Google Ads 2024: a Quick Guide

Any savvy business owner with an online presence knows that Google Ads is one of the best advertising tools. Not only is it linked to the biggest search engine of all times, but it also has been around for 20 years, making it the number one paid advertising platform in terms of seniority, advanced features, and accessibility.

Most probably, if you are a business owner who sells his products and services online, then you may have already used Google Ads for your campaigns, or at least you are familiar with its prestige.

But, the digital advertising game is ever-changing and you need to keep up with the latest trends if you want to put your dollars to work and see a significant return.

We have put together a quick guide for your 2024 Google Ads campaign, showing what you should focus on and how to improve your existing performance.

Let’s start by laying out the basics.

What to Focus on your Google Ads Campaign?

1. Ad Campaign Types

Content in digital marketing is more varied than ever, and 2024 will make us explore possibilities beyond written content. If you are planning on launching a Google Ads campaign, then it’s important to know that you can choose between three main categories:

a) Search Ads

These are mainly text ads that users see on the Google result page when entering a search query. They are shown amongst the organic search results. Last year, Google has also introduced gallery ads, an exciting feature allowing you to have a carousel visual ad displayed in the SERP, which is mainly optimised for mobile devices

b) Display Ads

Google also shows paid ads in its Google Display Network, a huge group of websites, videos and apps that host ad space. Most display ads are image-based.

c) Video Ads

As you may already know, video content is highly valued at the moment, and Google Ads include this type of content in its campaign preset categories.

So, what type of campaign should you choose? It depends on where your target market audiences prefer to spend their time online and what type of message you want to send across.

2. Bidding Strategies

Smart bidding in Google Ads can maximise your investment when setting a campaign. Google still maintains its role as a versatile tool that can be used by beginners and experts alike, allowing you to choose between automated and manual bidding.

a) Automated Bidding

If you are not confident enough or don’t have the time to handle the bidding yourself, you can just let Google adjust the bids based on your competition, while still being able to control the maximum bidding amounts.

b) Manual Bidding

You don’t have to be a digital marketer to be able to use this tool to your advantage, all it takes is being involved in the monitoring process and adjusting your bids according to the performance of each paid search ad.

Choosing the right bidding strategy is all about using your investment wisely and not put it into poorly-performing ads. This is why split-testing and monitoring your ads is the best way to go, even when choosing automated bidding.

3. Ad Rank and Quality Score

To better understand your ad campaign’s performance, learn more about your ad rank and your quality score. These are key indicators in Google Ads, and it’s wise to keep an eye on them at all times.

Your AdRank shows how high your ad will be on Google’s priority list. In other words, how many people will see your ad, compared to your competition’s content? Obviously, your goal should be to have a high AdRank, so how do you influence that?

Bidding more money on an ad will not be the only thing influencing your ranking. Your Quality Score is also a determining factor in your AdRank, measuring the quality of your ad by looking at your CTR, your keywords, your landing page, and overall performance.

How to make your Quality Score higher?

1. CTR (Click Through Rate)

Your click-through rate is given by the number of people who click on your ad, as a proportion of the number of people who have seen the ad (for example, 3 out of the 10 potential customers who have seen your ad have also clicked on it.)

2. Keywords

Adjusting your keywords is a continuous process in SEO. Matching your ad to the right audience is crucial for your ad to be relevant and receive a good Quality Score.

To have a successful ad, you have to:

● Pick the keywords that match the user’s intent;

● Match your ad copy and description to the right keywords;

● Add and remove keywords from the list until you find the most effective combination.

3. Landing Page

Let’s say your ad is good and your keywords are right for your audience targeting. It doesn’t end here. Once a user clicks on your ad, it’s very important what happens after. Is he seeing the product or services he was actually looking for? Does your page provide an interesting user experience?

If you aim to improve your Quality Score, focusing on just one of the above indicators is not enough, as they actually work together and influence each other greatly. A high CTR is given by well-chosen keywords and a good landing page, which leads to a higher conversion rate.

4. Responsive Search Ads

Part of Google’s expanding range of services is a feature launched in 2018, the responsive search ads module. This type of ad shows how the search engine looks to match the users with the best content, based on their search intent, behaviour and preferences and numerous other parameters that influence their browsing.

When creating a responsive search ad, you are providing several different options for the ad title, description, landing page, keywords, etc., and Google automatically tests the performance of different combinations of elements, choosing the best-performing ones.

This type of machine learning technology will definitely gather more and more ground in paid advertising, as Google introduces it to help website owners get matched to the right users. Using responsive search ads is definitely helpful if you want to update your Google Ads performance for 2024.

Back to You

If you have any other curiosities about using Google Ads to get leads, increase sales or make your brand more known, we at Australian Internet Advertising are here to provide expert advice.