Get More Out of PPC with Targeted Landing Pages & Lead Nurturing

If getting more 'clicks' out of your PPC campaign is the primary goal of your online ads, now is the time to re-evaluate not only your metrics but some of the tactics you can implement to get a better return on that investment.  While inbound marketing emphasizes organic traffic, there are reasons to use PPC as a complement to your inbound efforts.

HubSpot customer, Huthwaite, an international sales training company, decreased their cost per PPC lead from $400 to $10 by focusing on quality conversions instead of click volume. 

Here are some of the most important things they did that you should consider today:

• Bidding on a small number of keywords limits your ability to rank on them - so go broad and target 1000 keywords not 100

• Using a sole Ad Group limits you to just one phrase for your Ad Copy - different searches and preferences will lead people to click on one versus another.  Consider using multiple Ad Groups with similar ad copy to increase your chances for a click through and to test which ads have the best conversion.

Send PPC Visitors to Simple, Targeted Landing Pages

• The number one mistake businesses make with PPC is sending all that expensive traffic to their home page.  This visitor clicked on a very short and specific phrase based on their search and mindset at the time.  Once she arrives on your site, she wants to immediately understand how your product, service or download will meet her need.  If she doesn't, she might click around with no idea what you can offer or she'll bounce.  More likely than not, she'll bounce and click on the next result who may have a tailored offer she'll convert on.
• Each PPC campaign should have a very specific landing page that reflects your ad copy and speaks to what that searcher was seeking.  Keep your form short and limit any unnecessary navigation options so that your visitor has only two choices: complete the form or leave.

Follow up with Targeted Nurturing Campaigns

• Now that you've gotten this visitor to convert into a lead, hopefully lots of visitors and leads, you have a short window to make an impression.  She may be ready to buy now or may need more information and time to think about her next steps.  Instead of trying to frantically call or personally email every lead, let technology help you out.  Send her a few follow up emails over the course of the next 24 hours all the way out to several weeks with information that corresponds to her initial search and conversion.
• Most lead nurturing tools will let you set up multiple campaigns so that each PPC campaign you run for a unique offer can have a corresponding series of emails with relevant content, promotions or offers that will prompt a second conversion and let your sales team know that this is a really hot potential lead

Build Campaigns with 1000s of Keywords & Multiple Ad Groups

HubSpot's own lead nurturing campaigns also correspond to the type of offer that a lead has converted on - if they got an eBook on Facebook, then they get nurtured with the Social Media campaign.

I wish I could say that you'd all reduce your cost per lead by a HUGE amount like Huthwaite did, but I can't.  If you are doing none or only some of the best practices above, I am pretty confident that you'll see some improvement in conversions making every dollar that you do decide to spend on PPC that much more rewarding.  Then maybe you can spend some more money or time on creating remarkable content to improve your organic rankings that'll last forever.

What are you doing to improve the ROI on your PPC?

Double Your PPC Leads at Half the Cost

Join HubSpot's Mark Roberge to learn how to generate more leads and lower your cost per lead from your PPC. View this on-demand webinar to learn about low-cost lead generation!

Comments

Posted by Kirsten Knipp on Tue, Nov 09, 2010 @ 09:00 AM