. Now you've moved yourself into phase three. Phase three is when you've now acquired traffic at a manageable, profitable acquisition rate. Now you're in phase three, and phase four is the fun one Scale. Grow, test new things. Don't start your campaigns assuming that you can begin at phase three or even phase two. Every campaign starts at phase one. Focus on getting the right traffic and move forward from there. That is the first principle of Google Ads. You build campaigns based on strategic relevance, and then you move into the phases of Success. I have 10 episodes right here on this podcast that you can go back and listen to. Episode 385 begins that. Episode 385 is the Principles of Google Ads. You can listen to that. Then I get into phases of success, and then I get into pay per view value. And I. All 10 principles of Google Ads that I believe in and manage my accounts with for my clients are all discussed there. So you can go back and listen to that. It's totally free. Nothing for you to pay for, no paywalls. It's all there for you guys. Been doing this a very long time. So if you'd like to reach out to me for personalized help with your Google Ads, you can do so. Chris Schaefer.com is the place to go. Otherwise, I'll catch you guys next week.