How to implement a PPC campaign

Paid search is a great tool for advertising your business, but getting started can feel overwhelming and complicated. 

Yes, many tools are at your disposal, but expert knowledge is not the only way to succeed in PPC. The key is knowing what to focus on and what tools to save for later. 

This article outlines the core structure of a PPC campaign and provides a step-by-step guide for implementing a new campaign in Google Ads. 

The elements of a PPC campaign

Campaign

The highest level of a campaign setup and what the rest of the campaign elements will live within. Campaigns are set up around major categories of how users search for your product. 

For example, if you’re a clothing company, you may have a campaign for your sock category and another for sweatshirts. 

You also want to have campaigns for both the branded and non-branded versions of your categories. 

If I had a company called “Max Trotter Clothing Company,” I’d create:  

• Branded campaigns for searches like “max trotter clothing socks.”  
• Non-branded campaigns for people looking for my products without knowing my brand name.

Ad group

Ad groups are sub-categories within campaigns. While only one is required, you’ll often create more than one ad group to subdivide your campaign into relevant categories. 

The goal here is to create ads that are as relevant as possible to the user’s search, so you’ll want to create ad groups that reflect all the different ways users can search. 

Let’s go back to my clothing example. For a campaign advertising socks, you could create a single ad group based on just “socks.” But there are so many different types of socks. 

I wear completely different kinds of socks when I’m lounging on the couch than when I go on a run, so it makes sense that users would search differently for those different sub-categories. 

So, instead of an ad group based around “socks,” you should create multiple ad groups for smaller categories such as:

• “Running socks” 
• “Crew socks” 
• “Ankle socks” 

Keywords

Keywords are the core of your targeting strategy. Whatever keywords you decide to bid on are the search queries for which your ad can appear. 

That’s why it’s incredibly important to do your keyword research and develop a list of high-quality keywords relevant to each of your ad groups. 

Dig deeper: 19 keyword mining tools and strategies for PPC campaign growth 

Ad copy

Ad copy is what users see when your ad shows up on the results page. 

With Google Ads responsive search ads, you can add up to 15 headlines and four descriptions and it’s recommended that you use as many of them as possible to improve performance.

When creating ad copy, use your keywords as inspiration. For the “ankle socks” ad group, you want to have “ankle socks” prominently within the ad so it’s relevant to the user’s search. 

Dig deeper: Google Ads ad copy: What works and what doesn’t in 2024

Ad assets

Ad assets (formerly extensions) are smaller additions to the ads outside of the headlines and descriptions. 

These are not mandatory additions, but they improve the quality of the ad by adding useful information for the user. 

Some examples of ad assets include:

• Callout assets: Single sentences or phrases that advertise something unique about the product or service (i.e., “Free shipping” or “50+ years of experience”).
• Structure snippets: Ad asset that shows catalogs or categories (i.e., different clothing types you sell).
• Location: For physical stores, this shows store locations for the user to visit. 

Targeting

While keywords help you show up for people searching for specific things, targeting narrows your reach to only users in specific locations. 

Without location targeting, your ads will show to anyone in the world who searches for your keyword, which may be what you want, but will often lead to irrelevant traffic and vastly increased spend. 

You can add location targeting in two ways: 

• By targeting a specific location (e.g., country, state, city, ZIP code).
• By targeting a radius around a specific location (i.e., 30 miles around your store location). 

---

PPC campaign implementation

Access campaign setup

Log into Google Ads.

From the Campaigns tab on the left-side menu, click the blue “+” button and select New campaign.

Choose your campaign goal

Google will present various campaign goals based on what you want to achieve. Common goals include:

• Sales.
• Leads.
• Website traffic.
• Product and brand consideration.
• Brand awareness and reach.
• App promotion.

Most campaigns will fall into the “sales” or “leads” categories, but there are use cases for all of the different campaign goals.

Select a campaign type

Based on your choice, Google will recommend a different campaign type that fits that goal. Options include:

• Search (text ads in Google Search results).
• Display (visual ads across Google’s partner sites).
• Shopping (ads for ecommerce products).
• Video (YouTube video ads).
• App (mobile app promotion).
• Performance Max (all-in-one across various Google properties).

For the sake of this example, we will choose the search campaign option as that is the oldest and most common campaign type.

Choose your campaign settings

Next, go through the campaign settings and adjust them to your needs. 

Every campaign is different and has different needs, but here’s a general overview with some recommendations: 

• Campaign name: Name something relevant to your campaign for easy identification. For example, my branded socks campaign can have a name like “Branded – socks.” 
• Networks: Choose whether to show ads only in Google Search or if you would like to include Google Search Partners or the Display Network. Consider excluding both of these as they tend to generate lower-quality traffic and fewer conversions. 
• Locations: Select the geographic locations where you want your ads to appear. See more details above.
• Languages: Choose the languages spoken by your target audience. Keep it to one language per campaign so you can create relevant ads in the user’s spoken language.
• Bidding: Select how you want to bid for your ads. The bidding strategies vary depending on your campaign goal. For example:
  • Maximize conversions: Speaks for itself, you want to get the most conversions for your budget.
  • Maximize clicks: This bid strategy tells Google that you want to get the most traffic for your set budget.
  • Manual CPC (you set bids for each click): The old-school option, it gives you the most control but requires manual adjustments to bids.
• Budget: Set your daily budget, which is how much you are willing to spend daily on the campaign.

Dig deeper: How each Google Ads bid strategy influences campaign success

Create your ad group

Time to create those sub-categories we talked about earlier.

• Ad group name: Each ad group contains a set of ads and targeting criteria. Name it descriptively so you know what you’re targeting. For my socks campaign, I may have an ad group named “Running socks” or “Crew socks”
• Keywords: Add keywords that you believe your customers will search for. Refer back to the keywords section above.

Create your ads

Finally, you’ll create your ads and ad assets. Take your time going through this to try and create the most compelling ads you can. Some small tips not mentioned above:

• Try to use as much of the character limits as you can. Headlines can be 30 characters long and descriptions can be 90 characters.
• Use keywords in your headlines! People searching for “Men’s Crew Socks” are likelier to click on an ad that says “Men’s Crew Socks” than a more generic version. Get specific!
• Pick the most relevant landing page you can. The whole point of ads is to get users to the purchase point as fast as possible, so  the fewer clicks they need to make, the better. 

Launch and monitor

You’re almost done. Take one last look at everything you’ve created to make sure it looks correct, and when you’re ready, click Publish to launch your campaign.

This isn’t a set-it-and-forget-it type of thing, though. 

You’ll want to review performance periodically and make optimizations to keep things improving. Continuous iteration and testing is the most surefire way to see success in Google Ads.

From setup to success: Implementing a PPC campaign

Setting up a successful PPC campaign may seem complex at first, but with the right structure and a clear focus, it becomes manageable. 

By understanding the core elements – like campaigns, ad groups, keywords and targeting – you’ll be well on your way to driving meaningful results. 

Remember, success in PPC comes from continuous testing and optimization, so don’t be afraid to make adjustments along the way. Now it’s time to put your knowledge into action and start building your campaign.