As a digital marketing agency, we get asked the following question a LOT-
How can I improve my ad position and reduce my cost per click at the same time?
It can be easy to focus just on quality score and how improving quality score can bring wonders about. But what do you have up your sleeve to back that up?

Let’s assume you have inherited a really messy campaign and have been tasked with saving the client 50% on cost per click (CPC) by optimising for higher Quality Score. How do you go about increasing the Quality Score for those keywords?

If you are thinking about getting a better click through rate, you are basically left with two choices – either you can increase the number of clicks or you can cut down the impression to suit a more targeted audience – the maths is up to you. If you can successfully do a combination of both, you totally deserve a raise (or at least a pat on the back). Read on!

You Can Never Have Too Many Negative Keywords

If you think your keywords are too broad, put your thinking cap on. Cut down your impression and add some negative keywords. Pull out your search query report for the last 90 days (or a shorter time period if the account is huge). Next you need to add all the irrelevant queries to either ad group level or campaign level negative keywords (whichever applies). Now that you have successfully stopped showing your ads to the wrong audience, let’s move on to the next step.

Get Higher Click Through Rate (CTR)

If your CTR is high, it is an indication to Google that your ads are relevant and that’s why you are getting so many clicks. To please the big G, you need to do everything you can to get your click through rate higher (no, I don’t mean click on your own ads. Think smarter). Getting those clicks from the right audience isn’t as hard as it sounds:

Use Ad Extentions

We often come across a lot of poorly designed campaigns with no ad extensions whatsoever. Ad extensions are free to use and they can significantly increase your chance to get more clicks, so they’re worth adding to your arsenal. Don’t just limit yourself to

sitelinks – mix and match and play with them. Here are a few to get you started:Sitelinks Of course, you can only have one landing page, butusing sitelinks give people more options to click. We generally recommend no more than five sitelinks to avoid clutter, but you can choose to use more.

Call Extensions – Call extensions let you display your numbers next to your ads. The days are gone when you had to use Google’s forwarding numbers and now you canuse your own numbers here. Call extensions work like a charm for mobile ads offering a new level of immediacy and allowing mobile users to convert more quickly and easily. People can call you directly and you pay only for the click. numbers don’t lie.)

Location Extensions – Consumers generally love to deal with local businesses, so location extensions are ideal. If your ad is on the top position, you can show your map, address and phone number to let the searcher know that you are just round the corner.

And if you have an online shop, product listing ads can be a good option. I’ll talk about these in another post.

Everybody Loves Freebies

Try it, use the word ‘Free’ in your ads. Free delivery, free 30 day trial, free samples, 20% extra free, free gift box, free return ticket to Paris (yes please!!)This is a great way to get more clicks and can be easily tested. Run two campaigns in parallel and do a little A/B testing. You will be surprised. And do let us know if you are giving away free BMW, I’d love one!

Bid on Your Own Brand/ Company Name

This is vital. We cover our reasons why you should bid on your brand/company name in another blog. Otherwise just carry on reading –

These keywords are super cheap and you will almost always rank on #1 for them. People who search for you by your name already know you so they are more likely to click through on your ads. This gives you higher CTR and Quality Score. What’s even more interesting is your average CTR and quality score gets a boost. You may think you can save on your budget since you are ranking organically for your brand name already, but it will save you a lot more in the long run.

Scream and Shout

Not really, Google doesn’t allow you to let you all out. You can’t use excessive capitalisation or exclamation. You can only use one exclamation. Make sure you use it. Also, don’t forget to use Title Case for your ads. All these little things will make you stand out from the crowd and help you get more clicks! (Did we just use exclamation points on each and every line in this paragraph? It is a bad practice and your ads will never get approved if you follow suit)

If you follow these simple steps we are sure you will see some improvements in your overall quality score. One last tip – Don’t forget to break those very large ad groups into smaller targeted groups with closely related keywords. Have at least two perfectly written ads per ad group so that you can see which one works better. Maybe try one rational style against a more light hearted, emotive approach. It really depends on the industry you are marketing within.

Good luck and let us know how it goes