What Are Google Search Ads
If you use Google on a regular basis, then you’ve seen search ads, and probably interacted with them. Google Search Ads are text ads at the top of search results.
These ads are triggered and show when a search matches the keywords the advertiser is bidding on. That’s an oversimplification, but we’ll get to that later.
What makes Search Ads effective, is that they show up right when the customer is looking for the advertised service. Unlike a postcard or mailer, billboard, radio ad, etc. you aren’t interrupting someone.
With Search Ads, your ads show up in the top results when someone is looking for your landscaping services. The best part is, these ads are typically PPC or Pay Per Click. Which means you don’t have to pay unless the ad is clicked on. This saves you money and gives you an advantage over more traditional forms of advertising which you pay for whether it gets someone’s attention or not.
Why do they work for Landscaping Contractors
As mentioned above you can target based on keywords, so you’re much more likely to have your ad shown to someone who is interested in buying or wanting to learn more about landscapers, landscape designers, and landscaping companies in their area. But it goes far beyond that.
Here are a few of the other ways you can target people searching for you services so you can get the best possible leads:
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Demographics (locations, ages, genders, and device types)
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Affinity (interests)
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Location (Included or Excluded)
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Income Level
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Keywords and Phrase
You can see targeting a possible lead looking for the right service (keyword), in the right age bracket, and at or above an ideal income level, and in the right location, is going to far outperform other forms of advertising where you are showing your message to anyone who will look or listen.
Another reason search ads are great is their ability to exclude people. Want to avoid showing your ads to the DIY crowd? You can use negative keywords to weed out those people and never show your ads to people looking for instruction for how to do the work themselves. There are plenty of resources available for someone wanting to do the project on their own, and you don’t want to pay for that person’s click, which is why a comprehensive negative keywords list are always part of a successful Google Search Ads Campaign.
Google Ads (PPC) vs. SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
At this point you might be wondering about SEO.
SEO is great for landscaping companies and your company should have a long term SEO strategy or be working with an SEO professional like Wild Oak Media. But SEO can take months to be really effective.
Google Ads and other PPC campaigns are much faster and can start getting you results within hours or days of getting started. The one advantage of SEO is the results from a good SEO campaign tend to last longer even after the campaign has stopped. Whereas with Google Ads or any other type of PPC campaign, once you stop paying, your ads come down right away.
That’s why we recommend running both Google Ads and SEO campaigns to get long and short term results for your landscaping company. PPC gets your employees to work, and SEO keeps them working by providing long term organic search results and leads.
If you have any questions about using PPC Google Search Ads for your company let us know.