Search Marketing Sage

Google AdWords has introduced another exciting product in the long line of updates coming with the new Enhanced Campaigns rollout. One of the new, potentially phenomenal, features currently in a limited release is Offer Extensions. Offer Extensions allow businesses to add a promotion or offer at the end of their AdWords ads. Customers will click on the offer and be taken to a Google hosted landing page where they can either print the coupon or save it for later in Google Offers. Here’s what it will look like:

Cost & Benefits

Costs for Offer Extensions are the same as traditional clicks, so advertisers can look to Offers for a low-cost way to spread the word about certain promotions or sales. This could be potential competition for the likes of Groupon and LivingSocial, who have high cost for businesses as they take a large percentage of the revenue made with their deals. Offer Extensions provides simple, low cost alternative that could drive traffic, as Google so often reminds us, of people who are actually looking for related products. If advertisers start using Offer Extensions on a mass scale, it could be huge for businesses and customers!

As you all know, I’m a huge advocate of Google Analytics. The more insight you can get into your site traffic, the better. So, if you are an online retailer, I hope you have already implemented, or at least have it on your radar to implement Google Analytics Ecommerce Tracking. Just like most other Analytics data you can derive, the purpose is essentially to give you more information regarding visitor actions, just now on a more advanced level.

What is Google Analytics Ecommerce Tracking?

In a word: Amazing. Ecommerce tracking helps you better understand exactly what visitors are buying, and where they came from before they bought it. Even though it’ll take a bit of work to get it up and running, it will be well worth the extra effort. Through this tracking feature, you’ll be able to see products, transactions, and time to purchase, which are better defined below:

Ahh AdWords… For some, it’s music to your ears. For others, it’s nails on a chalkboard. AdWords is an incredible tool that, if leveraged properly, can provide you with excellent conversion and revenue tracking data. While the interface and processes may seem daunting at first glance, have no fear… I’ve laid out a foolproof method to get started with conversion tracking below.

What is Conversion Tracking?

An AdWords conversion occurs when someone clicks on your ad and performs an action on your website that you see as having value. Setting up conversion tracking lets you keep an eye on important statistics such as cost-per-conversion and conversion rate, giving you a glimpse into how successful a specific campaign or ad group is. This conversion tracking will help you begin making informed decisions on how to best optimize your account.

A conversion can be anything you want to measure. It can be something as simple as a visitor requesting more information and submitting contact information, a prospective buyer downloading a case study, all the way up to a purchase of a good or service. What you choose is completely up to you, as long as it isn’t milk…

How do I Get Started with Adwords Conversion Tracking?

As the curtain closes on another year at Search Mojo, we like to take one last look back at what made our year interesting – and our blog posts here on Search Marketing Sage are an excellent reflection of that. We write about the new things we as search marketers are learning about each day so we can pass that knowledge on to you, our awesome readers. And because of you, 2012 was the most successful year yet for the Search Marketing Sage!

We’ve compiled a list of our top 30 blog posts on search marketing, social media marketing, mobile marketing and content marketing for 2012. These were the most popular posts of the year, judged by your visits and feedback. We hope you enjoy these (and even learn something you didn’t know before), and here’s to a successful 2013 for all of us!

While most people are preparing their brine for the turkey on Thursday and scouting the best sales so they can go stand in line before the pumpkin pie even settles, others are getting things in order behind the scenes, making it possible to provide consumers with the insane sales that they need so bad that they are willing to trample each other for.

Whether you are an online retailer or a brick-and-mortar shop that also has a website, I’m here to provide you with some tips to be sure you take advantage of all those searchers looking for sales nearby on Black Friday, or looking for the lowest price on the web on Cyber Monday.

Mobile Ads

An important, but obvious option is to be sure you target your PPC ads to mobile devices during the holidays. If you think about it, a lot of people will be searching on the run between stores and coffee runs. Do a little work and tailor your ads around holiday verbiage, drawing people in for your big sales during the holidays. You can even use ad sitelinks and location extensions to make your mobile ads even more useful for searchers (see below).