Even seasoned marketers might not be too familiar with paid search, especially if they don’t specialise in search engine marketing. So, if your curiosity is bubbling under the surface, you’re full of questions or you’ve been tasked with looking into this powerful digital marketing channel, you’re certainly not the only one. In fact, since 2024’s data on Google’s search advertising pointed to an eyewatering 7% conversion rate, it’s become even hotter property. Which prompts the question: how does Google paid search work, and why is it so effective?
We’ll go into this in more detail later, but part of its potency comes down to the speed at which advertisers glean results, and captivatingly, how it instantly puts your brand before consumers’ eyes.
In this guide, we’ll help you get up to speed on paid search advertising; what it is and how it works, and hopefully, if we’ve done this right, you’ll be convinced of its momentous value for younger or growing brands. Allons-y!
Skip to:
- What’s paid search?
- Jargon buster
- The value of Google Ads
- How does Google paid search work?
- Google Paid Search campaign set-up
- What’s paid search doing for your brand?
What’s paid search? (A simple explainer)
Before we get to the specifics of what distinguishes Google paid search from other forms of pay-per-click advertising, allow us to provide a definition of paid search as a whole. This way, we can all stay on the same page.
So, paid search – what is it?
Boiled down to its simplest, paid search refers to the practice of placing any type of ad on search engine results pages (SERPs) like Bing, Yahoo and, of course, Google. Advertisers pay a fee to get these ads listed and are rewarded with brand visibility, website visits and hopefully, if deployed effectively, conversions. The aim is to use this valuable digital real estate to convince a given audience to click and then convert them into new customers on the destination page.
Paid search vs PPC
If you’ve already dipped your toes into the world of search engine marketing, you might’ve heard webmasters using the terms ‘paid search’ and ‘PPC’ interchangeably; for newcomers, though, it can be helpful to understand that the pair aren’t always identical.
Technically, PPC and paid search aren’t the same thing. Paid search is the specific channel, whereas PPC is a broader model in digital advertising wherein ads are only paid for when someone clicks on them. Therefore, marketers can have their pick of platforms for their PPC, from social media to display advertising. Paid search, on the other hand, only revolves around search engines.
As PPC is the most popular ad model out there, it’s easy to understand why the two pieces of terminology have coalesced into one generalised area, even if they have slightly different scopes.
Paid search on Google
Now you know what paid search is, you might be wondering how it looks on Google. Well, typically the ads placed on this search engine goliath appear under the search bar but above the organic search results (the pages Google served up based on its algorithms, without fees).
In the example below, you can see that a handful of Yorkshire-based roofing companies have all paid for their ads to appear alongside the term “York roofing”, jostling for attention. It’s the bold word “sponsored” that gives away that they’re ads.
Text ads aren’t the only formats either – see the below examples of product shopping ads, which appear for the search term “bridal shoes York”. In fact, there’s a whole slew of options across Google’s different campaign types from responsive ads, which adjust their appearance according to the available ad slots, to image ads, which display as static pictures or animated GIFs. This diversity is great for advertisers as you can easily align an ad format with your priorities, whether that’s the simplicity of set-up or the attention-grabbing addition of a product photo.
Time for some jargon busting!
Before we continue on with our explanation of Google paid search, we thought it would be helpful to give you a few definitions to help you navigate the technicalities of this topic.
- Conversion rate: The ratio of conversions to clicks on your ads, conversions being a desirable action taken by a user such as getting in touch, making a purchase or signing up for a newsletter.
- Cost-per-click: CPC or cost-per-click refers to ads that charge the advertiser for the number of times it is clicked, sometimes interchangeably with PPC and sometimes as a PPC metric.
- Keywords: The terms that people type into search engines, which are matched up with your ads in order for them to appear for relevant search queries.
- Keyword bids: The maximum price advertisers set for clicks on keywords targeting your paid ads.
- Landing page: The website pages marked by your destination URL that users navigate to when they click on your ads.
- Retargeting: A strategy wherein advertisers show targeted ads to return customers to increase their chances of converting.
- Return on ads spend (ROAS): A handy performance metric to demonstrate the amount of money gained/lost in comparison to how much was invested.
- SERPS: Search engine results pages – the list of ranking pages that appear for different search queries.
The value of Google Ads
There are many, many benefits of PPC, and Google Ads is the cream of the crop, with an almost 90% market share when it comes to the leading search engines out there. While this could be a blog post in of itself, we still want to impart you with an understanding of its value to SMEs in particular. So, here’s a small taster of what you might be missing out on if you’re not making use of this valuable tool.
Google Paid Search can deliver speedy results
Unlike other search engine marketing strategies like SEO and website optimisation, paid search tends to be a lot shorter term in nature. This means a faster deployment and faster ROI. Many marketers estimate that in the first month you’ll see your initial returns, and by the 3-6 month mark campaign maturity, which is where you can really ramp things up. Of course, this will depend on your ad spend and average industry conversion rates, but on the whole, you can expect to win bids fairly quickly.
It’s a cost-effective investment
Due to a combination of reasons, paid search via the Google Ads platform is especially cost-effective. With a reported ROAS of 200% (that’s a £2 return on a £1 spend), SMEs only tend to require a fairly small upfront investment, and as we said, because it offers such quick returns, you won’t be left out on a limb.
Granular targeting & detailed customisability
Perhaps one of the most enticing aspects of this PPC platform over others is Google Ads’ level of customisability and targeting. Using their complex algorithms and AI-powered bidding models, you can really drill down into your audience segments and start speaking their language – i.e., using the most tailored keywords. On top of this, you can pause, modify or stop your campaigns at any time, allowing for the optimal customisability and, music to the ears of ambitious entrepreneurs, the ability to scale.
Indirect improvements to your SEO
Like tea and biscuits, cheese and crackers, SEO and PPC go hand-in-hand. By placing your ads in search engines, you’re essentially improving your brand awareness, not to mention how the highly targeted nature of PPC can lead to an uptake in quality organic traffic to your site. Equally, a website with a strong SEO profile will naturally see better paid search results.
How does Google paid search work?
In the interest of not taking up your entire day, we’re not going into every single nuance of how Google paid search works, especially since we already have dedicated guides on certain aspects of the process. However, what we will do is provide you a comprehensive overview of its core elements.
Bidding
Google Ads operate according to a bidding system. What this means is that businesses bid on keywords or phrases to appear higher in the SERPs for their selected terms. In effect, they are all competing for ad placement, which is offered up via an auction every time a slot becomes available.
Simply, bid via your chosen metric – clicks, impressions, conversions, views etc. – and you enter that auction. From that point onwards, it’s in Google’s hands; they’ll weigh up all the ranking factors in play across you and your competitors’ ads and they’ll allocate ad slots accordingly.
For more information, we recommend dipping into our bid management guide.
Ad Rank
Ad Rank is one of the building blocks of Google Ads, and must be considered if you are to set up your own paid search campaign.
According to the search giant itself: “Ad Rank is a set of values that are used to determine whether your ads are eligible to show and if eligible, where on the page your ads are shown (if at all) relative to other advertisers’ ads.”
This means that you ought to know the 6 values that comprise this important factor. So here goes:
- Your bid value – bidding higher in Google Ads often translates to increased chances of winning the auction.
- The quality of ads and their landing pages – this value is underpinned by Google’s aim to provide users with the best quality results and is assessed by things like usefulness, relevance, audience expectations and landing page navigation among other Search Quality signals.
- The Ad Rank thresholds – Essentially, the minimum Ad Rank needed to be eligible for the auction, based on ad position, quality, user signals and the context around the search.
- Auction competitiveness – Because of this factor, the cost per click (CPC) can change under different circumstances. For instance, if there are lots of fish in a crowded pond, all competing for the same keywords and positions, the CPC will likely increase. And even if you have the highest bid, if your other Ad Rank values are lagging behind you could miss out on the top position.
- The context of users’ searches – The most relevant ads based on the search terms a user has entered, their location, device type and time of search can all have an impact too.
- Estimated impact from ad assets and other ad formats –When ad assets such as the little green badge on Google Guaranteed ads are included or you’ve gone for a more dynamic ad format, there’s more incentive for users to click on your ads over your competitors’.
Targeting
With Google paid search you get a great deal of freedom when it comes to setting the scope of your influence, and a huge part of this is using its features to target specific audiences. Selecting interest groups with a curiosity in your products/services or pastimes related to your business, demographics, device types, location, and custom audience segments, you can ensure that the right people are seeing your ads, at the right time. This is crucial to avoid wasted ad spend and keep your ROAS in the green.
How to get a Google Paid Search campaign off the ground: Your Google Ads Cheat Sheet
So, we’ve gone through the theory, but how does Google how does google paid search work in practice? Here’s a whistlestop tour of the process.
1. Create a Google Ads account
If you haven’t already, create a Google account and get your website connected up to Google Search Console while you’re at it; this latter tool is a godsend when you want to see which pages are doing the best and, by extension, what your audience is most interested in.
2. Research your keywords
As with any search engine marketing endeavour, it all starts with your audience. Thus, the first steps involve researching your keywords and selecting the right ones for your campaign. Think about your specific goals for your campaign and set your scope of intent.
We have a specific guide to keyword research, but some of the best tools to get you started are Google Keyword Planner, Mangool’s KWDFinder and WordStream’s Free Keyword Tool.
4. Select your campaign type, budget & bidding settings
The next step is to create a new campaign and select your goal, budget and bidding settings. You’ll find all of the relevant information in the drop-down menu under the “Campaigns” icon. Here, you need to choose between the goals of sales, leads or website traffic.
Once the bare bones of the campaign are set up, you can choose who to target with your ads and how to spread out your paid search costs, plus which assets to include from phone numbers to location information.
3. Craft your ad copy and/or visuals
With your keywords sourced and your objectives refined, you can now move on to the process of creating your ads. Whether that’s crafting copy within the confines of Google Ads’ strict word counts or developing product imagery and other visual assets that compel clicks, make sure to spend time making these as specific as possible for the target audience.
5. Get your campaign up & running
Check and double-check that all the settings are serving your objectives and hit launch. It won’t be long before you start reaching potential customers and seeing clicks and impressions roll in!
6. Monitor, test & tweak
Your final and ongoing step is to continually monitor and return to your ads throughout the duration of the campaign. To get the best results you’ll need to be agile in tweaking them, adjusting your bidding and rethinking or adding to your keywords as user behaviour changes.
If this isn’t enough there are also extras to think about – i.e., Google Ad Experiments, which is designed to help you understand how different campaign settings are influencing your ad performance with A/B test features and more. We also recommend investing in first party or server-side tracking when you get to reviewing your website traffic due to the growing irrelevance of 3rd party cookies.
What’s paid search doing for your brand?
Now that you have a bird’s eye view of how Google paid search works, you’ll be in a better position to make the most of this lucrative digital marketing channel – whether by giving it a go yourself or outsourcing the labour to the experts.
Whichever is the case for you, the next steps are to evaluate (or reevaluate, if you’re a bit further ahead of the game) exactly what your brand could achieve with paid search; in other words, taking a look at your specific industry’s benchmarks and weighing up the potential gains against your budget and time allocation.
Here, you might want an expert opinion to fill in the gaps in your knowledge. Especially as there are plenty of nuances you might not be privy to – I’m thinking along the lines of seasonal fluctuations and, crucially, industry changes like the recent tweaks to the flexibility of Google’s Responsive search ads (RSAs), not to mention the bomb shell that was AI-powered search.
Eliminate your Pay Per Click FOMO with an expert at the helm
Leaning towards the agency route? Our hive of down to earth PPC specialists have got you covered, however long the ride. Yep, that’s right. We’re here for the long-haul, not for quick wins and quick sales. So, if you’re looking for professionals who can deliver a responsive campaign according to your needs, hit us up – we love to see independent businesses succeed.
For oodles more digital marketing insights and actionable guides designed for growth-oriented individuals like yourself, don’t forget to stop by our blog. Feeling a bit more social? Then drop us a message or give us a ‘buzz’ to find out how we can help you increase trust, sales and authority in your field with paid advertising.
