A brand campaign (if you are not familiar with this form of advertising) is a search campaign that uses keywords that are specific to your company. This can include the name of your business, the names of your products, and even the names of your team members if you are a doctor or lawyer. In these efforts, your brand name may be misspelt in ways that people often do. Many of our clients worry that brand ads will waste their money or even take away from their site’s natural traffic.
One of the most common questions we get about brand campaigns is, “Why should I pay for clicks on my brand name if I’m already at the top of the organic listings?”. It’s a fair question, since the idea behind pay-per-click advertising is that you pay for each click. Should any money be spent on branded keywords when funds are tight and non-branded keywords cost a lot? Yes, is the short answer. In fact, you should bid on your own brand name in all of the big search engines for more than one reason.
Here are seven reasons why you should use Google Ads to run a brand campaign…
#1: Control Your Brand Message
You get to choose the message, which is one of the best things about running search ads. When Google crawls your site to add it to its search results, you don’t have much say over what information appears. Even though you can tell Google what parts of the meta description or title tag it should show, it will often try to match the user’s search query. This means that your listing could look jumbled, pull in pages that aren’t relevant, or even cause comments to be misunderstood. When you pay Google to show an ad, on the other hand, you have full power over the message.
#2: Control Your Search Engine Results Page
Search engine results pages, which are called SERPs in the online marketing world, are always changing. Google is always changing their user interface and making different guesses about what a user wants when they look. This means that a user’s search engine results page will look different based on where they are and what they are looking for. One thing that stays the same through many of these changes is ads. Adding ads to your brand campaign can help you show up higher on a SERP, which makes it more likely that a possible client will click on your site instead of another one.
#3: Protect Your Brand From The Competition
Not everyone knows this, but YOUR brand name can be bid on by other companies. This means that your competitors can steal people who are going to visit your site, and they can do this pretty cheaply. Some people who might view your site might be smart enough to avoid the ad and click on your site instead, but many others might go to your competitor’s site instead. With a brand campaign, it’s easy to beat competitors who are trying to steal your business, and it doesn’t cost much to do so. Also, because Google wants its users to have the best experience possible, it usually lets brands bid on their own keywords for a lot less than a competitor would.
#4: Compete On Your Generic Brand Name
If your brand name is pretty generic, like Best Plumbers, London, or says exactly what you do, such as Liverpool Dental Surgery, you need a brand campaign as part of your Google Ads plan.
By adding a brand campaign to your mix, you can keep rivals from bidding on generic names that resemble your brand name.
#5: They work well with other Advertising Channels
Even though Google Ads is one of the most popular ways to advertise, it is by no means the only one. At any given time, you can use hundreds of digital and traditional advertising sites, and almost all of them can be boosted by branded search campaigns. Social and display advertising have grown a lot in the past few years, and big companies are putting ads in as many places as possible to reach as many potential customers as possible. Even though these channels can lead to sales, they also tend to make potential customers more aware of your business. Not everyone who sees a social or display ad takes action right away, so a brand campaign is the only way to make sure you get all of that traffic. Traditional ways of promoting, like print, TV, and radio, also make potential customers more aware of a brand. People who hear or see a radio or TV ad about a business are likely to use a search engine to learn more about it. Branded search ads are the best way to make sure you get that traffic.
#6: Convert Lower Funnel Leads
If a possible customer searches for your brand name, it’s likely that they already know about your product or service and are interested in buying from you soon. They usually know what they want and are further along in the buying process than people who search for more general terms. Why not make money off of all that traffic?
#7: It’s NOT expensive
We’re all about finding inexpensive, high-quality keywords, and branded keywords are a great choice. Google wants to give you priority because your website is the best answer to a search for your brand. This means that you are likely to have good Quality Scores and low CPCs, and your budget will go much further.