The Secret to Tweaking Your Google Adwords Campaign for a Mobile Market Mobile searches are increasing at fast pace but advertising to an audience on the move is different from the same audience at their desktop.
By Brett Relander Edited by Dan Bova
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Mobile searches have increased by 400 percent over the last three years. If you are not advertising on mobile, you are missing out on potential customers.
Google Adwords remains the biggest search advertising platform. At a conceptual level, a mobile AdWords campaign requires attention to planning, execution and analytics in the same degree as a regular Adwords campaign but certain aspects are unique to the mobile landscape. Advertisers need to keep these in mind.
Related: 3 Things You Probably Don't Know About Google Adwords
Begin by studying the various mobile advertising formats offered by Google and their benefits. Google has put up several useful articles that outline how to best use a Google AdWords mobile campaign to fulfill objectives such as building a brand, increasing mobile app downloads and driving conversions to generate sales.
Mobile search is more intent-driven than corresponding desktop use. A mobile user who is on the move has different needs that require quick resolution. Advertisers need to keep this in mind when creating ad copy as well as landing pages. You should ideally drive mobile traffic to a mobile-specific landing page that enables quick scanning of information and has fewer fields to fill.
Google AdWords allows advertisers to geo-target their ads and place bids. Similarly, it offers tools to track conversions such as mobile calls, in-store purchases, app downloads and purchases completed using another device. You need to have a clear idea of what your top performance metrics are and focus on improving those. For example, a games app developer can designate app downloads as a conversion metric without worrying too much about targeting locations. On the other hand, a restaurant needs to show up on the sponsored results when a mobile user searches for a restaurant in the area.
Related: 3 Alternatives to Using Google Adwords
Data suggests that an AdWords campaign designed specifically for a mobile audience can generate a CTR of up to 11 percent. But it is worth noting that Google now does not support device-specific targeting of PPC ads. You can still use the feature "bid modifiers" that allows you to direct your spending toward mobile placement. The key here is to optimize by conversion tracking, weeding out non-performing keywords and formulating a holistic plan around the keywords that drive conversions.
Avoid using the same keywords that you would for a desktop campaign. Mobile users avoid lengthy keywords. Shorter keywords are the norm here. This is also important because mobile text ads from Google have a 36-character limit.
An important factor to consider when determining a budget for mobile ads is user behavior. To begin with, desktop user behavior can serve as a measure for adjusting bids for mobile AdWords keywords.
At the heart of your mobile AdWords campaign lies your understanding of what a mobile audience wants. It could be directions, store hours, availability or an online purchase. Your website should enable fulfillment of the search objective quickly and easily with as few clicks as possible. Google has made it clear that it prefers responsive websites to mobile-specific versions of desktop websites. That's just as well, as it frees advertisers from worrying about duplicate content.
Finally, consider complementing your Google campaign with a Bing ads project. It offers the benefit of device-specific ad placement and allows you additional testing and metrics to gather.
Related Book: Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords
Related: Common Google AdWords Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
