10 NEW WAYS TO USE PPC TO DRIVE SALES

Using good old sales promotion techniques reveals new ways to improve the way you use Google Adwords

Everyone knows that PPC can drive sales and much attention is paid to paying the right amount for the searched for phrases and then getting the optimum ranking. Especially now that online spend has overtaken traditional media. Yet now might actually be the time to start looking at it as a media and not be as constrained in to doing the same as everyone else. By looking creatively at this as simply a form of advertising then it is easy to see that  two key elements of marketing have been shortchanged in the simplistic pursuit of price and position.

They are BRANDING and PROMOTION.

In starting to think what message are you delivering  you can start to think to encourage the click through there and then. For the capability in Google and all PPC campaigns which is most overlooked in terms of message is that of IMMEDIACY. No other media offers the facility to decide upon and offer and allow you to have it on offer right away!

So how to drive sales with immediacy in mind? It is really quite simple – just make an offer! Make it immediate and call for action now. So all of these ideas come from  the old Sales Promoters Almanac…. Think of each of them in the context of your brand and product and what you can and should offer in the context of the constraints of the Adwords  struture.

No 1 Only 10 products left… Order today to get the best price

Driving response through implied shortage will bring out the true potential buyer

No 2 Hurry only 48 hours to go

Time running out is a constant theme is all of our lives so why not harness it creativley to drive buyers to your site rather than another

No 3 Save £10 today

Everyone wnats a saving so offer it as a reward for simply taking action. By the way just like ‘tomorrow never comes’ then ‘today is always today’ !

No 4 Buy one get one free … if you apply today

Here again is an offer yet now introducing the most powerful word in marketing FREE but in its BOGOF form costs less to you the marketer. For FREE can be sued ijn so many ways..

No 5 Free Audit, Service or Survey

Simply offer and introdcution to your service as an incetive to vsist your site. In fact it may well be an offer you are already making on your site that you are now to use in the PPC campaign

No 6 Free Gift

This can be offered simply for visting the site with registration or with a purchase. You could consider making it a mystery gift using perhaps those leftover premiums from last years promotions to be revealed only when on the landing page!

Yet there is another very powerful word in the marketing lexicon we have yet to use – WINFor with today’s loose interpreatation of the Betting & Gaming Law in the UK means basically….

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY  BUT ONLY ONE ENTRY A DAY

So win in a free draw can be useed to encourage a site visit. And WIN can be used in many ways as a simple prize fund with only a site visit required with nothing to buy just take a look and of cousre you can choose the prize fund to suit you…

No 7  Win a holiday

No 8  Win £100

From many years of  running draws and competitions I can tell you that whilst we all in the end would prefer the cash likelihood to enter is higher with a tangible prize.

No 9  Win a saving

The saving could be on a product or extra points in the loyalty scheme or a voucher /money-off coupon

No 10  The first 100 vsitors get a free…

Give the market the impression that you ar a busy site and encourage traffic at the same time.

Over to you

Now you have the diea of using PROMOTIONAL TECHNIQUES as part of your PPC campaigsn and BRINGING OUT THE OFFERS ALREADY ON THE SITE you will be easily able to devsie your own offers realting to your BRAND, product or service. Howver now you will do so safe in the knowledge that you are gaining a competitive advantage over your competitors and Google makes it immediate!

Well I didi say that these ideas come from the Old Sales Promoters Almanac so in trues sales promotion style her is an EXTRA idea…

No 11 Impacful Landing Page

OK no so much an idea as a means of implementing I grant you but as a landing page may well be much easier to produce / change that the site istself and it will increase promotional impact I commend it to you. And in the hope that you might consider using Sales Promotion more actively on line!

I indebted to my friends at Sleeping Giant Media who understand more about PPC than anyone I know for input

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1. Google wants to give me £30