Your Google Adwords account should be choosing the headline for your next Postcard Campaign
Firstly, I’ve spent a lot of time, money, and testing learning what I’m about to share with you…. So please do me a favor and don’t pass this along to your Ad Agency… (They may claim they are doing something similar but they aren’t… This just isn’t mainstream stuff.)
And I’m not an ad agency (and have no desire to be one). I grew up in a Culligan family, I’ve owned my own Culligan dealerships, I’ve personally been to over 100 Culligan dealerships doing software setup, training, and consulting. In short I’m a business owner with a lot of experience in the Culligan business and the Culligan business is marketing.
In the world of marketing, Internet changed EVERYTHING. For the first time ever, we marketers aren’t just limited to demographics, psychographics, geographics. or even purchasing history and patterns. For the first time in marketing history we can actually read the minds of our prospects.
Seriously, think about that one for a second. We know what our prospects are actually THINKING. How do we know this? Because they tell us, of course. They sit down at their computers and pull up Google and type in exactly what’s on their mind. And you have the ability to see that and respond with an ad.
So the big question is, How are you (or your ad agency) responding to that thought?
The typical ad agency is a big fan of beating the BRANDING drum. They say things like, “We just need to get your name out there,” and “the more people who see your ad the better we’ll be.” So when they setup an ad campaign they’ll display an ad that looks kinda like this:
Culligan Water Nebraska
$9.95/month for Soft Water
Great Softeners and Service
Call 1-800-Culligan
In the old school world of not knowing what our customers were thinking we had to guess. We had to guess that they recognize the Culligan name and that it would pull some weight. We also had to guess at which offer they wanted to see and for which product. In other words, an ad agency will generally market on Adwords like they’d market in a direct mail post card campaign.
So what’s wrong with that?
- Google charges you more per click the worse your ad performs. In other words, the more people who see your ad and don’t click, the more you’ll have to pay for the people who do click. We Googly experts like to call this a “Stupidity Tax.”
- You KNOW their thoughts so why not use that to your advantage?
- You can test multiple ads with different headings and offers to find out what works and then transfer that back to your print advertising.
1. The first one is pretty straight-forward. If your Ad Agency doesn’t understand that concept and their best ads aren’t pulling at least a 1% Click-Thru-Rate, you’re literally throwing money away every month. As a point of comparison, my best ads will pull over a 8% Click-Thru-Rate.
2. The second is again “obvious”, right? But as my father used to say, “The only thing common about common sense is that it’s uncommon.” Let me give you an example. If you go to a search engine, type in “drinking water,” and ad pops up talking about a water softener, how likely are you to click on it? Through various testing I’ve come up with 8 “thought groups” for online marketing for a Culligan dealership and I’m always working on more. Overall I’ve tested over 100 different Ads to figure out what works and what doesn’t. Guess what? The same ads don’t pull best in every market. Would you like to know which ads will work best for all of your print media in your market?
3. This is where the majority of people are really missing out. If your ad agency has never once called you to tell you which offer or Adwords tagline is pulling best for you to test in your local newspaper, it’s time to ask them to focus on the areas where they are experts, and then contact me to be your Adwords guru. In the world of online marketing, they obviously just don’t “get it.” Keep in mind, I work hand-in-hand with ad agencies. My goal is not to replace them but to make them better and a bit more accountable. Moreover, when you work with my team, we’ll ask for your input from your print ads so we can test tag lines and offers to scientifically determine which will generate a better response for you BEFORE you print a single newspaper insert or post card.
How much value does that add to all of your marketing?
Let me give you a quick example of how you use online information and transfer it back to standard marketing mediums.
Does any of your marketing say “Free Water Analysis”? Think about it for a second… Yellow Pages, post cards, website, newspaper, handouts…
Now consider this… In my online marketing I’ve found that people are more than 12x more likely to search for a term containing the words “water test” or “water testing” than “water analysis.”
Sure that’s probably because most people can’t spell analysis but more importantly, if people are thinking about a “water test”, is there any benefit in marketing a “water analysis”? Did your current Google Adwords marketer tell you that? This is just one example. I can give you half a dozen.
So right now you are in one of 2 positions…
- You aren’t doing online marketing with Google in which case you should fill out the contact form on the right immediately so we can chat. Recently a small Culligan dealer in a very low hardness market asked me to start marketing for them online. Within 4 days I’d sent 24 people in their local market to their website.
- You are already working with an Ad Agency or Google Marketer.
If you or your co-op are already working with a Google marketer, you may want to try this:
- Find out who is maintaining your Adwords marketing.
- Get a report of performance (leave the definition of performance up to them).
- Find out how much you’re spending on average each month and how many clicks you’re getting for that money.
- Call me and over the phone I’ll step you through a 15-minute test to help you figure out if your ad agency truly “gets it”
- If they get it, then you can feel good that you invested 15 minutes of your time to double-check.
- If they don’t “get it”, contact me to take over your Adwords management, and I’ll get you better results for up to 60% less than you’re currently spending.
It’s that simple to drive down your cost per sale and improve your ROI. Online marketing presents us with a power that we’ve never seen before. If your Google Marketer doesn’t fully embrace that paradigm shift, then hopefully your competitors’ Google Marketer doesn’t either.
To your online marketing success,
Bryan Trilli
P.S. It’s very easy to choose a company to do your online marketing. Ask for proof. Whoever can send the most clicks to your website for the least amount of money wins. EVERYTHING is tracked in the world of Search Engine Marketing so demand nothing less. Use the form on the right to contact me to see my proof.
