Go ahead and put off your Christmas shopping until the last minute. Just don’t procrastinate optimizing your PPC ad campaigns for the holidays any longer or you’ll be kicking yourself for not cashing in earlier.
Big spending comes with the territory this time of year, and your digital marketing budget is no exception. Lucky for you, the payoff from a holiday marketing campaign is a hell of a lot more rewarding than an ugly sweater from your sweet-but-clueless Aunt Martha–but only if you optimize well, which takes time and preparation. And that’s why we’re lighting this yule log under your ass.
But don’t sweat. We’ve got some ideas that’ll help you optimize your PPC marketing in time for the holidays.
Know your key dates
Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Free Shipping Day can be big wins if you have all your ducks in a row. On those high volume days, it’s a good idea to increase your budget, up your bids, and incorporate timely keywords. You’ll also want to make sure your servers are able to handle the extra traffic to your site.
Look to LY for insights
If you ran similar ad campaigns for the holidays last year, you have valuable data you can use to plan your campaigns this year. Here are some ideas:
- Look over your keyword data and pinpoint those that were profitable. Are they relevant to your campaign this year? If so, add ‘em to your campaign!
- Check out your top organic search terms from last year. If they’re tied to conversion, isolate the search queries that converted best and add those to your campaign’s keyword list.
- Revisit any tests you ran to identify what worked and what didn’t. Try re-running the profitable campaigns, creatives, etc. and avoid re-running anything that was a waste of money.
- Repurpose any profitable ad copy, creatives, or landing pages from last year. Odds are, they’ll do well this year, too.
Budget wisely
This isn’t the time of year for set-it-and-forget-it campaign spending. For maximum ROI, you’ll want to monitor your campaigns’ ROI and adjust your budget as needed. If you’re profiting from a campaign (rather than losing money), there’s no need for a budget cap. Just keep an eye on your ROI to make sure you’re still making more money than you’re spending. If the tables turn and your ROI dips, it’s time to optimize or pause the campaign.
Target the right audience
Depending on your business, it might be smart to tailor your campaign to appeal to gift shoppers. Let’s say you sell ladies’ scarves, and your campaigns typically speak to women who would wear your scarves. During the holidays, you might get more sales if your ads cater to husbands shopping for their wives, last minute shoppers looking for a gift for a boss, students shopping for gifts for their teachers, cat ladies who like to doll up their pets, (Okay, maybe not that last one…) etc.
Got any tips you’d like to share for holiday campaign optimization? Post them in the comments!