It goes without saying that when it comes to pay-per-click (ppc) advertising, conversion tracking is one of the most critical aspects of PPC management.
Focusing on PPC core metrics such as cost per click (CPC), click-through -rate (CTR) and quality score as a strategy for measuring campaign performance will only partially reveal your success and failures when it comes to PPC management. In order to gain a more accurate and thorough reflection of your campaign performances you should really be utilising conversion tracking in your PPC advertising campaigns. By using conversion tracking you can get a more accurate indication of your success than just a high/low CTR or high / low CPC analysis.
The Google adwords conversion tracking tool helps you to measure a conversion i.e. a desired action you want a user to take after clicking on one of your ads. By measuring conversions you will be able to gain much more insight into how effective your ads and keywords are in terms of conversion performance. The prospect of knowing that certain keywords or ads that convert really well can help you make more informed decisions to refine the performance of your campaigns on a more effective scale.
How Conversion Tracing Works:
Setting up Google Adwords conversion tracking involves placing a piece of snippet code on the page of your website where you want the conversion to take place (i.e. the conversion page). When a user comes through to your website via a keyword search and a click on one of your ads, a cookie is placed on their computer. If the user performs the desired action that leads them to a conversion page, then immediately the cookie that was placed on the user’s computer initially is sent back to Google’s’ server confirming that a successful conversion has taken place.
Snippet Code
A conversion page is the page the user reaches after taking an action. For example the page they reach after they signed up for a “free download” or the page they reach after they submitted their payment details.
There are one or two limitations to conversion tracking to be aware of however. For example the tracking cookie that is placed on the user’s computer will expire after 30 days. If the user comes to the website via one of your ads and decides to bookmark your page, returns after the 30 day period and completes the desired action during that time, then the conversion will not be registered.
Also some people (usually a very small minority) are just completely anti-cookie orientated. They can be quite touchy about the prospect of cookies tracking their movements across a website. These types of users will almost certainly disable the cookies features in their web browsers. With these cases the opportunity to track a conversion is lost.
The Value of Conversion Tracking; Example:
For instance picture a hotel which advertises their services using Google Adwords. They have conversion tracking set up in their Adwords campaign and have assigned a dedicated conversion page which registers a conversion every time a customer makes deposits on a booking after clicking on one of their ads.
They keep a close eye on the performance of regular pay per click metrics such as CTR and quality score to monitor the performance of their ads. However they are also able to gain extra valuable information by using conversion tracking which enables them to identify which keywords and or ads are not only getting the most amount of clicks but which are also converting to sales.
By assessing which keywords are having the best success in converting to sales they can work out how much revenue each keyword generated.
Knowing that for example a keyword like “ Dublin City Hotels” is generating a 300% return on investment and a keyword such as “Dublin Hotels” is getting a ROI of 100% the PPC manager for this hotel could decide to allocate more of his budget for the “Dublin City Hotels” keyword since he now knows that he is getting an extra 200% ROI on his keyword compared to the other one. This level of accuracy in terms of ROI measurement is one of the main pillars of strength that PPC advertising has over other forms of advertising.
Conclusion
Conversion tracking can help you make better informed decisions when it comes to managing your online advertising. It is an essential tool that when used correctly can reveal a lot of important information which can help you determine what ads and keywords are worth investing in. Measuring PPC performance by using conversion tracking can give you a much more accurate measurement as far as the ROI for your online advertising strategy is concerned.
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