Trying to manage your own PPC account without adequate knowledge or time is quite similar to a puppy trying to chase his own tail. By the time the puppy thinks he is close to getting his teeth around that tail, he bumps into the wall and falls over. Similarly, you can tweak ads and perform keyword research until you think your PPC campaign is almost perfect only to find that you have missed the smallest detail that will decrease the effectiveness of your entire campaign.
Just as the puppy eventually learns that he cannot catch his own tail, you may eventually come to realize that you cannot manage your own PPC campaign effectively without the help of professionals or the correct knowledge. There are some good reasons to outsource the development, management and optimization of your campaign.
PPC Costs – What Should You Expect?
When determining your PPC budget, you need to consider what you will pay a professional agency to manage your campaign as well as what you will end up paying to the search engines. The total cost of any campaign depends on the following factors:
1. Structure and focus of your campaign. The more your advertisements, keywords and outbound links coordinate, the more the search engines will trust your site. Google will assign your site a quality score based on how well your chosen keywords seem to correspond to the ads you are featuring and the other websites to which you lead your visitors. If Google decides these elements do not match up, then your quality score will lower and your campaign will become more expensive.
2. Long term performance for your campaign. Your click through rate (CTR) can raise or lower your cost per click. If the majority of searchers do not click on your ad, then Google knows that your ads are not convincing or appealing for one reason or another. This makes your site less valuable to Google, and your costs can go up.
3. Your goals and intentions. What do you want to achieve with this campaign? The better position you crave for your site, the more you may end up paying for that position.
4. What your competitors are willing to pay. The PPC market fluctuates depending on the highest bids offered. If you target highly-competitive keywords, there will be other people willing to pay a lot of money for the top spots in the search engines. Their bid will drive up your cost. Those willing to pay more than you will receive a better position and will likely receive more clicks. You pay to play in this market.
You also have to consider your maximum PPC budget, your expected return of investment and other factors. Determining realistic expected PPC costs is a matter of tweaking all of these elements to find the most affordable approach without sacrificing results.
Should You Outsource?
If your PPC budget allows for the assistance of professionals and you do not have an in-house marketing team to make this their priority, it does make sense to outsource this work. BMG can help you establish a winning campaign with reasonable PPC cost while ensuring your campaign is properly managed over the long term.
Why continue chasing your own tail and waiting for that knock up against the wall? If you don’t have the time to monitor changes within the online marketing field, analyze your PPC accounts and run test campaigns for new angles, you need someone who does have the time.