Preparing for Black Friday Weekend: Your PPC Checklist
With Black Friday weekend within touching distance, it’s very likely that you’ll be looking at last-minute tweaks to ensure your digital campaign stands out during one of the biggest e-commerce events.
Brits spent a massive £5.6 billion across Black Friday and Cyber Monday in 2019 and with that number predicted to be closer to £6 billion this year, it’s something that e-commerce brands should be capitalising on.
In our latest blog post we’re sharing a six-stage checklist to ensure your PPC activity is as strong as it can be this Black Friday weekend.
1. Tracking and measurement
Although the creation of advert copy and testing out imagery is arguably the most exciting part of PPC, tracking and measurement is probably the most crucial. In order to really understand the impact and success of your PPC campaign, you need to ensure that you have tracking tools and measurement set up correctly from the start.
By gathering information from tools Google Analytics and real-time tools from the outset, you can focus on activity optimisation throughout the weekend. It’s also a great learning tool to understand what went well and what can be improved in future campaigns.
2. Audience
Before pressing go on your campaign, it’s very likely that you are already very familiar with the audience you want to attract. However, the work doesn’t stop there.
The most important thing to consider when it comes to audiences in your PPC campaigns is that the audience depth, the percentage of spend that goes through an audience list divided by the amount you’ve spent overall, is as high as possible.
It’s also worth implementing retargeting for past customers and visitors, building lookalike audiences and using Google’s in-market audiences to reach as many of the right people as possible.
3. Budget management
Competition is extremely high over Black Friday weekend and whereas you don’t want to find yourself in a bidding war with competitors, you will want to consider adjusting your budget and bids throughout the campaign where necessary. As well as setting up campaign alerts to ensure you aren’t missing out on opportunities, be prepared to increase your budget where needed to make sure it doesn’t run out before it hits Cyber Monday.
It’s also worth noting that more success can be seen when using manual bidding so that you’re ahead of the game when it comes to high traffic during busy periods over the weekend.
4. Keywords
We’ve discussed the importance of keywords in previous blog posts and how crucial keyword research is to campaign success.
Make sure you’ve taken some time to evaluate how your keywords have performed in past PPC campaigns and use search engines to build up a collection of phrases that are highly searched for during Black Friday weekend.
Most importantly, don’t use generic terms such as ‘Black Friday’ or ‘Cyber Monday’. Competition for these terms will be high and it’s best if you can carve your own relevant path so that your e-commerce brand is seen.
5. Ad copy
Getting your ad copy right is key when it comes to a successful campaign and with Google’s plethora of options available, it couldn’t be easier to really utilise what you have available.
Before switching on those ads, review your copy to ensure it aligns with your overall brand messaging and that there is a sense of urgency when it comes to buying now. Black Friday weekend is only here once a year so make sure your audience wants to click and buy before they miss out.
6. Landing page and shopping
What will users see when they click your ad? Is it interesting and simple to use? Is everything working correctly? Will it be able to handle an influx of site traffic?
Test, test and test again when it comes to your landing page and ensure that you are optimising so that it’s a great experience for shoppers by keeping the process smooth and with as little clicks and distractions as possible.
Alongside your own landing page, utilise tools on Google Ads and Bing when it comes to shopping for maximum exposure.
Ensure that your shopping feed is up-to-date and highlight any promotions so that they are easily identifiable.
By following this PPC checklist, you’ll be on the right track to making your Black Friday campaign as successful as possible. If you’re looking for some more insight on how to really stand out against competition this Black Friday, check back next week as we tell you more about digital activity beyond PPC.
In need of support for your e-commerce brand when it comes to PPC? Get in touch today by emailing info@360-om.co.uk to find out how we can help.
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