6 tips to a/b test your way to winning ppc ads · 6 tips to a/b test your way to winning ppc ads...

6 Tips to A/B Test Your Way to Winning PPC Ads

2 6 Tips to A/B Test Your Way to Winning PPC Ads © Copyright 2014 Boost Media, Inc. All rights reserved.

Introduction

Who This Guide Is For

One ad will dramatically increase your click-through rate, drive more conversions, and improve your

return on investment. The other, however, will result in fewer clicks, a lower Quality Score, and wasted

ad spend. So how do you tell the difference? This white paper will serve as your guide on the road for

testing novices to seasoned pros. Over the course of this guide, you will learn:

• The value of adopting a “testing culture” across the entirety of your organization

• Why testing is so important, and how it can benefit your marketing efforts

• How to create and run tests that will yield actionable results

This guide is intended for anyone working in

marketing, paid search, SEO and other fields in which

applying a scientific approach to the production of

ad creative and other types of copy can improve

performance. Marketing managers, copywriters,

content specialists and paid search strategists will all

find plenty of actionable advice in this guide, but it is

not intended solely for these professionals – anyone

working in online marketing will benefit from a

greater understanding of A/B testing.

TIP: Keep the message simple. Stay specific and focus on just one offering per ad.

TWEET THIS!Reading the @WordStream & #BoostMedia guide: 6 Tips to AB Test Your Way to Winning PPC Ads. http://bit.ly/1sKFg08


Ad Creative Takes Center StageAutomated optimization has revolutionized virtually all aspects of online marketing. Yet

despite the vast technological progress that has been made in the industry, ad creative has

been relegated to the sidelines by many agencies, advertisers and search engine marketing

professionals, to the detriment of many campaigns.

Despite the potential for professionally crafted ad creative to increase click-through rates

and drive conversions, too many advertisers rely on Dynamic Keyword Insertion and other

automated methods of generating ad copy. Worse still is the fact that many advertisers

fail to test their ad creative, potentially costing them thousands of dollars in wasted spend

that could have easily been avoided through a rigorous testing culture. This guide will show

you how placing greater emphasis on individualized ad creative and A/B testing will yield

significantly improved results.


The Testing Culture

Definition of the ‘Testing Culture’

A/B testing is much more than comparing the results of a control element and a variant; for maximum

effectiveness, testing has to become inextricably interwoven into a company’s culture. Many of the

world’s leading brands have embraced the “testing culture”, but what is it for?

At the heart of testing culture lies the idea

that no business decision, regardless of

its importance or scope, should be made

based on assumptions. The advent of

increasingly sophisticated technology

enables companies to track, measure

and quantify virtually every aspect of

their operations, giving rise to a culture of

data-driven decision making. The greater

the volume of data available, increasingly

granular decisions can be made based

on this information. Just as scientists rely

on evidence to prove or disprove their

theories, data-driven marketers rely on

data to inform their decisions.

TIP: Implementing a testng culture creates an environment that fosters innovation & creativity.

The most successful companies realize

that no detail is too small to be overlooked

within a testing culture. Everything can

be quantified, and evangelists of the

testing culture know that basing business

decisions on hard data is the only way to

succeed in an increasingly volatile business

environment.


Companies With Strong Testing Cultures1. Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) - One of the world’s leading microprocessor manufacturers, AMD

implemented A/B testing to evaluate the effectiveness of its social media strategy, which led to a

3,600% increase in social shares of content from pages on the amd.com domain.

2. Google – Nothing is left to chance at the world’s second-largest technology company. Google

exhaustively tests every aspect of its numerous products, from updates to its AdWords advertising

platform to new functionality in its popular consumer products such as Gmail and Google Drive.

3. Hyundai - Korean automobile manufacturer Hyundai adopted multivariate testing to improve the

conversion rates of landing pages on its web presence in the Netherlands, resulting in a conversion

rate improvement of 62%.

4. Optimizely - Headed by Dan Siroker, a former product manager for Google’s browser team,

Optimizely perfectly embodies the testing culture. Hundreds of organizations rely on Optimizely’s

platform to conduct their own A/B tests, and testing is at the heart of everything Optimizely does.

5. Shutterstock - The stock imagery market is particularly competitive, and Shutterstock relies on

hard data to stand out from the crowd. Shutterstock A/B tests virtually everything, including image

sizes and formats, relevance algorithms, language detection functionality, pricing structures, video

playback options and much more.

The opportunity cost of not testing ad creative is determined largely by four factors:

1. Size of your budget2. Account structure3. Your performance4. Your processes


The Importance of TestingEven seemingly trivial decisions can

have a considerable impact, particularly

when it comes to online marketing.

With so many advertisers competing for

audiences’ attention, and so much at

stake, the importance of testing cannot be

understated.

The gains experienced by companies that

invest in testing cultures are numerous:

• Greater insight into actual marketing &

PPC campaign performance

• Quantifiable data that can be used to

support organizational objectives

• A corporate culture of data-driven

decision making

• Enhanced accountability and

transparency for all project stakeholders

• Benchmarks for more accurate

forecasting and goal-setting

”It’s important to test constantly because you never know what will resonate [with the customer] since search behavior is changing all the time. It doesn’t mean that something that was working a year ago will still work today. It’s important to keep testing to see if something has changed.”

– Laetitia Kieffer MediaCom

“

“


Why You Should Be Testing PPC AdsMany businesses A/B test

their email copy, banner

advertisements and landing

pages, but few bother to

test the copy of their PPC

ads. This results in missed

opportunities, as testing PPC

ads can provide you with

invaluable data about how

ad creative can impact the

click-through rate of your

advertisements, as well as

other metrics.

The more stringently you

test your ad copy, the more

highly optimized your ads will

be. This, in turn, will result in

significantly more compelling

ads that speak to your

prospective customers’ desire

to solve their problems.

When it comes to PPC, no

detail is inconsequential,

and the space and character

restrictions of AdWords and

Bing ads mean that your

ad copy must be as tight as

it possibly can be to drive

conversions.

The better your ads, the higher

your Quality Score. This should

be your ultimate goal as a PPC

advertiser, as it will result in

numerous benefits, including

more prominent positioning

and a lower cost-per-click. A/B

testing ad copy is an excellent

way to continually refine

and improve the quality and

relevance of your ads.

Doing so rigorously has other

benefits, including:

• Higher Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)

• Lower Cost Per Impression (CPI)

• Lower Cost Per Acquisition (CPA)

• Higher Click-Through Rate (CTR)

In addition to these quantifiable

metrics, you will also save precious

time and money by running

campaigns featuring highly

optimized advertisements that

yield results, rather than wasting

resources on ineffectual ads that do

not convert.

How do you decide where to start testing? Discover the strengths and weak-nesses of your PPC ads and AdWords campaigns today with a free, comprehensive performance report from WordStream.

Visit wordstream.com/goo-gle-adwords


Ad Creative Testing TipsImplement Tracking Before Each Test - Day-to-day campaign management and optimization has a

tendency to overshadow ongoing creative tests. Once a new test has been launched, it is critical to take

note and track the when and where of each new creative. Where in the account is the creative being

tested? And when was the creative activated? Taking note of when the account, campaign and group

into which a new creative was added can mean the difference between a successful test and one that

never happened. Reaching statistical significance in a creative test can take days, weeks and sometimes

months.

Prioritize Tests Based On Return – As paid search campaigns grow, it becomes increasingly

challenging to implement and manage creative tests across all groups within an account. To optimize

creative efficiently, prioritize tests to focus on groups with the most potential to shift overall account

performance. These groups are characterized by a high share of impressions, clicks or conversions within

an account. Prioritizing creative tests for high volume groups has the greatest potential for incremental

improvements in overall account performance.

Companies that test their ad creative rigorously see an average increase of 18% ROI on their paid search campaigns.*

* typical ad spend is $100K+ a month


Ad Creative Testing TipsReach Statistical Significance and Stop - Online marketers often end creative tests too early or let them

run for too long. Determining a winning creative through statistical significance requires patience, and is

one of the most difficult steps in a successful creative test. Achieving significance leaves little doubt that a

new creative outperforms the other creative in the statistical group. Prior to calculating significance, a KPI

such as conversions per impression, CTR, conversion rate or return on ad spend should be selected for

evaluating the performance of each creative.

By definition, creative performance is statistically significant if it is unlikely to have occurred by chance. To

calculate this, many creative testing tools utilize a Student’s T-Test with a user-defined confidence level.

This test determines the likelihood that the difference between a single creative and the average of all

creative in the group has not occurred by chance. A confidence level between 80% and 99% is standard,

but keep in mind that low-volume groups do not support high confidence levels and are not likely to

achieve statistical significance as fast as high-volume groups.

Here is a free and easy tool to calculate statistical significance.

“If you did consistent testing for creative...by the end of that year, I would expect 20% better results.”

David RodnitzkyCEO of 3Q Digital


Ad Creative Testing TipsStructuring Your PPC Ads - There are almost as many ways to write a PPC ad as there are products

to sell, but many experts agree on how to structure paid search advertisements to be as compelling as

possible.

Perry Marshall, author of “The Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords” and the world’s most frequently

quoted AdWords expert, recommends that ad copy should emphasize the benefits first. This is because,

according to Perry, consumers don’t want to buy products or services – they want to solve problems. By

highlighting the benefits of your product first, you can appeal to users’ emotions and offer them a way to

solve their problem.

Whether you choose to highlight the features or benefits of your product first, all of your PPC ads should

have all three of these essential elements. When creating your ads, using a Feature-Benefit Matrix can

help you identify opportunities to highlight your products or service in a way that appeals to prospective

customers, and craft a compelling call to action that will make them want to click your ad. Many

advertisers overlook the importance of this stage in their eagerness to launch a campaign, but the more

time you take to create strong PPC ads, the greater your CTR will be. On the next page is an example of a

Feature-Benefit Matrix.

Get more search testing tips and search insights at the BoostBlog

Visit BoostMedia.com/Blog


Example of a Features Benefit Matrix

Get more search testing tips and search insights at the BoostBlog

Visit BoostMedia.com/Blog


Ad Creative Testing TipsInclude Active Verbs in Your Ad Copy - Small changes can make a big difference in the effectiveness of

your PPC ads. Implementing action verbs is one way to make your ads more compelling

Active verbs not only sound more dynamic, they can also serve as calls to action such as “buy now”. When

writing your ads, imagine that your prospects are saying “I want to…” when performing a search, then

complete this thought with your ad copy.

Examples of active verbs include: Learn, Discover, Find, See and Get

Including active verbs in your ads is a great way to make them more interesting, compelling and enticing

for the user to click on them. If using an active verb in your ads’ headlines is not possible (or forces you to

sacrifice a high commercial intent keyword), you should definitely use one in your call to action.

When you test ad creative consistently, you learn more about your custom-ers and what actions they are taking online. Testing also neutralizes debates.


Ad Creative Testing TipsExperiment with Unconventional Calls to Action - Prompting your potential customers to do

something is essential – but so is differentiating your ads from the competition. One way to do this is by

including unconventional calls to action.

Too often, advertisers “ask for the sale” by using boring, unimaginative calls to action such as “buy now.”

However, calls to action like this are all too familiar to consumers and rarely have the desired effect.

Instead of using dry, bland sales talk, experiment with unusual calls to action that will capture your

prospects’ attention and get them to click.

So, how can you incorporate unconventional calls to action into your PPC ads?

• Highlight testimonials (“Read the rave reviews we got!”)

• Be highly specific about cost savings (“Lower your costs by…”)

• Make prospects use their imagination (“Imagine your wedding in…”)

• Show off satisfied customers (“Jim Rice trusted us – see who else did”)

• Include a bonus offer (“Plus Free Friendly Travel Advice!”)

• Appeal to their impatience (“Get an Answer Right Now”)

Just because you don’t have much space in your PPC ads doesn’t mean you can’t be creative with your

copy. Use your imagination and try taking a few risks with your ads – it could really pay off.

TIP: Make sure to consis-tently test the ad creative or your largest ad groups first.


Case Study: 99designs99designs’ PPC campaigns are structured around product categories. In order to gain more insights on

the online behaviors of their target audience, they invested in Boost Media’s ad creative optimization

testing tool for enterprise advertisers. Boost’s platform automates and scales many of the testing tips

covered in this whitepaper. Below are their results after a three month period of strict ad testing.

Get the entire case study on 99designs here >>

KPI Affected Category KPI Delta

CTR Key Products +35%

CTR Major Ad Groups +71%

CTR Avg Lift Due To Iterative Testing

+60%


ConclusionIn conclusion, writing ad copy for PPC advertising can

feel tough, particularly if you don’t consider yourself an

excellent writer or of the right-brained creative crowd.

However, if you test ad creative, you can focus your

writing and write ad creative that actually resonates with

your audience. This leads to higher conversion rates and

saves you from writing endless amounts of ad creative

that is ineffective with your audience. You don’t have to

be a super-creative copywriter or a PPC wizard to craft

competitive ad text.

TIP: Testing just some of your ad creative now will save you tons of time later.

TWEET THIS!Just finished...#WordStream and #BoostMedia “6 Tips to A/B Test Your Way to Winning PPC Ads” Whitepaper Collaboration. http://bit.ly/1sKFg08


About Boost Media

Contact

Boost increases advertiser profitability by using a combination of humans and software to drive

increased ad relevance at scale for many of the top Fortune 500s across Search, Social, Display and

Mobile. The Boost marketplace comprises over 1,000 expert copywriters and image optimizers who

compete to provide a diverse array of perspectives. Boost’s proprietary software identifies opportunities

for creative optimization and drives performance using a combination of workflow tools and algorithms.

Headquartered in San Francisco, the Boost Media optimization platform provides fresh, performance-

driven creative in 12 localized languages worldwide.

Boost Media150 Columbus Ave

San Francisco, CA 94133

1-800-771-9415

Learn More at boostmedia.com


About Wordstream

Contact

WordStream develops search marketing software, provides managed PPC advertising services, and

shares online marketing advice through our blog. Founded in 2007, we’ve evolved from being a keyword

software tool developer to a destination for paid search marketing expertise. The WordStream platform

lives in the cloud, delivering customer requests on-demand and quickly adapting to changes in the

industry with new customer requested features. The results speak for themselves: more traffic, higher-

quality leads, and greater profits, every day.

WordStream177 Huntington Ave., 16th Floor

Boston, MA, 02115

1-(617)-963-0555

Learn More at wordstream.com

6 tips to a/b test your way to winning ppc ads · 6 tips to a/b test your way to winning ppc ads...

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