Organization is key to a seamless digital advertising experience. After all, with so many factors to consider, the only way to monitor and facilitate improvement is to know which of these elements you can tweak.
Campaign vs. Ad Group
Let’s say you have a broad strategy for all your digital efforts, these are further separated into different campaigns that have the same underlying goal.
Think of campaigns as the broad picture. Here are some big picture choices you need to make for campaigns:
- Time of ad shown
- Location of user
- Platform where ads appear
- Budget
- Bid Strategy
For each of these campaigns, you have ad groups where ads with similar themes are typically grouped together. They make sure that your specific and carefully prepared ads actually reach the audience that truly needs them.
They are usually in the form of categories present on your website, but any categories will also do. For example, for an e-commerce retailer, {Clothing, Shoes, Accessories, Bags} are typical campaigns while further into the Clothing campaign, you have ad groups for {Tops, Dresses, Shorts, Skirts, Pants}.
It’s the same for the e-Learning industry. Campaigns can range from {Digital Marketing, Programming, Digital Art, Business, and so on}; with the ad group for Marketing being further categorized into {SEO, Copywriting, Social Media Ads, etc.}.
What are the strengths of ad groups?
Ad groups are effective because they are laser-focused, using keywords and bids that are highly targeted. Imagine an interested student in the trades. They wouldn’t be typing just “online courses” during a Google search. They would input their specific field in their query.
This extra specificity is the very purpose of ad groups. It’s not just in search engine pages. Ad groups link ads to blogs, videos, and other platforms with highly specific topics.
For example, you no longer have generic travel blogs but ultra-niche ones like budget travel blogs, Europe travel blogs, even ones solely dedicated to touring fantasy movie sets. These are the ones who succeed.
Your ads should mirror their niche in order to make the most out of your ad and capture the attention of prospects. Showing sneak peeks of your offerings by tickling their very interest can increase your traffic, and thereby, your conversions.
The keywords for this are: urgency and specificity.
Good strategy for organizing ad groups and campaigns can be the be-all and end-all of several businesses, especially one as highly moving and competitive as the online education industry. If you’re only painting and targeting a broad stroke, your ads won’t be as highly effective. All your efforts will just go down the drain.
