The document provides an overview of pay-per-click (PPC) advertising basics, including Google's dominance in the global search market share and how search behavior has evolved with the rise of mobile. It discusses how PPC auctions work when a user searches, factors that determine ad placement like bids and quality score, and best practices for structuring PPC accounts including separating brands from non-brands and isolating high-performing keywords. The document also addresses considerations for bidding on competitor terms.

1. PPCBASICS

2. PPCBASICS

3. GLOBALMARKETSHARE
● Unsurprisingly, Google dominates the global market,
with almost 91% market share.
● Bing is the second largest engine globally, with
around 3%, driven purely by its dominance in China.
● Baidu is a close run 3rd (of the standalone engines)
with 1.37%, driven purely by its dominance in China.
Source: gs.statcounter.com Date range: Aug-17 to Aug-18

4. SEARCHBEHAVIOURHASCHANGED
● The growth of the smartphone, and
more user friendly mobile internet,
significantly changed how people
searched.
● Mobile, and to a lesser extent Tablets,
replaced the home computer as a quick
medium to access the internet.
● This highlights the importance of
ensuring SEM campaigns are tailored to
mobile, but also that websites are
optimised for mobile.
Percentage of all global web pages served to mobile phones from 2009 to 2018

5. ANDCONTINUESTOEVOLVE
● Mobile is key…...passive signals such as
location already tailor search results
● Google Now makes recommendations
based on location, search history &
email content.
● Android and Apple Pay could collate
purchase patterns, tailoring your search
results
● Audience Data is crucial, ensuring you
target the right user, at the right time,
with the right message, across device
and location

6. ITALLSTARTSWHENSOMEONESEARCHES
When a search query is entered into Google, Google looks at its pool of advertisers and determines whether there will be an auction.
If one or more advertisers are bidding on a keyword that Google deems relevant to the search query, then an auction is triggered.
NOTE: Keywords are not Search Queries. Keywords such as “tennis shoes” could be entered into auctions for search queries such as “dancing shoes”
or “tennis equipment”, depending on your match types.

7. WHOGETSENTEREDINTOAUCTIONS
● Advertisers identify keywords they want to bid on, how
much they want to spend and groupings (Ad Groups) of
these keywords which are paired with ads.
● Google then enters the keyword from your account it
deems most relevant to the user's search query, into
the auction with the maximum bid you’ve stipulated.
● If you ‘win’ the auction, the ad you have associated with
that keyword is displayed.
● NOTE: You can only have one ad associated with your
domain entered into the auction.

8. HOWDOESGOOGLEDETERMINEPOSITION
Ad Rank
Max
CPC
Quality
Score
The best combined
Max CPC x Quality Score
gets the best position
This is the maximum bid
you specific for your
keyword
This is a metric used to
determine how relevant
and useful your ad is to the
user
= x

9. WHATISQUALITYSCORE
Google assesses the relevance of your keyword, ad and landing page content to each other, using measures such as Click Through Rate
(CTR) as key performance indicators.
The user experience of your website is also key… A poor experience (poor navigation, pop-ups, dead ends, long load times) also
negatively impact QS. Metrics such as bounce rates, time on site and page views / session are KPIs here.
User
Experience Quality Score

10. HOWDOESTHISWORKINPRACTICE
Max Bid Quality Score Ad Rank Position in SERP
Advertiser 1 £2.00 10/10 20 1
Advertiser 2 £4.00 4/10 16 2
Advertiser 3 £6.00 2/10 12 3
Advertiser 4 £8.00 1/10 8 4
Your Price =
Ad Rank Of Person
Below You
/
Your Quality
Score
+ £0.01
Advertiser 1 £1.61 = 16 / 10 + £0.01
Advertiser 2 £3.01 = 12 / 4 + £0.01

11. ACCOUNTSTRUCTURE

12. TYPICALACCOUNTSTRUCTURE
ACCOUNT
Billing Info, Monthly Budget
CAMPAIGN - BRAND
Daily Budget, Ad Extensions, Location,
Demographics, Device Modifiers
CAMPAIGN - SUITS
Daily Budget, Ad Extensions, Location,
Demographics, Device Modifiers
CAMPAIGN - SHIRTS
Daily Budget, Ad Extensions, Location,
Demographics, Device Modifiers
AD GROUP
EXACT
Keywords,
Creative
AD GROUP
VARIATIONS
Keywords,
Creative
AD GROUP
BLUE SUITS
Keywords,
Creative
AD GROUP
GREY SUITS
Keywords,
Creative
AD GROUP
SHORT
SLEEVED
Keywords,
Creative
AD GROUP
SLIM FIT
Keywords,
Creative

13. WHATISANACCOUNTSTRUCTURE?
A structure is how a site is broken down into different sections and enables tightly themed
keywords and ad copy to be put in place.
For example: A retail website selling various items such as clothing, shoes, accessories
● Topline different categories of products would be the campaigns
○ Clothing
○ Shoes
○ Accessories
● Each of these categories would be broken down sub-categories known as ad groups
○ Clothing > Trousers
○ Clothing > Tops
● Each ad group would house tightly themed keywords and highly tailored copy
○ Clothing > Trousers > buy trousers
○ Clothing > Trousers > buy tops

14. BRAND&NON-BRANDSPLIT
Brand is the company name with variations, misspellings and brand +product. The brand will
generally have better performance than non-brand terms resulting in a difference in optimisation
and results.
What that means for us...
● Non-brand will always be the challenge which is why it is best to keep them separate and know how well brand and
non-brand are performing
● We will always create dedicated campaigns which contains a range of brand related categories
● Benefits us by enabling
○ Clear reporting
○ Ease of labelling
○ Ability to apply negatives to non-brand campaigns
○ Easier to measure the value and contribution between brand and non-brand activity

15. CORE-TERMISOLATION
We isolate terms that are high-performers, in regards to traffic/CTR/CR, if they are quite generic
or a vanity term for the client.
These terms will sit in their own adgroup on exact match. Either within an applicable campaign
or a ‘HighVis’ campaign.
Key Benefits of this are,
● Better messaging: creative tailored to that specific keyword
● Controlled testing: landing page testing
● Ease of management: know where to focus optimisation efforts
● Improved results: stronger CTR/QS/CPCs
● Better insight: provide clear results to clients without any ‘noise’ in the data

16. COMPETITORBIDDING
We would generally also create a competitor campaign which is separate from the Brand and
Non-Brand campaigns, so that we can appear on competitor terms.
● It is possible to bid on trademark terms, however advertisers should not use trademarks within any copy
●
● Some advertisers choose to target related competitors, particularly those challenger brands who are trying to
establish themselves in the market

17. COMPETITORBIDDING
However...
...you should always take your client’s lead on competitor bidding and who to bid on - you should never engage in such
tactics without the client’s consent. As brand bidding/competitor bidding comes with its risks
● It may start a bidding war which is difficult to pull away from
●
● Bid requirements will appear to be excessive due to lack of relevance / poor ad-rank
●
● Some advertisers may take legal action if your presence is perceived to damage their brand or confuse customers