Andy Black
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The Holy Trinity of Paid Search
The smallest unit you should consider with Paid Search is the
“Search Term -> Ad -> Landing Page” (ST-AD-LP).
This unit is so important that I call it the “Holy Trinity” of paid search.
Get it right, and your CTR will increase, your conversion rate will increase, and you will get the Google AdWords algorithm working for you.
Get it wrong, and you crash and burn.
It’s knife edge stuff, and if you don’t do it right, then you’ll lose to your competitors that do.
Never judge a landing page in isolation!
You might have a landing page for Dublin Plumbers that you say converts at 30%.
I say it converts someone looking for a Dublin Plumber who clicked your ad for Dublin Plumbers at 30%.
If I sent someone looking for Car Insurance to that landing page then it has no chance of converting at 30%.
Make sure that what people search for is in the ad, and in the landing page.
This is the default ST-AD-LP combination that you want to start with.
Search Engine Marketing is that simple: give people what they are looking for.
(And remember, there is a reason it’s the “Search Term -> Ad -> Landing Page” unit, and not the
“Keyword -> Ad -> Landing Page” unit. The search term is what someone searched for. The keyword is what you’re bidding on. They aren’t always the same thing.)
Using Google is a painful experience.
You have to guess what to type to find what you want.
And then you have to find the most relevant listing in a page full of competing listings.
Most people don’t read the page, they scan.
They want to leave the Google search results page as soon as possible and find what they are looking for.
So your creative emotional-hot-button-pushing ad copy is worthless if no-one has read it.
Have an initial ST-AD-LP unit where you echo back the search term in both your ad and your landing page.
At least get the baseline CTR and conversion rate for this simplest combination before you get all “creative” with your ad copy.
Then you know what you have to beat if you want to go down the split-testing route.
ST-AD-LP Example 1 (a “short head” search term)
ST-AD-LP Example 2 (a “long tail” search term)
And here’s the last 30 days stats for the resulting AdWords campaign:
The smallest unit you should consider with Paid Search is the
“Search Term -> Ad -> Landing Page” (ST-AD-LP).
This unit is so important that I call it the “Holy Trinity” of paid search.
Get it right, and your CTR will increase, your conversion rate will increase, and you will get the Google AdWords algorithm working for you.
Get it wrong, and you crash and burn.
It’s knife edge stuff, and if you don’t do it right, then you’ll lose to your competitors that do.
Never judge a landing page in isolation!
You might have a landing page for Dublin Plumbers that you say converts at 30%.
I say it converts someone looking for a Dublin Plumber who clicked your ad for Dublin Plumbers at 30%.
If I sent someone looking for Car Insurance to that landing page then it has no chance of converting at 30%.
Make sure that what people search for is in the ad, and in the landing page.
This is the default ST-AD-LP combination that you want to start with.
Search Engine Marketing is that simple: give people what they are looking for.
(And remember, there is a reason it’s the “Search Term -> Ad -> Landing Page” unit, and not the
“Keyword -> Ad -> Landing Page” unit. The search term is what someone searched for. The keyword is what you’re bidding on. They aren’t always the same thing.)
Using Google is a painful experience.
You have to guess what to type to find what you want.
And then you have to find the most relevant listing in a page full of competing listings.
Most people don’t read the page, they scan.
They want to leave the Google search results page as soon as possible and find what they are looking for.
So your creative emotional-hot-button-pushing ad copy is worthless if no-one has read it.
Have an initial ST-AD-LP unit where you echo back the search term in both your ad and your landing page.
At least get the baseline CTR and conversion rate for this simplest combination before you get all “creative” with your ad copy.
Then you know what you have to beat if you want to go down the split-testing route.
ST-AD-LP Example 1 (a “short head” search term)
ST-AD-LP Example 2 (a “long tail” search term)
And here’s the last 30 days stats for the resulting AdWords campaign:
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