In a way, the search engine algorithm is like rocket science: we know it’s important, but most of us aren’t exactly sure how it works.

Every year, Google rolls out numerous updates (often with little to no warning) that manage to change the playing field for marketers in big and small ways.

But even for pros who have been working in search engine optimization (SEO) and paid search for years, understanding the search engine algorithm can be tricky. Knowing the basics allows you to react to new changes quickly or prepare your campaign for them in advance.

What are search engine algorithms?

Search engine algorithms are a collection of formulas that determine the quality and relevance of a particular ad or web page to the user’s query.

From Bing to Yahoo, every search engine has its own algorithms (or “rules”) and Google reportedly changes its algorithm hundreds of times each year.

The good news: only major changes (or updates) have the power to affect SEM campaigns significantly.

Google uses more than 200 ranking factors when determining which results to serve and in what order. (Image: Unsplash)

How do search engine algorithms work?

Each search engine algorithm is made up of sub-algorithms that perform different tasks. At the most basic level, search engine algorithms have three jobs: to crawl, index, and rank web pages.

1. Crawl: Bots (aka web crawlers) scan web pages and follow links.
2. Search index: The crawled content is stored in a large database organized by topics (keywords).
3. Rank: When someone enters a search query, the search algorithm analyzes the indexed content in its database to find the most relevant, high-quality, and authoritative pieces and display them on the results page in order of importance.

Overall, the Google search engine uses more than 200 ranking factors when determining which results to serve and in what order.

However, no matter how well you adjust to them, each new update has the power to push your efforts to square one.

While updates may be mostly focused on organic search, they can have not-so-clear (but oh-so-painful) implications for paid search as well.

For example, your ads could stop showing up as a response to a big part of your target audience’s queries simply because the landing page they lead to isn’t specific enough.

What is the purpose of search algorithms?

Search engine algorithms were created to:

1. Help search engines understand the user’s intent
2. Identify the most relevant, helpful, high-quality content
3. Present that information in an organized manner

What factors influence search rankings

While we might not know the exact set of rules for each search engine’s ranking algorithms, we do know key factors that influence which content is chosen to appear on the SERP.

These factors include:

• • Keywords: How well the website content matches the search query
  • Content quality: Original, accurate, well-written, valuable, and relevant information
  • Backlinks: The quantity and quality of external sites linking to the page
  • User experience (UX): How fast the page loads, mobile-friendliness, usability, and intuitive navigation
  • Domain authority: The credibility and trustworthiness of the website, along with the age of the domain
  • Freshness: How recently the content was published or, better yet, updated
  • Engagement: Click-through rates, dwell time, and bounce rates
  • Structured data: Use of schema markup to help search engines understand content

• On-page SEO: Title tags, meta descriptions, headings, URL structure, and alt text

Pro tip: While social media isn’t a direct ranking factor, it can indirectly impact SEO (and rankings) by increasing website traffic.

Types of search engine algorithm updates

Not all updates are created equal.

It’s nearly impossible to monitor all the updates Google comes up with and still have time to focus on your marketing strategy.

• Major updates: These updates are infrequent and often address a specific search algorithm issue. For example, the Core Web Vitals update addresses problems related to user experience on web pages. Search engines usually release them once or twice a year.
• Broad-core updates: Updates in this category focus on targeting low-quality pages. Usually, they adjust the importance of several ranking factors. For example, they may decide that page loading speed is now more important than the total number of backlinks. These updates usually occur once every 4-5 months.
• Small updates: These updates don’t usually create major visible changes to your site’s performance and analytics. They’re often minor tweaks that improve the searcher’s experience and don’t affect the rankings of high-quality websites. Minor updates can be implemented daily or weekly.

Basically, major and broad-core updates are worth your attention. However, only a few of them are strong enough to make a significant impact on your rankings.

Google algorithm examples

With each new Google update, search engine algorithms are working to become more useful to the searcher. Unfortunately for digital marketers, predicting specific changes is nearly impossible.

By understanding the overall intent to improve the searcher’s experience, it’s possible to adjust your SEM strategy so it doesn’t suffer as new updates take effect.

1998: PageRank

In 1996, Larry Page and Sergey Brin (co-founders of Google) created the PageRank algorithm at Stanford University as an effort to better organize searched content.

Essentially, the PageRank algorithm determined which sites were more important than others — and if important sites linked to other sites, those associated sites were more likely to be considered important as well.

This early algorithm was all about trustworthiness and credibility.

2011: Panda

The Google Panda algorithm update was designed to reward high-quality content while penalizing lower-quality, thin, and spammy content.

This update went after sites that stuffed keywords in their content, and those with high bounce rates and low user engagement were negatively impacted.

2012: Penguin

The 2012 Penguin update cracked down on spammy backlinks, targeting websites that used black hat tactics like link schemes.

This update rewarded those with natural, high-quality links and was integrated into Google’s core algorithm in 2016.

2013: Hummingbird

Google Hummingbird focused on better understanding search intent. In other words, it shifted from relying only on keywords to interpreting the meaning and context behind user queries.

This algorithm update helped Google improve the relevance of results for more complex, conversational, and long-tail searches.

2015: RankBrain

The RankBrain update also helped Google further understand user intent and context behind search queries.

But while Hummingbird was focused on semantic search, RankBrain leveraged machine learning to interpret user intent and handle more ambiguous or complex queries.

2019: BERT

This update’s aim was to improve the search engine’s translation of natural language queries to improve its understanding of context.

This forced marketers to pay more attention to user intent than before. Pre-BERT, if you needed to focus on separate keywords in the search phrase, full phrases became much more important after the update.

For example, the query “cooking your own vegetables” shouldn’t simply give a list of tips for cooking veggies. It should also provide tips for cooking vegetables you grew and harvested on your own. In turn, paid ads had to become much more specific targeting the intent of the audience to stay relevant to search queries (in addition to leveraging personal data, user behavior, and search history).

2021: MUM

In May 2021, Google announced its Multitask Unified Model update, or MUM. This AI is designed to analyze content similar to the way a human does. Google calls MUM a powerful evolution of the BERT algorithm.

MUM’s goal is to process complex search queries that can’t be satisfied with a short snippet. To get answers to these query types, a user needs to do an average of eight searches.

To address this problem, MUM works to predict these searches and provide answers on the first search engine results page (SERP).

When adjusting your SEM strategy for MUM, it’s wise to focus on:

• A high-quality internal linking system
• Leveraging structured data
• Working to predict complex queries as part of the buyer’s journey so you can provide answers
• Creating multi-tiered content and splitting it into snippet-friendly fragments

2022: Helpful Content Update

Focused on user-first content, the Helpful Content Update targeted websites that produce low-quality content designed to rank on the SERP rather than provide value for the searcher.

Content that is helpful and created by subject matter experts is now prioritized over sites with unoriginal or thin content.

Pro tip: If you’re focused on user experience (as you should be), then these updates shouldn’t have a major negative impact. However, if you do see your rankings take a dive, here’s how to deal.

Search engine algorithms are a complex system for helping users find the best answer to their queries. (Image: Unsplash)

How to optimize for search engine algorithms

Search engine updates can be as unpredictable as the weather. The only thing you can know for sure is that they will happen.

When they do, many websites and ads may see a drop in rankings, even if the change is temporary. Luckily, there are ways to stay prepared and ready when updates do arise.

1. Continue ongoing SEO maintenance

The most important step to prevent the negative effects of algorithm updates is to continue routine SEO maintenance in conjunction with creating high-quality content.

From technical SEO basics (improving site speed, mobile friendliness, and indexing) and on-page SEO staples (proper use of keywords and metadata), to a quality backing strategy and user experience, make sure to audit your site regularly and keep an eye on important metrics for optimization opportunities.

2. Focus on landing page quality

Even when updates roll around, it’s hard to understand immediately how they’ll affect the connection between paid and organic search.

But one thing is always clear: High-quality content on landing pages is likely to affect your conversion rate positively, regardless of algorithm changes.

Just a few years ago, landing pages weren’t as important for paid search because they didn’t play a big role in the ad-clicking process.

Today, with Google’s focus aimed at search relevancy and accuracy, landing page quality is an integral factor, particularly when determining things like your Quality Score.

Search engines pay close attention to the landing page quality and relevance to keywords, and that isn’t likely to change.

Now, Google even tracks how often a user returns to the search page after visiting the landing page in an attempt to understand whether they were satisfied with the search result.

To stay ahead of the updates, it’s imperative to maintain the quality and relevance of both landing and linked pages.

3. Don’t rely solely on keywords: focus on intent and relevance

Google algorithm updates tend to move away from a hyper-focus on keywords to more long-tail phrases and nuance.

Of course, keywords are still an integral part of SEM. However, building your strategy solely around them can prevent you from seeing the big picture or creating a well-rounded program.

Rather than only focusing on your keyword, you also want to take intent and relevance into account. Look into how you can best answer the questions your audience is asking.

Paying attention to when, how, and what they ask can help you design relevant content while satisfying changing search engine algorithms.

It can help to focus on the buyer’s journey instead of only on single keywords that users type when starting the search.

For example, Google has a different view of relevance with the roll-out of MUM. Now, it evaluates how your content or landing page fits into the context of the subject.

This includes relevant backlinks, internal linking for content clusters, and proper Schema markup.

4. Look for update warnings

In some cases, search engines will offer some advanced notice about an upcoming algorithm update.

Back in April 2020, Google announced a 2021 algorithm change that would introduce Core Web Vitals as ranking factors.

This gave marketers more than a year to get familiar with these new factors and adjust accordingly. Since Google isn’t always forthcoming about algorithm update details, it’s wise to take notice when they are.

5. Don’t panic — but do update your content

When search engines change their algorithms, it can cause chaos for marketers. It’s often a mad dash to adjust strategies and make quick changes to curb significant ranking changes or irregular reports. But sometimes these actions can hurt your campaign even further.

Remember, all you can do is implement relevant improvements and follow the latest guidelines.

If you’re using Google Analytics, making note of when an algorithm update took place can explain any out-of-the-ordinary results when you pull reports or debrief clients.

Algorithm update or not, it’s always best practice to revisit your content regularly to ensure it offers value and aligns with the search intent to be considered the most relevant result.

Pro tip: If another company’s site starts outranking you after an algorithm update, you can run a competitor analysis to figure out why that might be.

The takeaway

Search engine algorithms are a complex system for helping users find the best answer to their queries. And to improve user experience, search engines change their algorithms regularly.

But studying how algorithms work isn’t as important as understanding what your target audience wants.

By improving the quality and relevance of your page content while exploring questions your audience asks, you can work to minimize your dependence on algorithm changes and control, to some degree, how drastically they affect your initiatives.

Need some help along the way? We’ve got you.

This article has been updated and was originally published in November 2020.

The post Search Engine Algorithms: What You Need to Know appeared first on HawkSEM.

Seeing your competitor’s name on the search engine results page (SERP) is never a great feeling.

But an even worse feeling?

When a rival brand shows up after someone searches for your brand’s name.

So, are companies allowed to use another company’s name in their paid search ads? What about as keywords for bidding?

We answer these questions and more below.

Can a competitor use my brand name in their ad?

Yes, a competitor can bid on your brand name in their Google ads. However, there are rules to follow.

Competitors can use your brand name in their Google ad copy if the name isn’t trademarked and the way they use it can’t be deemed “deceptive.” (Deception tactics include things like the company impersonating your brand.)

If your company’s name is trademarked, that’s a different story. Per Google guidelines, no other brands can use a trademarked name in their ad copy.

An exception to this rule is if the company using it is a legitimate reseller, such as Zappos creating an ad for Nike sneakers.

Pro tip: Bing (Microsoft’s search engine) also allows competitors to bid on your business name. It’s policy states that “as an advertiser, you are responsible for ensuring that your keywords and ad content, including trademarks and logos, do not infringe or violate the intellectual property rights of others.”

Here’s an example of what it looks like when one brand bids on another’s name (without even mentioning them). (Image: Google)

What are the rules about competitors bidding on my brand name?

Competitors can buy your brand name as a keyword, even if it’s trademarked. By using your brand name as a keyword, their ad could potentially show up on the SERP when someone is searching for your specific company.

Unfortunately, you can’t do much about the competitor using your brand name or trademarks as a keyword.

However, there are things you can do to remain competitive. For starters, ensure you’re bidding on your own brand name. This way, competitors aren’t stealing extra traffic that should go to you. This also gives you more real estate in the SERPs by showing a paid ad and appearing in the organic results.

If a competitor is bidding on your brand name and you aren’t? Then their ad will show above your organic result, driving more clicks away from your website. You can also bid on their brand name — more on that below.

Further reading: Should You Bid On Your Branded Keywords? (5 Pros + Cons)

Why would a competitor bid on my company’s brand name?

The main reason companies bid on another’s brand name is to steal traffic from the competition. They want to target those looking for a brand that sells a similar product or service, so they can redirect them to their own website.

This tactic makes sense when you have a new brand that few, if any, people know about. So you bid on a competitor’s brand with more notoriety to gain brand awareness and visibility for your brand.

Pro tip: If you have an existing amicable relationship with a competitor, consider contacting them for a truce and agree to not bid on each other’s terms. There’s no guarantee they’ll agree, but if you’re worried about your budget, it’s worth a shot.

How do I choose which competitor brand names to bid on, if any?

If you’re going to bid on a competitor’s name, we advise picking the right competitors to bid on (or ensure your agency picked the right ones, if you’re not doing your own marketing).

There’s no point in bidding on brands that aren’t stealing business from you, such as big-name brands with significantly more offerings.

For example, you can target competitors that give you a hard time because they have:

• Been around for many years
• Lots of website traffic from high-ranking content on Google
• A high domain authority (DA) score
• Recent complaints from customers that you can point out in your copy to show why you’re better
• An inferior unique selling proposition to yours

If the competitor is similar enough and more popular than you but isn’t too out of reach (e.g., an ecommerce mom-and-pop shop targeting Walmart keywords wouldn’t cut it), then go for it. Test the results to see if this boosts your traffic and conversions.

Also, tailor the ad text to differentiate your brand from that competitor. One way to do this is by highlighting your unique selling proposition.

For instance, if a competitor brand has a similar but more expensive product or service, highlight your brand as the more affordable option.

Have more questions about paid search or Google Ads? You’ve come to the right place.

What if I think a competitor is breaking the rules when using my brand name?

Before you get heated, it’s important to realize that they might not actually be bidding on your brand.

If your brand is “Sunrise Senior Living,” for example, the company could be bidding on “senior living.” That’s what will match in Google’s algorithm — not necessarily the “Sunrise” part.

Unfortunately, there’s not a lot you can do unless they’re using your trademarked term in their ad copy. If they are, submit a trademark complaint to Google.

Aside from bidding on their brand in return, fight back by conducting keyword research (using tools like SpyFu or Semrush) to find other search terms they’re using for search marketing efforts.

In extreme cases (e.g., trademark infringement), send the company a cease and desist letter, though this will likely come at a cost and not guarantee the outcome you want.

Just because a competitor bids on certain keywords doesn’t mean they’re the “right” keywords. (Image: Google)

Should I bid on my competitor’s brand name?

If other keywords are working well, it’s a better use of your ad spend to allocate your marketing budget toward those.

There’s no hard-and-fast answer to this. However, experience tells us that bidding on a competitor’s brand name shouldn’t be a top priority in your paid search strategy.

If you have an excess budget, then you could bid on a competitor’s brand as a keyword. We don’t suggest using another brand in your ad copy.

Why?

Because it’s giving unnecessary attention to the competition, which could backfire and direct more traffic to them. In the Monday.com example above, they bid on the term “Asana” without mentioning it in their ad copy.

Going about this wrong is a major reason why we recommend using a digital marketing agency that specializes in SEO and SEM.

HawkSEM’s experts have helped brands large and small gain higher clicks and conversions.

This is partly due to our decades of experience in the industry and our proprietary software, ConversionIQ, which pinpoints the best keywords to improve optimization and earn more clicks from high-converting prospects.

How can I use competitors bidding on my brand to my advantage?

Review your competitor’s ad copy or strategy and take inventory of what you uncover. How does your campaign compare? This is a great time to reflect on your own advertising efforts.

Are you taking full advantage of Google’s ad offerings like assets and sitelink extensions (if appropriate)? Ask yourself: If I were a consumer, would I click on my ad?

“Most large companies have a competitor campaign,” says Sarah McKraken, a search engine marketing expert. “You’ll find plenty of large companies bidding on others and getting bid on as well.”

For example, if you type “Etsy t-shirts design” into Google, you’ll find a Printify ad at the top, instead of Etsy:

Or if you type in “Kohl’s women pajamas” in Google search, you’ll see a pay-per-click (PPC) ad from their competitor, JCPenny:

In the Etsy branded keyword “takeover,” Printify didn’t mention its competitor at all. It focused on what its brand offers: printing and shipping, custom shirt designs, and no upfront costs.

Then, in the Kohl’s branded keyword takeover, JCPenny vied for the attention of shoppers with a clearance deal on their women’s pajamas. They also didn’t mention the competitor directly in their ads, and instead focused on their special offer.

These are all great tactics when bidding on competitor brand keywords. But also note how Kohl’s dominates its own branded keyword:

It sits at the top and includes its own featured deals, ratings, and a clear return policy.

Since these searchers are looking for Kohl’s directly, they’ll likely still gain most of the traffic by targeting their own brand keyword. So the takeaway is to ensure you’re focusing just as much on your brand keywords as on competitors’ brand keywords (if not more).

Pro tip: If you bid on competitor terms, avoid using dynamic keyword insertion. This feature involves the searched keyword auto-populating as an ad’s headline. This will cause your competitor’s name to show up in your ad. It could be deemed deceptive, even if it’s unintentional.

Tips to win at bidding on branded keywords

If you decide your marketing strategy requires an ad campaign using branded terms, these two tips will be helpful.

1. First, tackle your opponents on the defensive end: Use high bids to maintain impression share of your brand’s keywords. This way, you’re above competitors’ ads in a branded search for your company’s name (like in the Kohl’s example).
2. On the offensive end, you can build campaigns using a competitor’s branded terms using the tips above — showing why you’re better. Then to seal the deal, build a landing page specifically for that ad campaign that dives deeper into why your brand is the better choice.

“If you’re a coffee company, having a targeted page that exemplifies how your brand is better than buying from Starbucks could be worthwhile,” says McKraken.

“Some callouts could be that you’re a small business, you sell exclusively fair-trade, or out of a blind taste test your blends are tastier.”

Think of this as a brand vs. competitor blog post. The goal is to show, not tell, why you’re better. So include:

• Benefits of your product or service that relate to that audience’s specific pain points
• Testimonials from happy customers who overcame those pain points using your brand
• Comparison of plans, prices, features, and other unique differentiators to showcase why your brand is better
• Visuals, such as infographics or videos to demonstrate your product’s benefits
• An offer that’s tough to refuse, such as a limited-time discount, free trial, or free shipping
• Multiple calls to action (CTAs) throughout in case they’re ready to convert before they get to the end

Use landing pages to stand out from competitors

Now, like an ad campaign, landing pages require ongoing testing to determine what works.

So prepare to build A/B split tests and monitor the metrics (like click-through rate or CTR, conversions, and bounce rate) to see what converts potential customers into buyers or leads.

To give you an idea of what a winning landing page looks like for a competitor keywords campaign, we’ll use Monday.com’s feature in the Asana keyword campaign as an example.

Once you click on their link in the SERP, the first thing you see is a large and bold statement of why you should select its platform:

It includes social proof (the number of customers who use their platform and their logos), showcases what it can do in a nice visual way, and has a clear CTA button.

Scroll down, and you’ll find another bold move — a comparison chart between Monday.com and not just Asana, but all of its contenders in the market:

You can click each to see why Monday.com is the better choice. It’s a smart move to add the other competitors just in case prospective buyers consider them now or in the future.

Scroll a bit further, and you’ll see accolade badges from all the awards Monday.com won, further proving the worthiness of your dollar:

Then just below it, you’ll find a list of the benefits of using Monday.com for your project management:

But it doesn’t stop there. Beneath, you’ll find data from a Forrester report showing Monday.com’s economic impact on its users. And what better way to end a landing page than with a testimonial from happy clients?

Further reading: How to Create Landing Pages that Convert: Examples + Pro Tips

TL;DR: Using competitor names in Google Ads

What you’re allowed to do:

• Use competitor names as keywords

What you shouldn’t do:

• Use competitor names in ad copy
• Use dynamic keyword insertion (a feature that automatically updates ad copy to match the keywords people use to search)

What you can do if a competitor bids on your brand name:

• Bid on your own brand name to stay above the competition
• Tailor ad copy to differentiate your brand from that competitor
• Review your competitor’s ads and apply any missing pieces to your own campaign

For a more aggressive approach:

• Conduct keyword research to find other search terms your competitor targets and bid on those keywords
• Build campaigns around your competitors’ branded terms with dedicated landing pages that outline your value proposition

For extreme cases:

• Submit a trademark complaint to Google if a competitor uses your trademark brand name
• In extreme cases, you can send the company a cease and desist letter

The takeaway

Bidding on your competitor’s brand shouldn’t be your top priority. But if you must, use the help of digital marketing experts to ensure you do it right. Without an expert’s help, you could get lower-quality scores for those keywords.

That’s because Google can see you’re not the brand whose name you’re bidding on. Plus, bidding on those branded keywords will likely cost you more because the brand isn’t your own.

Even worse? Using a competitor’s trademark name can result in legal issues.

In the long run, it’ll be better for your marketing plan to focus on your unique products or services, make sure the user experience is top-notch, and use ads to highlight your unique selling propositions to stand out.

This article has been updated and was originally published in November 2021.

The post Can Competitors Use My Brand Name in Google Ads? appeared first on HawkSEM.

Google’s search engine results page might be the most popular place to display Google Ads  — but you can broaden your reach beyond Google with Google Search Partners.

This network of third-party websites, search directories, and Google-owned properties like YouTube can boost visibility and clicks. But it can also come with trade-offs, like lower-quality traffic.

In this article, we’ll break down who Google’s Search Partners are, how to decide if it’s the right choice for your campaigns, and if so, how to maximize its performance.

What are Google Search Partners?

Google Search Partners are websites that partner with Google Ads to display promotions on their sites and search results pages.

They’re part of the Google Search Network and help to extend the reach of ads to hundreds of sites across the internet.

Essentially, Google Search Partners puts your ad across websites beyond Google and YouTube, with the goal of increasing your ad’s overall reach.

List of Google Search Partner sites

Google doesn’t share a complete list of its Search Partners. However, the following are confirmed partner sites:

Google sites:

• Google’s search engine
• Google Images
• Google Maps
• Google Play
• Google Shopping
• YouTube

Non-Google sites:

• 247 Sports
• Amazon
• Ask.com
• BizRate.com
• Dogpile.com
• Excite.com
• Lycos.com
• Target
• The New York Times
• W3Schools
• Walmart

A telltale sign that a website is sharing Google text ads? Hover over the ad link. Notice how this sponsored ad on Dogpile directs to a Google.com domain:

Take a look at what these ads can look like on partner sites. For example, here are Google ads on Ask.com:

BizRate.com:

YouTube:

And finally, Dogpile.com:

Websites that have opted into the Google Search Partner network receive a small cut of the ad revenue in exchange for hosting the ads.

While some smaller search engines partner with Google, Bing doesn’t, and it actually offers its own Search Partners network for its advertisers.

Is Google Search Partners worth it? Pros and cons

“Some advertisers find that Google Search Partners can bring additional traffic and conversions,” says Vaibhav Kakkar of Digital Web Solutions. “While others might see lower conversion rates or higher costs-per-click.”

Ultimately, the best way to determine if GSP is right for you is to segment and test your campaigns and review performance.

Generally speaking, however, there are some common pros and cons.

Pros:

• Greater reach
• Higher conversion rates due to a larger audience
• Lower costs per click (CPC)

Cons:

• Sometimes lower quality results
• Higher bounce rates if ads appear on sites that aren’t relevant to your target audience
• Lack of control with ad placement

“Google Search Partners is a viable avenue to attract more potential customers,” says HawkSEM CEO and co-founder Sam Yadegar.

“Not only do we use this to grow conversions, but we track and analyze the data in a granular fashion to increase conversion rates and to lower cost per acquisition as well.”

In fact, HawkSEM was able to help Peer Software increase conversions by 128% by integrating Search Partner campaigns into their overall strategy.

Similarly, Magee Clegg of Cleartail Marketing helped a brand generate a 14,000% increase in website traffic with Google Search Partners.

Audrey Bakhach of Custom Digital Solutions helped another brand reduce cost per lead by 20% and increase conversions by 30%.

“This showcases how leveraging Google Search Partners can lead to enhanced targeting and cost savings,” says Bakhach, “ultimately boosting campaign performance and delivering tangible results.”

Best campaign types to use for Google Search Partners

If you’re new to GSP and want to test out a sure-fire (or as close to it as you can get) campaign, here are two campaign types to try first.

Brand campaigns

A brand campaign focuses on using branded keywords, or keywords that include your brand name in them.

For example, client management platform HoneyBook created a brand campaign so its ad shows up at the top of its brand name search:

Using Google Search Partners for branded campaigns can help spread the word about your brand while also ensuring your competitors aren’t bidding on your name and stealing traffic.

RLSA campaigns

RLSA campaigns, or remarketing lists for search ads, target people who have already been to your website.

Using this type of ad for a Google Search Partners campaign can improve conversions and overall performance because your ads appear for people who are already acquainted with your site.

Further reading: What is Google RLSA? + How to Use It Right (7 Expert Tips)

How to turn off Google Search Partners

If Google Search Partners doesn’t seem like the right fit for your campaigns, you can turn off this setting inside your Google Ads account:

1. Click Campaigns
2. Hover over the campaign you want to exclude from the Google Search Partners setting
3. Click the gear icon next to the campaign name
4. Click the drop-down menu for Networks
   1. Uncheck the box for “Include Google Search Partners” (To only show your ads on Google Search, the Google Search Network checkbox should be the only box selected)
5. Click Save

How to turn on Google Search Partners

The default campaign settings automatically include GSP. But to manually turn this setting back on:

1. Log into your Google Ads dashboard
2. Click the campaign you want to leverage Search Partners
3. Click the Settings tab
4. Click on the Networks drop-down menu
5. Make sure the box that says “Include Google Search Partners” is checked
6. Click Save

How to improve your Google Search Partner performance

If you decide to give this network a try, here are seven strategies to get the most out of your Search Partner ads.

1. Research where your audience spends time
2. Create separate Search Partner campaigns
3. Use specific Search Partner keywords
4. Test new features and offers with Search Partners
5. Experiment with your ads
6. Turn off Search Partners for low-performing campaigns
7. Monitor your ad performance

1. Research where your audience spends time

If you know your audience only (or mostly) uses Google and its proprietary websites, turning on Google Search Partners likely won’t benefit your text or display ads performance.

On the flip side, if you run an ecommerce store and know your audience also shops on sites like Amazon and Walmart, reaching them through the Partner network can be a great tactic.

Pay attention to where your audience spends their time online and use that to inform your ad strategy.

Conducting market research, researching user demographics, and putting together a user persona can help you discover this information.

Further reading: How to Create an Ideal Customer Profile (+ Template)

2. Create separate Search Partner campaigns

While you can’t create a campaign only for Search Partners, you can create two campaigns with this option toggled on for one and off for another.

“Segment your campaigns to allocate budgets and set bid adjustments specifically for partner traffic,” explains Bakhach.

“This level of control can make a significant difference. Keep a watchful eye on the performance of partner websites and apps within your campaigns, allowing you to identify top-performing placements and exclude underperforming ones.”

This ensures your ads consistently surface on relevant and high-quality partner sites, increasing the likelihood of engagement.

Creating multiple campaigns gives you more granular control, ensuring you hit your goals.

3. Use specific Search Partner keywords

Paying attention to past Search Partner data can improve your ads for the future. Look at your Search Query reports from existing Search Partner ads to pinpoint high-performing keywords.

Then create Search Partner campaigns specifically for those keywords.

“By routinely evaluating your campaign’s performance data and making the necessary adjustments, you’ll be well on your way to leveraging Google Search Partners effectively and boosting engagement while keeping a cost-effective strategy in play,” advises Bakhach.

Further reading: How to Build a Keyword Strategy: 6 Easy Steps (+ Expert Tips) 

4. Test new features and offers with Search Partners

Just because Search Partners didn’t work for a previous campaign doesn’t mean it’s never going to work. When you launch new features, products, or service offerings, test GSP again.

“The best advertisers, in my experience, are those who remain personally invested in their efforts and are open to change,” says Draven McConville, founder at Klipboard.

“They don’t hesitate to attempt new things and experiment.”

5. Experiment with your ads

Speaking of experimenting, test different formats, sizes, and creative assets within your ads, as well as different features and offerings.

“For advertisers looking to leverage Google Search Partners effectively, I recommend utilizing the extensive targeting options, unique ad formats, and flexible bidding strategies offered by Google,” Clegg recommends.

In other words, you have options — use them.

Bakhach agrees, stating that to adapt to the varied layouts and screen sizes of partner websites and apps, leverage responsive ad formats. They’re like chameleons for your ads, ensuring they look good and perform well across different platforms.

“Explore different targeting options, including keyword targeting, demographic targeting, and device targeting, to [home] in on the most relevant audiences in the partner network,” continues Bakhach.

“Lastly, don’t be afraid to experiment with various bidding strategies, such as target impression share or maximize conversions, to find the approach that best aligns with your campaign objectives.”

6. Turn off Search Partners for low-performing campaigns

Google Search Partners isn’t going to work for every campaign. Sometimes, no matter how you adjust your keywords, bid strategy, or what have you, it simply won’t perform the way you want it to.

And that’s okay — just turn off Search Partners in those instances and focus solely on Google sites.

To monitor the effectiveness of your GSP campaigns, check in frequently.

You may increase the performance of any advertisements by changing your bids or targeting if you notice that they aren’t receiving many clicks or conversions.

“Concentrating your investment on the sites that are giving you the best results, will help to increase the overall performance of your ads,” says Michael Wall, founder at Codefixer.

7. Monitor your ad performance

Finally, keep an eye on your ads to ensure they’re working hard for your business.

“The key to effectively using Google Search Partners is to monitor its performance closely,” says Kakkar. “Separate the data for Google and its partners to analyze which channels are driving the best results.”

“Adjust bids, ad copy, and targeting settings accordingly,” continues Kakkar. “It’s essential to regularly review and refine your campaign to ensure that you’re getting a positive return on investment from Search Partners.”

For some businesses, it can be a valuable addition to their advertising strategy, while others may find that focusing solely on Google Search yields better results.

FAQs about Google Search Partners

Here are some of the top questions advertisers have when it comes to the Google Search Partner network.

Can I choose where my ads appear?

You cannot choose specific sites to show your ads.

“Your ads will show up on the types of partner sites as users who like specific things or work in certain fields, based on your targeting parameters,” Bakhach explains.

“The only other thing you can tweak is putting in ‘negative’ sites. So, if you have users coming that are producing more spam you can block ads on that site.”

Can I turn Google Search Partners on for select ad groups but not others?

Google Search Partners is a campaign-level change, so you can’t switch this option on for different ad groups.

However, you can duplicate a campaign and have one campaign using Search Partners and another campaign solely living on Google sites.

Can I create a campaign only for Google Search Partners?

No, you can’t. You can create a campaign just for Google sites, but you can’t do the inverse and create a campaign just for Search Partners.

You can set your Google search ads to appear in Google’s search engine results pages (SERP) and Partner sites.

How to tell when traffic comes from Google Search Partners

Inside your search terms report, you can use the “Network (With Search Partners) option to segment your traffic by the Google Search Network and Google Search Partners.

Indicators of traffic from Search Partner sites may include: a very low cost per click (CPC) or lower than expected conversion rates.

Will a lower clickthrough rate (CTR) impact my Quality Score?

No. While ads on Search Partner sites can impact other important metrics positively or negatively, they won’t impact Quality Score.

5 myths about Google Search Partners

Not every brand or campaign sees success from Google Search Partners. Of course, this can be the case for many new strategies. However, there are a few misconceptions.

1. All partners are smaller search engines

While many are, like Dogpile and Ask.com, there are other sites too. Your ads can appear in search engine results, on directory pages, or even in search results on ecommerce sites like Amazon or Target.

2. If Google Search Partners doesn’t work for one campaign, it won’t work for any campaign

Google Search Partners can work on a campaign-by-campaign basis, fully dependent on the ads, ad types, and targeted keywords.

Google Ads itself is always changing, updating functionality, offering new features — so experiment with your ads, but always check back in to see if Google has introduced new options that can give your Search Partner ads another chance.

3. Search Partners is for traditional search campaigns only

Search Partner ads don’t only show up as traditional search campaigns. You can also use it in the display network and for shopping ads.

Again, test different ad types and creative to see what works best for your brand.

4. You can’t get more granular than segmenting by Search Partner network at the campaign level

One big frustration advertisers have is that you can’t see a comprehensive list of all Search Partners and how each one is performing.

However, there are other ways to take a look at your ad performance. For example:

• Look at how your keywords are performing, and select specific keywords for your Search Partner ads.
• Review your match types to see how they perform across networks. In many cases, broad match keywords don’t always perform well on the Partner network.
• Consider device usage, as Partner ads don’t always convert as well on mobile devices.

5. If the CPA is higher in Search Partners, you can’t do anything about it

Search Partners offers less control than traditional search ads. However, if you head back to our seven tactics for optimizing and improving your Search Partner ads, you’ll discover ways you can minimize the CPA (cost-per-action) for your ads.

The takeaway

The more reach your ads have, the higher the traffic you receive — and Google Search Partners can help you achieve this. But if you’re not getting the right traffic to your site, you’re wasting ad spend on irrelevant clicks.

To improve your performance and optimize your ad campaigns, reach out to HawkSEM to get help from our seasoned experts. We’d love to improve your PPC campaigns and boost your return on investment (ROI).

This article has been updated and was originally published in February 2024.

The post What Are Google Search Partners? + 7 Pro Tips appeared first on HawkSEM.

Like a real-time scoring system, the Facebook algorithm filters and ranks social media content for each individual user.

For marketers, understanding how this system ranks content (and why) can mean the difference between a failed campaign and a viral post.

In this article, we’ll explore how the Facebook algorithm works for paid and organic content and share tips and troubleshooting advice you can use to build more successful Facebook marketing campaigns.

What is the Facebook algorithm?

The Facebook algorithm is the system the social media network uses to identify, rank, and display content in various feeds.

It’s the series of processes and data points that determine how Facebook distributes content across all surfaces, including Facebook’s:

• Feed
• Stories
• Video
• Reels
• Groups
• Ads

In fact, the algorithm even determines the search results and comments you see on Facebook. Think of it as an always-on system that runs in the background, pinpointing the most relevant results.

While the Facebook algorithm uses specific processes and user data, the general concept isn’t unique. Every social media platform and search engine uses an algorithm to filter and rank content.

How does the Facebook algorithm work?

Across every surface (such as news feed, ads, and stories), the system crawls the platform for content most relevant to the user and most likely to drive engagement, such as:

• Clicking to view a search result or see more of a caption
• Liking or reacting to a post
• Replying to a story
• Sharing a video to the user’s feed
• Using a reel’s audio or template to create new content
• Clicking on an ad and completing a conversion

How Facebook distributes content

Facebook uses four steps to find, rank, and distribute content.

1. Identify content sources

First, the network determines potential sources to create a preliminary pool of content. The source types depend on how the surface works.

For example, the stories feed almost exclusively shows content from Facebook users, creators, and businesses you already follow.

The ad algorithm considers a much wider range of interest and engagement signals. We’ll explore all of these in depth below.

2. Consider content signals

Next, Facebook considers information about each piece of content.

Signals may include:

• Which account published the content?
• How recently was the content published?
• How popular is the content (e.g., how much engagement did it already generate)?

3. Predict engagement

Then Facebook predicts how individual users will respond to each piece of content. These predictions depend on each user’s unique data.

Considerations may include how likely a user is to:

• React, comment, or share the content
• Watch the reel or video all the way to the end
• Click to view the original creator’s profile or follow them

4. Develop relevance scores

Finally, Facebook compiles all these signals and predictions to estimate how relevant a post, story, video, ad, or search result is to an individual user. The algorithm ranks content based on this score.

“The Facebook algorithm’s goal is to ensure everyone sees posts from the people they find valuable,” says Simon Bacher, CEO and Co-founder of Ling App.

“The platform gives a relevance score, wherein a high content score means a higher feed placement.”

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How Facebook ranks content across surfaces

While the main principle is the same across Facebook, the inputs are a little different for each surface. Here’s a brief overview of how Facebook uses AI and machine learning for each algorithm.

News feed

Since the news feed includes content from accounts that users already follow and content from recommended sources, it has the most complex ranking factors.

The main inputs for Facebook’s news feed algorithm include:

• The amount of time the user is likely to spend reading or looking at a post
• The likelihood that the user will stop scrolling through the feed to view a post
• The likelihood that the user will tap or click to read additional comments
• The value the post is likely to deliver, based on the user’s history and the post’s popularity

Business pages

Facebook pages and professional profiles have news feeds that are similar to individual accounts. As a result, the Facebook algorithm for business accounts uses the same types of signals and predictions.

Stories

The stories feed only shows content from people and businesses the user already follows. As a result, the total volume of potential content is much smaller than it is in other feeds.

In addition, the stories feed works a little differently. Users have to click or tap to open stories and to continue scrolling through the feed.

As a result, the stories algorithm uses signals from you and other users to predict how likely a user is to:

• Open and view a story
• View subsequent stories from the same creator
• Send a reaction or reply to the story
• Spend watching a creator’s stories
• Engage with stickers in a story

Video

The Facebook video algorithm uses two recommendation systems to rank content in your feed (including live videos) and to score the videos that appear next.

Both systems consider the likelihood that the user will:

• Watch a video for at least 30 seconds, based on the user’s past behavior
• React positively to a video (e.g., like or love)
• Click to view the creator’s profile
• Share the video in DMs
• Comment on the video

Reels

Because the Facebook Reels feed is geared toward discovery, it’s much more likely to include content from accounts that users don’t yet follow.

To deliver engaging, relevant content, the Reels algorithm considers signals like:

• How much of the reel the user is likely to view — and how likely the user is to complete the reel
• If the user is likely to open a reel from the feed
• Whether the user is likely to leave a positive reaction on the reel

Similar to the video feed, the Reels feed uses a secondary recommendation system to rank the short-form videos that appear next as the user scrolls.

This secondary system also considers the user’s likelihood to share the reel and follow the creator.

Groups

The algorithm for groups is designed to maximize value for each user, based on interests and past behaviors.

It also prioritizes variety, which means it aims to show different kinds of content to provide a mix of video, image, and text posts.

The Facebook groups algorithm considers how likely the user is to:

• Engage with the post
• Spend time viewing the post
• Hide the post
• Read comments on the post
• Join a group after viewing a suggested post

Ads

Because the Facebook ad algorithm considers advertiser input and user signals, it works a little differently from any of the organic feeds.

For advertisers, the most important factor is building the right target audience. Before ads can enter the auction, they must target the user in question.

Then the Facebook ads algorithm calculates a total value score to rank paid content. This score is based on the bid, the ad quality, and the estimated action rate.

The ad algorithm uses machine learning to calculate an estimated action rate based on how likely a user is to take the action that the ad prompts. This system considers user behavior on and off Facebook.

How to improve your reach: 7 tips

Content and campaigns that work with (instead of against) the Facebook algorithm are more likely to generate higher reach, engagement, and conversions.

Use the tips below to improve your reach on Facebook:

1. Produce original high-quality content
2. Experiment with a variety of content formats
3. Use in-app content creation tools
4. Create content your audience cares about
5. Generate meaningful interactions
6. Engage users in the Facebook app
7. Encourage followers to favorite your page

1. Produce original high-quality content

No matter what types of content you publish, Facebook prioritizes originality. To give your content the best chance at maximum distribution, aim to publish original, high-quality content every time.

What does original content mean exactly? Facebook defines original content as copy, images, and videos your team had a hand in producing.

That could include:

• Interviews with your team members
• A photoshoot featuring your products
• Customer stories featuring original videos or user-generated content (UGC)
• Updated content from past months or years

Facebook pages that regularly repost memes, images, and videos from third-party sources may get flagged for limited originality. Over time, these flags can reduce your page’s distribution.

2. Experiment with a variety of content formats

Facebook users don’t want to see the same types of posts repeatedly. That’s why some Facebook feeds prioritize delivering a variety of text, image, and video content.

To keep your audience engaged and give your content a better chance of a high score, experiment with new formats. For example, if you usually post images, test videos, or reels.

“Now more than ever, we aim to create more targeted, diversified, and engaging social media posts to maintain audience interest,” says Bacher.

“We incorporate language events, gamification elements, QR codes, animation, avatars, and infographics to remain competitive.”

By testing new formats, you create new opportunities for Facebook users to discover your content.

For example, GT’s Living Foods optimizes content for the news feed (above) and the stories feed (below).

Experimenting with various formats helps optimize your overall marketing strategy.

“We believe that the more specific and targeted you can get with ad placements on Facebook, the more likely Facebook is to show your ads (i.e., be able to ‘beat’ the algorithm),” says Sam Yadegar, Co-founder and CEO of HawkSEM.

“The more targeted your ads are, the higher the engagement rate will be. We’ve learned that ads that have higher engagement rates will likely be shown more often, which can optimize Facebook ad costs.”

3. Use in-app content creation tools

To create quality content for Facebook, you may need third-party editing apps. While there’s no rule against using external tools, you shouldn’t let them replace native content creation tools.

For example, you can access templates and add interactive stickers when you publish reels and stories natively.

Since the algorithm factors in how users engage with stickers, using them may improve your organic reach.

4. Create content your audience cares about

The most efficient way to reach social media management goals is to publish content that aligns with your target audience’s interests, challenges, and goals.

What does your audience care about? The easiest way to find the topics and content types they prefer is to check your page’s Facebook insights.

With Facebook’s reach and engagement reports, you can see the post type and format that performed best.

You can also dive into metrics for individual posts, reels, and stories for more nuanced insights.

Tools like ConversionIQ can also pinpoint the types of ads and messaging that work best for your audience. CIQ tracks every step of the buyer’s journey, providing deep insights into the target audience.

“With targeted Meta ads and CIQ, HawkSEM was able to help Apotheke increase conversion rates by 25% and grow year-over-year (YoY) return on ad spend (ROAS) by 62%,” says Yadegar.

5. Generate meaningful interactions

Content that gets likes and reactions can certainly rank higher and get wider distribution. But Facebook typically prioritizes content that gets what the social network calls meaningful interactions.

Meaningful interactions are more in-depth conversations or comment threads. In other words, create content that’s likely to spark a conversation and get your audience talking.

Focus on genuine questions and conversation starters. Avoid engagement bait that prompts followers to respond in a specific way. We’ll explore this issue further below.

6. Engage users in the Facebook app

Whether you’re running Facebook ads or managing organic social media, post content that gets users to engage without leaving the app.

The social network often deprioritizes content with external links and prioritizes content that encourages users to interact with the app longer.

Focus on creating native organic content like:

• Original reels
• Quality videos
• Image and text posts without links

For ads, consider conversions like:

• Video views
• Messages
• Lead forms

7. Encourage followers to favorite your page

The Facebook algorithm uses ranking signals like past behavior and content popularity to predict whether users will engage with a post. But users can also take manual actions to direct the algorithm.

To increase the chance that followers will see your business page’s content, encourage them to favorite your page. Then they’ll see your organic content near the top of their feed.

The more often they see it, the more likely they are to engage — which can boost your content popularity signals.

Troubleshooting tips for the Facebook algorithm

Some marketers blame Facebook algorithm issues for low reach or limited conversions.

To improve your social media ROI, maximize the time active users spend in the app through engaging content.

If your content isn’t creating the most optimal user experience, these troubleshooting tips may help.

Avoid clickbait or misinformation

Publishing misleading content (i.e., clickbait) or misinformation (i.e., fake news) to your business page can cause Facebook to deprioritize your content. Over time, that can lead to dramatically lower reach and engagement.

Including misinformation or misleading content in ads can lead to worse outcomes. Facebook often flags ads for misinformation (including health claims), which can delay your ad campaigns.

After repeated issues, Facebook may even suspend your ad account, making it impossible to advertise.

Don’t repost “borrowed” content

Reposting memes or repeating stale content you published weeks ago may seem like an easy way to post more content quickly. However, publishing content with limited originality can get your page flagged.

If reposting content is part of your Facebook strategy, start thinking about ways your team can create more original content. You can also use these reposting tactics, which won’t harm your reach:

• Cross-post a video from a partner page
• Post Instagram content directly to Facebook
• Share a follower’s post or story about your brand directly to your brand’s stories

Know which keywords not to use

There’s no definitive list of words that hurt your reach. But these guidelines can help you avoid publishing content that Facebook deprioritizes:

• For organic content guidelines, review the Facebook Community Standards
• For paid content guidelines, review the Facebook Advertising Standards

Don’t directly ask for engagement

Facebook refers to organic content that requests a specific type of interaction as engagement bait. Avoid directly asking users to like, comment, or share a post, reel, or story.

Facebook views these prompts as attempts to increase engagement in an artificial way. The social network often deprioritizes this content since it typically creates poor user experiences.

Stay on top of Facebook algorithm changes

The AI-driven ranking signals and prediction formulas that Facebook uses today aren’t necessarily the same ones that the social network will use next month or year.

To maximize your social media and advertising ROI, monitor Facebook algorithm updates and your own Facebook page insights.

Notable algorithm updates

Lately, Facebook has leaned into more AI-driven updates, including:

1. Content recommendations: Facebook integrated its AI technology to refine content suggestions, the goal being to deliver more personalized and relevant posts to users.
2. Emphasis on authenticity and transparency: In 2024, Facebook updated its algorithm to prioritize content that fosters authentic connections and conversations.
3. New content tabs: Facebook also introduced new tabs such as “Local” and “Explore” in 2024, meant to expose users to content outside their existing social circles. The “Local” tab showcases local content from Marketplace, groups, and events, and the “Explore” tab suggests personalized content based on user interests.
4. AI bot integration: Meta integrated AI-generated characters in an effort to enhance user engagement. The AI personas operate similarly to user accounts, (with bios and profile pictures to boot), and have generally not been received well by users.
5. Enhanced video ranking: Facebook introduced a full-screen video feed, (like TikTok’s “For You” page), to prioritize engagement with short, long, and live videos.

The takeaway

Creating content and campaigns that work with the Facebook algorithm is key to increasing social media ROI.

But for small business and enterprise users alike, beating the algorithm is often easier said than done.

Our seasoned social media marketing team is here to help. Book a free consultation to learn more about our social media services.

This article has been updated and was originally published in January 2024.

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The post How the Facebook Algorithm Works — And How to Beat It (+ Checklist) appeared first on HawkSEM.

More than 40% of all search engine results page (SERP) clicks go to the top three paid ads.

Of course, scoring one of the coveted prime spots is no easy feat.

There are a number of moving parts when it comes to running a successful Google Ads campaign. For an ad to appear in the top spot, it’s got to have a premier level of quality and relevance.

Like putting out forest fires, building rockets, and hitting the high notes in “I Will Always Love You,” some things are best left to professionals.

The same goes for pay-per-click (aka PPC or paid search) marketing. Check out our list of top 9 experts below, along with pro tips from HawkSEM Senior SEM Manager Cristin Barta.

Top 9 Google Ads experts

Are you low on time and want to hop into our picks of vetted Google Ads experts? We hear you – let’s get into our top list.

From there, we’ll tackle FAQs and tips for how to choose the right one for you.

1. HawkSEM

Surprised to see us at the top of the list? While we may be biased about our amazing team, we’ve also got the experience, skills, and results to back up our slot on this list.

For proof, look no further than some of our case study results. We’ve helped clients of all sizes across a variety of industries get the Google Ads results they deserve.

We helped CDL Consultants increase conversion volume by 124%. Zephyr partnered with us and saw an 80% decrease in CPA. And Wyndham Capital Mortgage increased lead volume three times over.

What makes us stand out? Well, we only employ senior-level managers, meaning you can be confident that the person you’re partnering with for your PPC strategy is a bonafide pro.

Best for: B2B and B2C, lead generation, ecommerce, finance, SaaS, healthcare, professional services, educational institutions

Notable clients:

• Nike
• Honda Motor Co.
• Sweet July
• Siemens

2. Wpromote

Wpromote’s been in the Google Ads service game a long time – since 2001, to be exact.

That means they’ve spent decades in the platform, learning its features and nuances and determining how to best use it to get clients maximum results.

The team’s focus on performance means they’re not afraid to iterate, test, and try outside-the-box tactics to ensure your Google Ads campaigns perform the best they can.

Maybe that’s why big-name brands like Spanx and Whirlpool and awards organizations like Adweek trust them and their digital marketing prowess.

Best for: B2B and B2C enterprise brands

Notable clients:

• e.l.f.
• Rite Aid
• Ethan Allen
• Converse

3. Tinuiti

Tinuiti’s team is passionate about paid search — and it shows. Their roster of Google Ads specialists is ready to take your efforts to the next level, particularly if you’re a brand that sells products in stores or online.

As the self-described largest independent performance marketing firm, they’re dedicated to big ideas that get big returns – no wishy-washy plans or tactics here.

With more than 1,000 employees and over $3 billion worth of media managed to date, prospective customers can feel safe with their marketing programs in the hands of Tinuiti’s team.

Best for: Larger corporate retail and ecommerce brands

Notable clients:

• Revlon
• Instacart
• Rebecca Minkoff
• Nautica

4. Kim Herrington

Herrington is, in her own words, an expert in search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), and digital marketing.

She’s also the founder of a digital marketing agency and a sought-after industry speaker.

Her big-picture approach forgoes the tiny tweaks in favor of a simplified process that keeps results front and center without sacrificing a brand’s ethics or mission.

She also takes things one step further, with a substantial library of helpful content on her website spanning Google, Pinterest, SEO, social media, and more.

Best for: Small businesses just getting started with Google Ads

Notable clients:

• Conway Counseling & Wellness
• Paul Jarvis
• Class Tech Tips
• Yes and Yes

5. Claire Jarrett

Jarrett wrote the book on Google Ads success – no, literally. In 2023, she penned Rapid Google Ads Success: And How to Achieve it in 7 Simple Steps. (Its third edition went live in May 2024.)

Drawing from real-life examples and her 15 years of experience, as the synopsis explains, she details the strategies that work for developing a profitable Google Ads account.

Partnering with a pro or agency with the experience to know what works and what doesn’t means less time spent on the trial-and-error process and more time on achieving – then exceeding – your goals.

Best for: Small- to medium-sized businesses looking for quick results

Notable clients:

• David Nicholls Associates
• Names.co.uk
• Digitool
• F2media

6. Silverback Strategies

Some agencies focus on a specific service or industry niche. Silverback, on the other hand, is more like a jack-of-all-trades.

To wit, they’ve worked with a variety of business sizes, types, and fields, from smaller local orgs to larger global enterprises.

With a focus on highly relevant search ads and a hyper-targeted audience, they’ve been able to achieve next-level success for their clients. Think: boosting year-over-year online leads by more than 400% and cutting cost per lead in half – not too shabby.

Best for: B2B and B2C, hospitality, educational institutions, SaaS, and home services companies

Notable clients:

• The Ritz-Carlton Residences
• LexisNexis
• Homeland Security
• Discovery Education

7. Rise

Got big Google goals to match your big ad spend budget? Then Rise may be just the solution you’ve been looking for.

Using data-driven insights and the latest tech platforms and tools at their disposal, the Rise team (now under the Quad Agency umbrella) works with clients to help them speak directly to their ideal client personas while leapfrogging over competitors.

Big-name brands trust them to take their existing paid search programs to the next level with bold, innovative campaigns and strategies.

And the results — like a 99% higher conversion rate for Reynolds Consumer Products — speak for themselves.

Best for: Large enterprise brands with a global reach

Notable clients:

• Stanley Steemer
• Ulta Beauty
• Follett
• ColourPop Cosmetics

8. DEPT

Formerly known as 3Q Digital and 3Q/DEPT, this notable team of Google Ads experts focuses on solid foundations and smart strategies over gimmicks and “hacks.”

That means they don’t take shortcuts when it comes to your accounts. Rather, they take a holistic, multi-prong strategy that sets you up for manageable scaling and growth – no growing pains here.

Whether you’ve been publishing Google Ads for years or need help leveraging the platform for the first time, you can trust the 3Q team will work with you hands-on to focus not just on achievements, but on creating a professional partnership built to last.

Best for: Bigger brands that need help taking Google Ads campaigns to the next level

Notable clients:

• Nextdoor
• Turbotax
• Skechers
• Sam’s Club

9. 97th Floor

Doing the same thing over and over and expecting better results? Not with 97th Floor.

This agency team doesn’t waste time mulling over the old ways of marketing. Instead, they focus on using the most cutting-edge methods, features and platforms to create dynamic marketing plans.

Their Google Ads experts will work with you to analyze your current state of affairs, work with you on a game plan, and then help you execute it to perfection.

And their formula works: It’s how they got client Lawn Doctor a nearly 150% boost in conversion rates.

Best for: Brands with a large budget (and high business goals) for their Google Ads

Notable clients:

• Capital One
• Oatly
• Utah Jazz
• Dell

What is a Google Ads expert?

A Google Ads expert is a digital marketing professional who has extensive knowledge of the features, nuances, and processes of creating ad campaigns on the Google Ads platform.

Ideally, someone calling themselves an expert has created a variety of successful, effective campaigns for a variety of business types and goals.

They should feel comfortable answering questions about creating ad campaigns via Google Ads, what campaign types might work best, and what elements help set up a campaign for success.

Common responsibilities for a Google Ads expert

While each expert has a unique set of skills, there are a handful of general duties and responsibilities that any Google Ads expert should be able to do.

These responsibilities include:

• Campaign strategy, building, and execution
• Conversion tracking and reporting
• Campaign analysis
• Conducting A/B testing
• Monitoring and optimizing campaigns
• Researching competitors
• Understanding target audience
• Conducting target keyword research (including negative keywords)
• Creating or identifying quality ad and landing page copywriting
• Leveraging campaign assets and other Google Ads features as needed

9 things every Google Ads expert should know

Google has a massive reach, making it possible for you to reach a global audience. The platform also allows for a range of targeting, lets you harness intent, and allows you to see results in an easy-to-understand format.

Whether you’re looking to brush up on your own skills or partner with a pro to help take your campaigns to the next level, here are 8 things someone who deems themselves a “Google Ads expert” should know.

1. How to create effective ads

Since Google is the most popular search platform for most demographics, it makes sense that competition for ads is high. When you choose Google Ads, you’re competing with a host of other businesses that bid on the same keywords.

Developing high-quality, relevant ads will help to improve your Quality Score. This is one of the metrics Google uses to assess the quality of your ads, as well as keywords and landing pages.

It can save you money, too: Higher quality scores mean you can snag lower prices and higher ad placements. A Google Ads expert should know why Quality Score matters and how to find yours.

2. Ways to make the most of bidding strategies

Google Ads offers several bidding strategies that advertisers can use to maximize ROI. Cost-per-click (CPC) bidding is recommended when the goal is to drive website traffic, while cost-per-thousand-impression (CPM) bidding works great for building brand awareness to boost your online presence.

CPA bidding is mainly for advertisers whose focus is on conversions like sign-ups and purchases.

Your Google Ads expert should understand that testing different bidding models offers insight into PPC campaign success and be able to help identify the one that drives better results. They should also be adept at managing your PPC ads budget accordingly.

Further reading: 12 Google Ads Bidding Strategies (+ When to Use Each)

Optimizing PPC landing page content can be the ticket to turning prospects into real buyers. (Image: Unsplash)

3. Content tips that inspire clicks

Once your ads have surfaced for your target audience, you want as many of them as possible to click on them — a no-brainer, right?

An experienced Google Ads expert should be able to harness attention-grabbing power words in your ad copy as an effective way to incite people to engage with you.

Ideally, the expert you work with will understand how important it is to get your message across clearly and concisely in the parameters allotted for your ads.

After all, what good are impeccable landing pages if no one sees them? First, they’ve got to want to click.

Pro tip: Ask if your expert has a Google Ads certification or is part of the Google Partner program. This may give them better access to customer support and beta versions of new products, which could benefit your efforts and help you beat competitors.

4. How to optimize the ad-to-landing page UX

Speaking of landing pages: When guiding customers through your sales funnel, you want to offer them an experience that feels tailored to their specific needs.

This increases the chances of prospects taking the desired action when they reach your landing page.

Optimizing PPC landing page content can be the ticket to turning prospects into real buyers.

There are various ways to optimize your landing pages, such as:

• Having a strong call to action (CTA)
• Making sure the ad and landing page are consistent
• Ensuring the page looks good on both mobile and desktop
• Having a form that’s not too lengthy

Additionally, an effective landing page is scannable, free from too many distracting graphics and images, and features badges, testimonials, or other helpful proof points.

5. The ins and outs of device targeting

Device targeting can mean the difference between PPC success and failure.

With two-thirds of Google Ads search clicks happening on mobile devices, it’s crucial to provide a great user experience, no matter the advertising platform.

To that end, your ads expert should make sure landing pages are mobile-friendly, responsive, and have a great layout regardless of the device they’re viewed on.

Bonus: A website that’s optimized for mobile will also be good for your overall SEO.

6. Why producing top-notch content is key

Google pros know that, when running a paid search campaign, your aim is usually to generate leads and sales. But, rather than pushing products by being overly sales-forward, many of the most successful ads focus on providing value.

Producing content that your audience wants to read and promoting your brand as one that offers value will help build traffic.

Value can help do the selling for you, getting more customers to use your products or services by viewing you as a trustworthy authority.

After all, you don’t want visitors feeling skeptical that you’re simply trying to close a deal by any means necessary.

Running a high-performing Google Ads campaign requires the account manager to be proactive and consistent. (Image: Unsplash)

7. The latest ad settings updates and features

Naturally, your expert should be well-versed in Google Ads Manager and Google Analytics. Understanding the search audience’s settings will help a Google ads expert run a successful campaign.

Choosing the type of campaign you want to run will affect the settings available to you.

Ask your expert how comfortable they feel going through the settings menu to make the most of what’s on offer from the platform, including any new updates.

Location settings allow you to choose who gets directed to your website, for example, effectively saving you money by ensuring only those in your target location visit your site.

8. How to properly manage (and optimize) a Google Ads account

Running a high-performing Google Ads campaign requires the account manager to be proactive and consistent.

Proper and active campaign management involves regularly assessing how the ads are performing, conducting A/B tests, and running Google Ads audits every quarter or so.

When you invest time and money into your marketing strategy, the last thing you want to do is simply set it and forget it.

By having a plan for setting up proper tracking, continuing to assess the data, and optimizing accordingly, Google Ads experts can better determine where to invest more, where strengths and weaknesses lie, and where to make the necessary improvements.

The right candidate should also be “data-focused,” Barta adds, meaning they can “track results and focus efforts on strategies with the highest ROAS.”

Pro tip: While not a necessity, it’s helpful if your expert also has experience with platforms like Facebook Ads and LinkedIn, as well as other online advertising types like email marketing, remarketing, Google display ads, or Google shopping ads, if applicable. This way, they can ensure your paid search program isn’t operating in a silo.

9. Proper communication – and flexibility

As Barta notes, being a good communicator is key to this role.

She says the right Google expert should “have a system in place to work with stakeholders that ensures everyone is on the same page with KPIs (and the strategies being executed to achieve them).”

Another key: flexibility. “The Google platform is constantly evolving, and what worked 12 months ago might not work today,” Barta explains.

“Managers need to be active learners and need to constantly test new strategies, and have an understanding that they may feel they know what will work, but testing is essential. Sometimes results can surprise you.”

Pro tip: As far as red flags go, Barta cautions to avoid working with an expert who puts too much faith in AI or the machine learning Google often pushes. “Machine learning is essential to success,” she explains, “but the machine has to be taught to learn.”

The takeaway

Every Google Ads expert needs to have an in-depth understanding of Google Ads basics and how this form of advertising works.

The experts will also need to develop effective strategies that will deliver the desired results.

These tips can help you find the right search engine pro to partner with, so you can feel confident this aspect of your online marketing program is in good hands.

Need more Google Ads help? Let’s chat.

This article has been updated and was originally published in June 2020.

The post Find the Right Google Ads Expert For Your Business: Top 9 Picks appeared first on HawkSEM.

Sure, your brand may have the best products and services, the most admirable mission, or a top executive team.

But if no one knows or talks about your brand, you’ll struggle to attract and convert customers.

In this article, we’ll cover how to increase your share of voice, how to calculate it, which measurement tools to use, and why this metric is so important for controlling the conversation and staying ahead of the competition.

Let’s get into it.

What is share of voice?

Share of voice (SOV) is a measurement of how your brand’s visibility compares to the competition. It’s a type of competitor analysis that tells you:

• Prospects’ awareness of your brand
• How frequently prospects mention your brand online
• Visibility of your brand across various digital marketing channels
• How much of the conversation your brand owns compared to the competition

What channels does share of voice include?

This metric isn’t limited to a single channel. Share of voice can quantify your brand’s impact across several channels:

• Content marketing and search engine optimization (SEO)
• Organic social media, including Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter/X, YouTube, TikTok, and more
• Digital advertising, including pay-per-click (PPC) and paid social
• Public relations (PR) and earned media

In some cases, you may measure total share of voice across all channels. But marketers typically focus on one channel at a time.

For example, you can measure social media share of voice to assess visibility across your brand’s social networks.

“We believe that share of voice is an important metric to measure for both organic and paid initiatives,” explains Rambod Yadegar, President and co-founder of HawkSEM.

“In fact, we recommend using as many channels that are viable for your business in order to gain as much share of voice as possible. From there, we want to get strategic and granular to convert a high percentage of the SOV.”

Share of voice vs. market share: What’s the difference?

These metrics are similar — both measure your brand against competitors. However, share of voice and market share have one key difference:

Share of voice measures visibility or brand awareness compared to the competition, whereas market share measures sales or revenue compared to the competition.

9 ways to increase share of voice

Is your brand awareness constantly trailing behind the competition? Here’s how to improve your share of voice across various channels.

1. Expand your reach on social media
2. Create content your customers want to share
3. Build a more engaged online community
4. Encourage user-generated content (UGC)
5. Partner with industry influencers and content creators
6. Seek out guest posting and guest speaking opportunities
7. Invest in your SEO and content marketing strategy
8. Audit your PPC budget and keyword portfolio
9. Reevaluate your target audience

1. Expand your reach on social media

If your social share of voice is low, take steps to expand your reach and engagement on key social channels.

Ask questions like:

• Does your brand have a minimal presence on major social media networks? If so, you can build out a more robust social media marketing strategy and start posting more organic content.
• Does your social media reach seem unusually low? To fix this, get familiar with each social network’s algorithm so you know what type of content works best on each.
• Is organic social media growth taking too long? Then consider running brand awareness ads to get your business in front of more prospects and increase your following.

“In my experience and what my data shows, social media and SEO are by far the best channels for increasing share of voice,” explains Tom Golubovich, head of marketing at Ninja Transfers.

“Online visibility and market share come down to a combination of SEO and social media efforts, and these two channels play an important role in increasing a brand’s share of voice, and most importantly, maintaining the edge against the competition.”

The one tactic Golubovich says always works is analyzing the market’s content performance and optimizing your content strategy to boost output, reach, and engagement across these platforms.

“For example, any time we decided to double or triple our content efforts to compete in the market, our brand visibility and SOV metrics went up significantly,” he adds. “However, it’s not just about producing more content, but also better content.”

2. Create content your customers want to share

Increasing share of voice is about more than just getting followers to comment on your social media posts.

Ideally, you want them to share your content with their own followers. That way, you can gradually improve awareness of your brand, and expand your potential customer base.

The content topics your audience is most likely to share depend on their demographics, interests, and challenges. However, certain content types and formats are more likely to drive shares.

The most shareable content includes infographics, videos, memes, and limited-time offers. The content with the most backlinks includes how-to guides, interviews, and original research.

3. Build a more engaged online community

Creating share-worthy organic social media content and running more paid social campaigns are just the first steps. To get customers to talk about your brand, you need an engaged community.

Posting content that sparks conversations is a good place to start. But when you want to increase share of voice significantly, you need customers to start conversations about your brand.

“Social media can be an excellent place to increase share of voice, particularly by implementing campaigns that command more engagement from your followers,” explains David Gaglione, founding partner of PS212.

“Say you launch a challenge where followers are asked to tag you in their Stories and Posts once they’ve completed the tasks involved in your promotion. That alone can generate dozens of mentions for your brand on just a single platform, increasing your reach and brand awareness without much market spend.”

4. Encourage user-generated content (UGC)

As you take steps to improve brand awareness, you’re likely to start collecting more brand mentions on social media.

While comments and tags can increase your share of voice, original content can have a bigger impact.

To prompt customers to share content featuring your brand, encourage them to create UGC.

Ask them to:

• Show what they made using your product
• Reveal their workflow for using your products
• Create an unboxing reel featuring your product
• Highlight the store where they purchased your product
• Share how they benefited from your company’s services

You always have the option to run completely organic UGC campaigns. But if you offer prizes or freebies, you may get more engagement — and ultimately more share of voice.

5. Partner with influencers in your industry

Customers can be excellent advocates for your brand. After all, around 50% of consumers trust recommendations from strangers online as much as those from family and friends.

But if your customers have relatively small audiences, their mentions may not help as much as you’d like. To reach a much wider audience, consider influencer partnerships.

When you work with influencers, you tap into an engaged community and a network that trusts each other’s recommendations. If you choose an influencer who’s a good match for your brand, you can also get high-quality SEO and social media content that mentions your brand.

6. Seek out guest posting and guest speaking opportunities

Increasing media share of voice doesn’t have to require press releases or a PR team.

Instead, consider alternative ways to get your brand in front of your target audience while earning media mentions.

• Podcasts: Make a list of podcasts that cover topics in your niche. Filter out those that don’t accept guests. Then review the pitch process for the rest and start reaching out to pitch your executive team.
• Guest posts: Written thought leadership can be just as effective. Follow the same steps as above but for blogs in your industry. Then start placing high-quality guest posts on sites with high domain authority.
• Subject matter expert quotes: You don’t always need to write a full post or record a full episode to get great brand mentions. Contribute your team’s subject matter expertise to get mentions and backlinks.

7. Invest in your SEO and content marketing strategy

Is your SEO share of voice always slightly below the competition? Follow these steps to improve your metrics:

1. Rethink your budget: Are you spending enough to create the high-quality content you need to rank at the top of the SERPs?
2. Revisit keyword research: Are you going after the most relevant keywords for your business? Does your content align with search intent?
3. Reconsider distribution: Producing great content is just one step of the process. Are you sharing SEO content across channels and building links?

“Having a comprehensive understanding of our competitors was crucial,” explains Harmonic Outreach Fractional CMO Sam Tarantino.

“Monitoring was done through standard SEO tools like Google Analytics, Google Search Console, etc. Understanding which artists or songs resonated with our audience and then creating more of that type of content became our north star.”

Wondering what a successful SEO campaign and B2B content marketing funnel look like? HawkSEM partnered with Prismatic to boost keyword rankings by 67%. Our efforts also increased the top three keyword rankings by 225%.

8. Audit your PPC budget and keyword portfolio

Is your impression share remarkably low for Google or Microsoft ads? To find out why, check the ad network’s impression share lost metrics.

Both networks reveal whether budget or ad rank is causing you to miss out on ad impressions. Use this data to determine how to optimize your PPC campaigns.

If budget is the main issue, consider increasing your total budget or allocating more for crucial keyword groups. Revisit your bids for important keywords, and increase them to be more competitive and land more impressions.

If ad rank is the main issue, review your keyword research and ad copy to ensure it aligns with your target audience. Optimize your landing page so it fits your PPC campaign better.

9. Reevaluate your target audience

Whether you’re successfully increasing share of voice or struggling to get traction, it’s worth reconsidering your target audience. Are your campaigns reaching the right people? Are you leaving major markets untapped?

“Tracking is an essential part of any marketing campaign. Along with measuring share of voice, we use ConversionIQ (CIQ) to granularly track every single step of the buyer journey,” shares Sam Yadegar, CEO and co-founder of HawkSEM. “That way we can understand what aspects of a campaign are working and where we should cut back.”

Once you have more insight into your target audience, you can take that data and leverage it on other marketing channels. This allows you to further scale PPC campaigns and content marketing funnels while maintaining profitability.

Top share of voice tools

No platform can monitor the share of voice metrics across all channels. Instead, use a tool designed for the channels that matter most to your brand.

Social listening tools

Leverage social listening tools to track social share of voice.

1. Agorapulse

(Image: Agorapulse)

As a social media listening platform, Agorapulse can track mentions, hashtags, and keywords for your brand and the competition.

Its tagging system can track sentiment, offering another layer of insights. Because it’s also a social media management tool, Agorapulse helps teams plan, analyze, and optimize social media content to improve their share of voice.

2. Keyhole

(Image: Keyhole)

Keyhole tracks direct and indirect mentions so brands can easily assess impact across social media.

The platform’s AI-powered sentiment analysis offers more nuanced feedback, breaking down positive, neutral, and negative mentions. Keyhole’s trending topics feature can help brands find and join popular conversations to boost their share of voice.

SEO tools

Use these tools to measure and improve SEO share of voice.

1. Ahrefs

(Image: Ahrefs Rank Tracker)

As a complete SEO platform, Ahrefs charts keyword rankings and organic search traffic. Ahrefs’ rank tracker tool monitors share of voice using a custom set of competitors, offering a more complete picture of how your brand performs on the SERPs.

“We rely on SEO metrics to see how our marketing strategies enhance our share of voice,” explains Bernard Castro, Founder of Bybrand.

“We use a rank tracker that compares the keywords our company is associated with. Then we compare that with competitors using the competitor tab on Ahrefs.”

2. Semrush

(Image: Semrush)

Semrush is an all-in-one SEO tool for keyword research, backlink monitoring, and competitor analysis. Semrush’s position tracker can chart your brand and its competitors, monitoring both visibility and share of voice.

Since it tracks each brand’s position on the SERP on a daily basis, this tool is ideal for monitoring progress and spotting trends.

PPC dashboards

Set up PPC dashboards to monitor impression share for active campaigns.

1. Google Ads

(Image: Google Ads)

Google Ads automatically tracks search and display impression share for any PPC campaign you run on the ad network.

It can also reveal when your ads lost impression share due to ad rank or campaign budget, which can help you make data-driven improvements.

2. Microsoft Ads

(Image: Microsoft Ads)

Microsoft Ads tracks impression share for ads on Bing. The ad network’s share of voice report charts total impression share, top impression share, and relative click-through rate (CTR).

It also calculates lost impression share to reveal how often the competition outbids or outranks your ads.

PR software

Use PR software to track brand mentions and earned media.

1. Prowly

(Image: Prowly)

As a PR and media monitoring tool, Prowly measures both press and social media mentions.

Its filtering options let you zero in on specific topics, and its sentiment features help you understand how the press, your customers, and the general public are talking about your brand.

2. Brandwatch

(Image: Brandwatch)

Brandwatch is a media monitoring tool that tracks mentions across 100 million surfaces, including both online and print channels.

It provides real-time data on mentions and share of voice, making it ideal for marketing teams that need to analyze campaigns and respond to trends quickly.

How to calculate share of voice

To calculate this metric, use this simple share-of-voice formula:

Share of Voice = Your Brand Metrics / Total Market Metrics

As you can see, this formula requires two data points: your brand metrics and total market metrics.

The best way to track these metrics depends on the channel. Here’s a breakdown of each channel that drives share of voice.

SEO share of voice

When you measure SEO share of voice, you have to factor in metrics like:

• Keyword portfolio, since this measurement is based on the specific keywords your brand is pursuing
• Organic clicks, since website traffic from search engine results pages (SERPs) drives this measurement
• Search volume, since keywords that drive more organic traffic make a bigger impact on your overall share of voice

To calculate SEO share of voice, divide your brand’s organic search traffic by the total search volume. You can measure this metric for individual keywords, for your entire portfolio, or for keyword categories.

“We found that SEO was a powerful channel for increasing our share of voice,” shares Tarantino.

“By focusing on optimizing our site content for popular artist names and tracks, we managed to consistently rank in the top 10 search results on Google.”

He says this generated high organic traffic and significantly boosted our visibility.

Social media share of voice

Social media share of voice focuses on brand mentions. In other words, you need to know the total number of mentions of your brand versus the competition across social media platforms.

Although this metric may seem simple, this kind of social media competitor analysis can be complicated to measure. You’ll need to track all kinds of social media mentions, including full brand names, nicknames, and hashtags.

You may opt to measure the share of voice for a single social media platform or for several at once. Use your social media strategy to determine the platforms that matter to your team.

PR share of voice

Also known as media share of voice, this metric refers to the mentions your brand gains from earned media and PR campaigns.

PR share of voice can include mentions in:

• Podcasts
• News articles
• Blog posts
• YouTube videos

To measure PR share of voice, track your brand mentions across the web. Then compare your brand’s number to the competition.

PPC share of voice

Compared to other marketing channels, PPC share of voice is much easier to calculate.

Compare the number of times your ads successfully displayed to how many times they could have served — but were outranked by the competition.

When you run Google Ads, the advertising platform calculates this metric automatically. Below, we’ll cover how to find your impression share for search and display ads using Google Ads reporting tools.

Why is share of voice important?

Tracking share of voice is crucial for businesses in virtually every industry. Here’s why share of voice is important for B2C and B2B companies alike.

Goes beyond basic campaign analysis

From content strategy to SEO to PPC, you can easily measure the results of any marketing campaign or channel. Share of voice goes beyond monitoring campaigns to provide a big-picture view of your brand’s performance.

Measures full-funnel impact

Many marketing campaigns focus on outcomes like conversions and revenue. As crucial as these results are, they don’t reflect brand visibility. By measuring your brand’s share of voice, you can more accurately assess full-funnel impact.

Helps you gain competitive analysis insights

When reviewing your marketing efforts, it’s easy to use benchmarks to quantify campaign success. Yet this approach fails to account for the competition.

Share of voice is a type of competitive analysis. As a result, it provides a more nuanced view of your advertising or marketing strategy.

For example, you may find that you’re outperforming your brand’s previous campaign. Yet you may also learn that you’re underperforming compared to the competition. These insights can help with reassessing your marketing efforts.

The takeaway

With a well-crafted digital marketing plan, you can increase your share of voice strategically, across all marketing channels that matter to your brand and industry.

To explore how our experienced team can help, reach out to HawkSEM. Book a free digital marketing consultation to learn more about our services and marketing tools.

This article has been updated and was originally published in January 2024.

The post How to Grow Share of Voice (and Beat Competitors): 9 Pro Tips appeared first on HawkSEM.

The Google search results page is separated into two different categories: organic results and sponsored results.

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving your website to rank higher in the organic results for relevant keywords.

Search engine marketing (SEM), on the other hand, leverages SEO as well as pay-per-click (PPC) marketing techniques to appear in the sponsored and organic results.

So which is best: A targeted organic strategy or a hybrid approach?

Here, SEO expert Matt Smith shines a light on the key differences between the two — and when to focus on SEO or use SEM in your marketing strategy.

(Image: HawkSEM)

What are the differences between SEM and SEO?

The primary difference between SEO and SEM is that SEO focuses on earning traffic through organic search optimization, while SEM uses paid and organic strategies together.

Search engine optimization (SEO)

SEO is the practice of optimizing the content, layout, speed, and backend organization of a website to rank higher in the search engine results.

The goal is to rank highly in the organic search results for relevant search queries.

SEO marketing can be broken into three categories:

1. On-page SEO

On-page SEO is the practice of optimizing elements on your website, including:

• Keyword research
• Website content
• Meta descriptions
• Title tags
• URLs
• Images
• Internal linking structure

2. Off-page SEO

Off-page SEO is the promotion, outreach, link building, and other efforts you take to promote your content on other sites.

This allows your brand to build a reputation, establish authority, and optimize factors like high-quality backlinks, which involves content and information about your business on third-party websites.

The main focus is to build high-quality backlinks from other reputable websites.

3. Technical SEO

Technical SEO techniques improve the backend components of a website so it performs optimally, is easier for search engines to crawl and index, and provides a better user experience.

This involves:

• Optimizing site speed
• implementing structured data markup
• Ensuring proper XML sitemaps
• Optimizing for mobile devices
• Addressing issues like duplicate content, broken links, and server errors

Together, these elements are the bulk of what we consider SEO, which is a significant component of SEM.

Search engine marketing (SEM)

SEM is the practice of using paid search ads and SEO together to make a brand’s website more visible on the search engine results page (SERP).

The goal is to rank at the top of the organic search results and appear in the sponsored section above the organic results for maximum visibility.

Aside from the SEO techniques mentioned above, SEM incorporates PPC advertising strategies, including:

• Keyword research and targeting
• Ad creation
• Landing page optimization
• Bid management
• Audience targeting
• Remarketing

(Image: Unsplash)

The similarities between SEO and SEM

SEO is often part of an SEM strategy. Therefore, SEO is a subcategory of SEM, alongside PPC.

“SEO and SEM are digital marketing strategies aimed at increasing website visibility and driving traffic from search engines,” says Smith.

He adds that SEO focuses on optimizing a website’s content and structure to improve organic search rankings, while SEM involves paid advertising to appear in search engine results.

“SEO is a long-term strategy with no direct cost,” Smith explains, “while SEM requires a budget for keyword bidding and offers more immediate visibility through paid ads.”

SEO vs. SEM vs. PPC

If SEM is a Venn diagram, then SEO is one circle, PPC is on the other.

SEM is where the two overlap.

(Image: HawkSEM)

The key differences between SEO and PPC come down to four factors:

1. Cost
2. Time
3. Longevity
4. Keywords

Let’s break them down.

1. Cost

PPC involves paying the search engine for a spot in the search results.

SEO, on the other hand, only requires paying for the people, agencies, and tools that assist in your marketing efforts to rank higher — rather than giving money to Google, Bing, or Yahoo directly.

How much do SEO and PPC cost?

You can expect to pay anywhere from $2,500 to $10,000 and up per month. SEO can be performed for “free” or cheap, though the results you get may not be effective.

And while you can run PPC ads cheaply by setting a low cost-per-click (CPC) bid and maintaining a high Quality Score, the paid results may be as small as the investment.

Large brands have large budgets, befitting the number of digits on all the numbers they use. Therefore, small businesses may have a harder time with high competition keywords.

2. Time

SEO is considered a long game, while PPC offers nearly instant results in comparison:

• SEO takes roughly 3-6 months to show results, because the search engine needs to index your content and rank it appropriately, which can take
• six months or more.
• PPC takes roughly 2-3 months to see results. You create an ad, the ad network (usually Google Ads) approves it, and it starts running immediately.

3. Longevity

In terms of longevity, the same dichotomy holds:

• SEO can last nearly indefinitely. Some of the best content on the internet is many years old. While organic content can “age out” and fall out of favor, it can also be refurbished and kept relevant. With the proper maintenance, SEO basically lasts forever.
• PPC, meanwhile, lasts precisely as long as you have the money to pay for it and keep your ad campaigns active. If your budget runs out, the PPC campaigns stop until you put more money into the system. And, of course, if you decide you don’t like the ad’s performance, you can pause them at any time.

This phenomenon is primarily why both SEO and PPC advertising complement each other well. SEO starts slow and takes a long time to build up, while PPC begins almost immediately.

Further, you’re less likely to have PPC success without strong SEO. If your ad directs a prospect to a poorly written landing page, you’ll probably miss out on a conversion.

High-quality web pages mean higher conversion rates.

4. Keywords

Keywords are at the core of both SEO and PPC. However, the types of keywords that work best and the metrics that you’re looking at will vary.

When performing keyword research, you’ll find specific keywords have different intents behind them. These intents are:

• Navigational: the user knows where they want to go and wants a link
• Informational: the user has a question and wants an answer
• Tutorial: the user has a problem to solve and wants to know how to solve it themselves
• Commercial: the user has a problem to solve and wants to research solutions they can buy
• Transactional: the user wants to make a purchase and is looking for where to do it

Informational and tutorial keywords tend to perform best for SEO and are less effective for PPC.

If your goal is to get your target audience to download a checklist, for example, PPC ads can probably get some downloads and provide value.

However, you may want to let SEO handle these early-stage inquiries and focus on more purchase-ready keywords for your PPC campaigns.

Commercial and transactional keywords tend to perform best with PPC, though properly formulated high-quality content can also work well for SEO.

PPC tends to be most relevant when it has a tangible offer for the user and a concrete, easy-to-calculate return on investment.

A massive part of effective SEM is understanding the intent behind a search term and sculpting the marketing campaign you use to reach that intent most effectively.

When should you use SEO?

When it comes to choosing between SEO and PPC, there’s no one-size-fits-all answer. Both strategies have their place in a successful digital marketing strategy. However, for some campaigns and businesses, SEO is the better option.

If your goal is to get on the first page of the SERPs and stay there, investing in a good SEO campaign will be essential. Although Google Ads can get you onto the first page quickly, being on the organic side of SERPs is more reliable and longer lasting.

With a smart SEO campaign and consistent efforts over time, you can achieve a higher click-through rate (CTR) than with paid ads because searchers trust organic results more than they do ads.

Another instance where SEO may be preferable over PPC is when you’re targeting keywords with high competition.

If your budget isn’t high enough to compete with other advertisers for those keywords, then you’ll need to focus on organic search engine optimization instead of PPC.

This involves creating content that targets those keywords and optimizing it for search engines to appear near the top of SERPs when people search for those terms.

If your goal is to secure long-term visibility in the SERPs while also building trust with potential customers, then investing in an effective SEO campaign should be part of your digital marketing strategy.

A real-world example of SEO results

MileIQ, a mileage logging mobile app, needed to enhance its SEO and bring in more high-quality organic traffic to its app. To achieve this, it needed to get more rankings in Google, especially on the first page, by leveraging higher volume search terms.

So it partnered with HawkSEM and our teams zoned in on featured snippets, answering common search questions, and building in-depth content to enhance their authority.

The results:

• Growth in year-over-year organic site traffic by 125%
• Nearly 4,000 new first-page keyword rankings
• Increased organic sessions by 207%

When should you use PPC?

While SEO is focused on improving organic rankings in search engines, search marketing is a paid strategy that uses advertisements like Google Ads or Bing Ads.

Depending on your goals and budget, one of these strategies might better suit your needs.

For instance, if you want a short-term solution with guaranteed visibility, a paid search campaign can deliver fast results.

And because you’re only paying for ads when people click on them, it can be more cost-effective than SEO if budgeted correctly.

Additionally, PPC offers greater flexibility than SEO by allowing you to adjust and test different components of your ad copy when certain keywords aren’t driving enough clicks or conversions.

“SEM requires constant maintenance and refinement, so it’s imperative to consistently test, monitor and execute changes based on keyword-level performance,” says Smith.

In a nutshell, PPC is a great choice if you need quick visibility into SERPs and a way to measure the success of your campaigns in real-time.

But even though it might be tempting to rely solely on paid advertising campaigns instead of SEO strategies, using the two together offers the maximum ROI.

A real-world example of PPC results

Columbia Virtual Academy, a public education program in Washington State, understood the importance of digital marketing, but lacked the in-house expertise to effectively build and execute a strategy.

So it came to HawkSEM to restructure its PPC account with new campaigns, ad groups, keywords, ad copy, and ad extensions.

The results were phenomenal:

• Increased Google Ads conversions by 134% year over year
• Decreased cost per acquisition (CPA) by 51%
• Increased search clickthrough rate (CTR) by 45%

Why a holistic approach (SEM) is best

Using both SEO and PPC maximizes visibility and ensures your message reaches the widest possible audience.

For example, an organic SEO campaign can help boost your website’s rankings while also building trust with potential customers over time.

On the other hand, a PPC campaign can help you get quick visibility into SERPs and also measure the success of different ad variations in real time.

All you need is the right strategy to make your SEM campaign succeed.

The takeaway

“SEM” covers the bulk of your online advertising, while “SEO” is just one of the tools at your disposal, alongside PPC.

Your digital marketing strategy will depend on your goals, targeted keywords, budget, the quality of your site, your competition, and more.

Whether you’re a beginner or a seasoned marketer, finding the right balance between SEO and PPC is essential in SEM.

That’s why powerful tools like ConversionIQ exist. We created this platform to help you easily monitor and optimize your campaigns — from paid search to SEO to social media, resulting in better performance and higher ROI.

The question is, where do you put your budget? Can you write more content for organic traffic and SEO results, pay for high-quality tools to improve your overall marketing, or give Google money directly to give you more exposure and website traffic?

The choice is yours.

This article has been updated and was originally published in September 2022.

The post SEO vs SEM: What’s the Difference? Costs, Strategies + Timelines appeared first on HawkSEM.

Pay-per-click (PPC) channels are a dime a dozen.

So how do you decide which ones deserve your hard-earned advertising budget, from TikTok and Instagram to Google and Bing?

Today, we compare two of HawkSEM’s go-to platforms: Google Ads and Facebook Ads.

You might prefer to stick to one or the other, but as paid social marketing expert Magnolia Deuell points out: You need both to maximize your reach and impact.

Join us as we walk through the pros and cons of Google Ads versus Facebook Ads and show you how each one draws new audiences and killer sales.

(Image: Adobe)

Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads: An overview

Google Ads and Facebook Ads are pay-per-click advertising platforms where the advertiser can promote their product or service with targeted online ads, only paying a fee when a user clicks.

Google Ads display across the search engine network, including:

• Google search engine results pages
• Gmail
• YouTube
• Other websites on the Google Display Network
• Apps

Facebook Ads display across the social media network, including:

• News feed
• Videos
• Messenger
• Marketplace
• Non-Facebook apps and websites through Meta Audience Network

Google caters to a more high-intent audience who is actively searching for a solution or answer. Facebook is home to more passive browsing that can lead to more brand awareness and trust.

Google Ads pros and cons

Google Ads is the search network giant’s built-in PPC platform that rewards businesses who play by their algorithms (and higher price points) with top-of-search-results status.

It’s known for quick traffic and conversion results, even though Google campaign success doesn’t come without significant investment.

With an average CPC of $2.69, this PPC platform takes a toll on your marketing budget. But its high conversion rate, massive reach, and purchase intent make Google Ads a vital platform for your PPC strategy.

Pro #1: High purchase intent for niche brands and expensive products

People who type specific items or products into Google already know what they want, meaning Google’s search intent is a serious pro for your ad strategy.

Of course, that doesn’t always translate to instant revenue. Your potential customers might search for industry knowledge and information before they feel ready to purchase your product.

Still, Deuell says that Google Ads places your product in front of people with high purchase intent:

“Last-click attribution methods typically show that direct/paid search traffic drive the most conversions,” says Deuell.

Let’s say you own an accounting SaaS business, and a 40-something VP of a big retailer needs new accounting software.

He might type in “accounting software for enterprise businesses,” and find your SaaS business at the top of the search engine results page (SERP). He could decide to make a purchase right then and there, and turn into a new customer on the spot.

This purchase intent in Google Ads campaigns becomes especially valuable for brands in super niche industries, or ones that sell expensive products. You still need to sell your value, but it’s a lot easier if someone is actively searching for it.

(Image: Adobe)

Of course, your customers also search on Facebook (aka Meta). The only difference is they don’t do it as often as they do on Google (but more on Facebook search later).

Most of the time, Meta Ads appear as “interruption” ad placements, where they appear randomly on your potential customer’s newsfeed.

While both ad platforms are hugely popular, we’d say Google is even more of a household name.

Pro #2: Massive reach

We won’t discount Facebook’s 3 billion monthly active users (MAU). But Google boasts a whopping 8.5 billion searches daily.

Chances are, your product will fulfill one or two of those Google searches, right? Well, it’s not really about chance. You need a well-oiled PPC strategy to land on your ideal customers’ SERPs.

But back to Google’s reach. No matter your target audience or how niche they are, they probably use Google.

The fact that Google offers increased chances of reaching your audience with its universality is one of the most powerful benefits of the platform, but it doesn’t come cheap.

Con #1: More expensive

Tons of factors influence marketing costs; however, Deuell tends to see higher ad spends and average cost per click (CPC) on Google Ads than Facebook:

“Paid search is typically more expensive on a CPC basis, but the conversion rates are typically higher.”

But does that mean smaller businesses and startups should exclude Google Ads in favor of Facebook? Absolutely not. Channel diversification is key for bottom-line ROI.

Meaning? The higher ad spend isn’t as much of a con if paired with more return on your investment. Deuell shares how to make the most of your Google Ads:

“This [higher CPC on Google Ads] is why it’s important to measure your marketing efforts as a blended return on ad spend (ROAS)/ROI versus trying to compare costs per acquisition by channel,” says Deuell.

Con #2: More comprehensive to manage

From the Google Display Network (image ads) to text ads, Performance Max, Shopping, and YouTube, brands already have a lot on their plate working with Google Ads.

But once you dive deeper into campaign account structures, each campaign demands a ton of tweaking and details that make things difficult to manage.

Ad scheduling and automation make it more efficient if you have a solid handle on the platform, but they can quickly overwhelm the average business owner.

Overall? Google Ads is the clear winner for purchase intent and wider audience reach. Still, Deuell reminds us that no effective advertising strategy relies on just one paid channel to drive business performance.

You want to leverage the strengths of both Google Ads and Facebook Ads.

Facebook Ads pros and cons

In the fight of Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads, the latter’s unique benefits may surprise you.

You might know the social media platform Facebook for Messenger, photos, and keeping in touch with friends. But Facebook users present a prime audience network to market your brand.

The platform allows this through Facebook Ads, a PPC platform that focuses on creative assets and detailed targeting while offering a cheaper price than Google ($.77 compared to Google’s $2.69).

Pro #1: More customizable and granular targeting

We talked about the power of search queries and relevant keywords with Google Ads, but does it work similarly on Facebook? Not exactly.

A potential customer on Facebook might not type in a high-intent keyword in the Facebook search bar. However, Facebook Ads targeting harnesses a ton of other relevant criteria like:

• Connections: People who have “liked” your Facebook pages
• Apps: Downloads and purchases
• Age: Most people plug in their birthday on their profile
• Career: Job title, industry, employer
• Life events: Birthdays, bar mitzvahs, weddings, etc.
• User behavior: Device type and purchase history, website visit history
• Interests: Hobbies and passions demonstrated by groups and likes

Google Ads search intent lets you tap into a niche audience who knows they need your product.

However, Facebook gets just as deep into the details to find top-of-the-funnel customers likely to respond well to your brand. Demographics, job information, hobbies, and interests are all valuable insights to create a solid audience persona for targeting.

Facebook also takes things a step further with lookalike audiences, which helps you identify even more of an audience that shares similarities with your existing target. And if your audience has already seen your ads? You can use retargeting to seal the deal.

Pro #2: More creative ad types

While Shopping ads and Display ads also let you leverage the power of imagery, Facebook offers a vast variety of creative ad types for brands in ecommerce, entertainment, arts, and design — industries in which images and videos speak directly to their competence and unique value propositions (UVPs).

Carousel ads also mimic the browser’s shopping experience with a swipeable series of product photos.

Even though a Facebook audience doesn’t actively search for products using a keyword search, such as “high-quality leather boots,” the nature of this ad type appeals even to top-funnel customers and builds brand awareness.

Pro #3: Superior for demand and building brand awareness

What leads up to someone typing “L’Intervalle winter boots” into Google? Sure, the searcher has the purchase intent now, but that didn’t happen overnight. Perhaps a friend recommended the brand to them.

Or more likely?

(Image: Facebook)

L’Intervalle has a solid Facebook Ads strategy that made this searcher aware of the brand. Deuell says that creates demand for a product.

“Taking a step back and looking at a multi-channel attribution report will open analysis to where all of that demand is coming from,” she explains. “Hint: it’s normally paid social!”

Maybe you didn’t land a purchase with the Facebook campaign right away, but Deuell says the platform plays an undeniable role in your Google Ads conversions.

“Especially for small businesses where brand awareness is crucial to filling the pipeline and driving demand,” says Deuell. “Paid social media (and other upper funnel tactics) play a critical role in driving demand within lower-funnel efforts like search.”

Con #1: Limited local audiences

Both Facebook Ads and Google Ads offer geographical targeting options in your ad campaigns.

However, Google Ads has more potential to reach location-specific audiences just by the sheer number of people who use the search engine every day.

Facebook advertising only lets you target users in up to 25 countries and up to 250 cities.

And while you can also target states and up to 50,000 zip codes, there are limitations for businesses that rely on local sales:

“Hyperlocal businesses can be hard to scale on Facebook,” says Deuell. “For example, if you are looking for a 24- to 34-year-old business owner in a specific zip code, your campaigns will likely not be sustainable due to limited audience size.”

Con #2: Limited demographics for certain industries

Facebook has received some flack for discriminatory ad targeting. The platform used to allow ad targeting based on political affiliation, religion, and ties to charitable organizations. However, they’ve removed these features to keep advertising more ethical.

Are targeting rules more stringent if you’re in a certain industry?

“Protected categories, like housing, education, and credit offerings remove a lot of demographic-based targeting options on Facebook to ensure there are no discriminatory practices within the advertising strategy,” says Deuell.

We’ve covered the pros and cons of each platform. Now, let’s talk about the cost.

Cost of Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads

Facebook Ads generally cost less than Google Ads, with an average CPC of around $.77 versus $2.69. However, the exact cost depends on your industry, targeted search terms, and goals.

It’s important to keep in mind that Google Ads typically yield a higher return on investment (ROI) due to a more high-intent audience, while Facebook Ads can facilitate an increase in search volume (resulting in higher conversions through Google Ads).

Further reading: How Much Do Facebook Ads Cost? and How Much Does a Google Ads Campaign Cost?

How much of your budget should go to Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads?

While HawkSEM has a wide roster of clients spanning various niches, we typically recommend a trusted formula for budget allocation. Ideally, 30% of your marketing budget should go toward paid advertising platforms:

• Paid social: 10%
• Paid search: 20%

The remaining 70% of your marketing budget looks like this:

• Email marketing: 25%
• SEO: 20%
• Organic social: 25%

We know, we know — talking about budget allocation isn’t exactly thrilling. Fortunately, we’ve got the blueprint for how to split your marketing budget.

As for which platform deserves more of your attention…

Which should you use: Google Ads vs Facebook Ads?

Bottom-funnel lead generation, high click-through rate (CTR), and massive audience reach are serious benefits to making Google Ads work hard for your advertising strategy.

But online advertising on Facebook Ads gives you high engagement and awareness metrics that propel people to convert via Google search ads in the first place.

Meaning?

“Channel diversification and a solid marketing mix strategy is key to bottom line ROI,” says Deuell.

If you’re a B2B business questioning the effectiveness of Facebook for your industry, think again. Don’t underestimate the power of a B2B Facebook Ads strategy. While Facebook is more popular for B2C brands, this advertising platform is perfect for targeting business decision-makers by job title and industry.

Just ask our financial SaaS client TimeWarp Trading. We refined their landing page messaging, researched relevant keywords and audiences (via Facebook’s job and industry targeting), and conducted a slew of A/B tests to optimize each campaign.

The results? A whopping 471% boost in ROAS.

The takeaway

So who takes the gold in the battle between Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads? Each has upsides and downsides, but think of them as the dynamic duo of your digital marketing family. While they may have different characteristics and functions, they complement each other (and your ROI) perfectly.

Deuell brings it home: “Each channel has pros and cons. The biggest note is that you should not put all of your eggs in one basket.”

But let’s be real: we don’t always have the bandwidth to juggle everything. 

Similarly, your internal team might be too busy taking care of your existing customers to dedicate ample time to learning how to use Google Ads and Facebook Ads for effective marketing campaigns.

At HawkSEM, omnichannel marketing is our forte. Our team of PPC and SEO strategists are masters of social and search channels, consistently delivering an average 4.5X ROI for our clients. Now it’s your turn to be one of them.

Let’s craft your omnichannel marketing strategy.

This article has been updated and was originally published in January 2024.

The post Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads: Pros, Cons + How to Budget appeared first on HawkSEM.

Want to grow your B2B website’s organic traffic? One of the best ways is to build a B2B content marketing funnel. A content marketing funnel is a funnel-shaped marketing strategy that pulls people in and walks them through the customer journey.

Creating content that seamlessly guides potential customers down through each stage of the funnel (which you’ll learn about in this article) can increase leads and conversions.

Read through our ultimate guide below to create your first (or next) B2B content marketing funnel.

What is a B2B content marketing funnel?

The B2B content marketing funnel is a marketing strategy that helps bring people in your target audience from being completely unaware of your product down to fully informed customers.

It gets its name from the funnel shape the strategy takes. It happens naturally because people will fall off at different stages, and not everyone who discovers your business will become a customer (though we all wish that were the case).

Get an idea of what the B2B content marketing funnel looks like below:

The top of the funnel is the largest, as that’s where people are just becoming aware of your brand and the purpose of your business. As people continue shopping for a product or service like yours, they’ll move to the middle of the funnel. Then, those who make it to the bottom are making the decision to become a paying customer.

But while that’s the gist of how it works, understanding that isn’t enough — you also need to create content for each stage and know your audience well enough to create the right content.

How to build a B2B content marketing funnel

Ready to build your B2B content marketing funnel? Let’s walk you through four basic steps to get started:

1. Get a clear understanding of your audience
2. Set goals for your B2B marketing funnel
3. Create content for each stage of the funnel
4. Analyze your performance

1. Get a clear understanding of your audience

The first step is knowing who your ideal customer is and what type of messaging will resonate with them. What pain points or problems does your product solve? Speak to those issues to attract the type of customer who’d most benefit from your product.

Rambod Yadegar,  President at HawkSEM, explains, “Knowing your target audience like the back of your hand is essential when creating a strategy for a B2B content funnel. Otherwise, you can’t create valuable content for the reader, adversely affecting the performance of your content marketing campaigns and funnel.”

To get a clear understanding of your audience, you can do three things:

1. Conduct market research to discover insights about your industry and buyers
2. Interview people in your target audience to gain a better understanding of their needs
3. Do a competitive analysis to see who’s buying from others in your industry

After you have all of that information, build a buyer persona, or a profile depicting exactly who your target customer is.

Ryan Zomorodi, COO & Co-Founder at Real Estate Skills, explains how his team tailored their content strategy to resonate with decision-makers within target organizations.

“We focus on creating content that addresses their specific industry challenges, offering insights and solutions,” shares Zomorodi. “This targeted approach ensures our content is relevant and valuable, especially during the consideration and decision phases of the buying process.”

John Hughes, CEO at PlumberShield agrees. He says, “We had to adapt our content marketing funnel to better align with the evolving needs of our B2B audience. This shift was prompted by feedback and market analysis, leading us to focus more on educational content that addressed specific industry challenges.”

By doing so, Hughes’ team created a more effective funnel, increasing engagement and conversions.

2. Set goals for your B2B marketing funnel

Setting goals ensures the content you create in your funnel adds to your business’s bottom line.

Ryan Hammill, Executive Director at Ancient Language Institute, provides a great example.

“Our approach to aligning content marketing with sales involves creating content that directly supports our sales objectives,” says Hammill. “We focus on developing materials that educate and inform, while also addressing common questions and objections that arise during the sales process.”

Check with different departments in your business to see what goals they’ve set and if your content marketing funnel can support those goals. Otherwise, look to your business and sales goals.

For example, your product team might want to increase the number of customers who sign up for a specific package or product. By creating content that focuses on this new product, you can help reach that specific goal.

3. Create content for each stage of the funnel

Then, you need to create content for each stage of the funnel — top, middle, and bottom. We’ve already covered the different types of content that work well for each stage. Now is the time to create it.

Your content team should work closely with your sales team to ensure the proper messaging aligns and resonates well with your target audience.

Sturgeon Christie, CEO at Second Skin Audio, says, “In our experience, the key to driving B2B conversions lies in the synergy between content marketing and sales enablement. We create content that not only educates but also supports the sales process, providing our team with valuable tools to engage and convert prospects.”

Consistently create, publish, and promote content that fits each stage of the sales funnel to seamlessly guide your target audience from stranger to customer.

4. Analyze your performance

Finally, analyze your performance each month or so. Ensure your funnel is hitting people at the right stages and that you’re generating even more leads and conversions than you previously were.

Rosie Langello, Founder of Book Vibe, says, “At Book Vibe, we measure the effectiveness of our B2B content marketing at each funnel stage by tracking engagement metrics, such as click-through rates, time spent on content, and conversion rates. We also pay close attention to feedback and interaction levels, as these provide invaluable insights into how our content resonates with our audience.”

Marketing consultant Chad Sultana shares a few other metrics to track. Sultana says, “We focus on key performance indicators like lead generation rates, engagement levels, and conversion rates. Tracking these metrics at each stage of the funnel helps us understand the impact of our content and where improvements can be made.”

Tools you can use to analyze your performance include Google Analytics, social media insights tools, and other marketing reporting tools.

Plus, take advantage of tools like ConversionIQ, HawkSEM’s proprietary tool. Our experts use ConversionIQ in every campaign we run or strategy we create for our clients — even sales and marketing funnels.

Once we have your content strategy/funnel in place and are pumping out content, we use ConversionIQ (CIQ) to granularly track each step of the buyer’s journey to understand what aspects of a campaign are working and where we should trim the fat. This allows us to optimize the funnel and improve our overall conversion rate and ROI.

Why is a B2B content marketing funnel important?

Creating a content marketing funnel can take some time — but is so worth it. Here are four major benefits your business can reap from putting together an effective content funnel.

1. Make organic traffic more accessible

A content marketing funnel is heavily reliant on content. You’ll create several different types of content to fit every stage of the sales funnel, giving you more opportunities to generate organic traffic.

Not only can this improve your overall SEO efforts, but it can also save money on PPC campaigns. Get your content to show up in search engine results pages (SERPs) for free, rather than having to put your ad budget behind them.

2. Increase brand awareness

Your content funnel can also boost brand awareness. The top-of-the-funnel stage (as you’ll discover more about soon) is dedicated to helping potential customers become aware of your brand. If you’re successful, you’ll reach a much wider audience, improving your overall brand awareness.

Jason Boyd, Director at Evolve SEO Agency, agrees that this is a major perk in any content funnel.

“From a brand awareness standpoint, a great content marketing funnel makes an excellent tracker in the B2B industry,” shares Boyd.

“We discovered its value in creating content that generates leads and converts, and we continue to explore ways to set consumer expectations on informative, educational resource materials to help with their purchase decisions,” Boyd continues. “Once we found the sweet spot for brand awareness to grow, the results trickled down to driving revenue and retaining customers.”

3. Become an authority in your industry

A successful content marketing funnel can also position your brand as an industry authority. The more high-quality content you create, the more people will trust your brand and what it has to say.

“Thought leadership is a key component of our content marketing funne,” explains Ryan Zomorodi, COO & Co-Founder at Real Estate Skills. “By providing in-depth analyses and expert opinions on real estate trends, we position Real Estate Skills as a trusted source of industry knowledge. This approach not only attracts leads but also establishes our credibility and authority, crucial for long-term relationships.”

4. Generate more quality leads

A solid B2B content marketing funnel can also help you get your business in front of even more qualified leads and B2B buyers. When you’re targeting the right people with the right content, they come in ready to buy.

“The importance of B2B content marketing became evident to us when we saw a significant increase in qualified leads correlating with our focused content efforts,” says Phil Strazzulla, Founder of SelectSoftware Reviews.

To double down on that point, Shawn Plummer, CEO at The Annuity Expert, says, “Our realization of the importance of B2B content marketing came when we noticed how effectively it generated leads and nurtured prospects. By focusing on creating content that educates and informs our audience about financial planning and annuities, we’ve been able to establish a strong connection with our prospects.”

Stages of the B2B content marketing funnel

There are three main stages or phases of the B2B content marketing funnel, and they follow the standard buyer’s journey.

The three stages are:

• Top-of-the-funnel (ToFu): The awareness stage, where people search for B2B companies that offer the same products and services as yours.
• Middle-of-the-funnel (MoFu): The consideration stage, where potential customers learn more about your specific business’s offerings.
• Bottom-of-the-funnel (BoFu): The decision stage, where your lead makes the decision to work with your business.

Learn more about what each stage should look like — and, more importantly, what types of content you should create for each.

Top-of-the-funnel (ToFu)

At the top of the funnel, your target customer is just starting to discover their pain point. They’re researching solutions — and hopefully will discover your business in the process, thanks to your content marketing strategy.

To increase search traffic and reach, start with top-of-the-funnel keywords. These will vary from business to business.

For example, if your target customer has discovered they’re losing website traffic and your B2B business is an SEO tool, you may start with content touching on keywords like “search engine optimization guide” or “free SEO tools.”

At this stage of the marketing funnel, the goal is to use your messaging to help your target customer understand their problem and how your business is an easy solution.

ToFu content types:

• Blog content
• Social media posts
• Landing pages
• Podcast episodes
• Video content
• Ebooks
• White papers

Middle-of-the-funnel (MoFu)

In the middle of the funnel, the B2B customer is aware of their problem and is now searching for solutions. Now they’re in the midst of it, trying to figure out which company will offer the best options for their needs.

This is where you’ll want to start promoting comparison guides, share thought leadership content, and make sure your marketing team is positioning your offerings as the best amongst competitors. Social proof like reviews and testimonials can also come in handy here.

Keywords to use at this stage include “best SEO tools” or “company A vs. company B.” Touchpoints here center around why your business is the best option out there and sharing even more information about your specific offerings.

MoFu content types:

• Webinars
• Reports
• Email marketing content
• Testimonials
• Product videos

Bottom-of-the-funnel (BoFu)

And finally, the bottom of the funnel focuses on generating as many conversions as possible. Your customer is making their final purchasing decisions — and fingers crossed, your business is the one they choose.

Your content here should reinforce why your business is the best solution for the job. Your B2B sales team can help by offering demos of your product (especially for SaaS companies), walking potential customers through the user experience.

With that in mind, your content and overall digital marketing strategy at this stage should focus on getting your target customers to fill out forms requesting demos.

Create BoFu blog content, like guides that walk readers through how to use your product to do certain tasks, share case studies, or showcase templates that can be used in your products. Alongside each of these BoFu content formats, include a call-to-action for requesting a demo and learning more about your product.

Remember that once you get a lead to convert into a paying customer, your last step (almost like a fourth funnel stage) is about retention. After landing your customer, focus on keeping that customer.

BoFu content types:

• Case studies/success stories
• Demos
• Templates
• Pricing pages

Checklist for building a B2B content marketing funnel

• Know your audience
  • Conduct market research
  • Interview your target customer
  • Do competitive analytics
  • Build a buyer persona
• Set goals for your marketing funnel
  • Check in with different departments in your business
  • Look to your business and sales goals
• Create content for each stage of the funnel
  • Create content for the top of the funnel
  • Create content for the middle of the funnel
  • Create content for the bottom of the funnel
• Analyze your performance
  • Use Google Analytics
  • Create a dashboard with your KPIs
  • Monitor performance and adapt your strategy accordingly

The takeaway

Ready to drive more qualified leads to your business? Then it’s time to create a better B2B content marketing funnel for better lead generation. As your content continues to answer visitors’ questions and concerns, you’ll see more visitors turn into paying customers.

However, if you don’t have the time to conduct the research, build a funnel and personas, and execute your content strategy, consider hiring a B2B content marketing agency.

To get help from a team of experts, and get access our CIQ tool, schedule a free consultation with our team today.

The post How to Build a Content Marketing Funnel (+ Expert Tips & Checklist) appeared first on HawkSEM.

The rollout of Google’s AI Overviews is Google’s shift to include AI-generated search results that summarize answers from multiple sources in the search engine results page (SERP).

As of 2025, AIO now appears in up to 100% more complex search queries than before for more than 1 billion global users every month.

And with Google’s expanded Circle to Search tool with some Android phones, users can access AI-driven summaries inside the app.

This is the first step in expanding AIO to Google’s visual searches, with more integration on the horizon.

Alissa DeGeorge, Google-certified SEO manager at HawkSEM, shares her expert insights on how AI overviews in search impact organic traffic — and how you can use it to get ahead.

What are Google’s AI Overviews?

Google’s AI Overviews place an AI-generated synthesis of the highest-quality and most informative search results and sources, before organic results.

Powered by Google’s Gemini, these generative AI features appear on every device, including iOS and Android, and every browser that uses Google, including Chrome — even AI assistants.

(Image: Google)

Is this the same as AI tools like OpenAI’s ChatGPT?

This generative AI platform generates answers to queries from online sources in a conversational manner through natural language processing.

While ChatGPT offers convenience, the AI model sometimes risks accuracy with outdated sources. DeGeorge says they’re not the same — here’s the difference:

“The AIO pulls in information from live sources that you can click on and visit yourself to verify,” she explains.

Google’s AI-powered overviews are snapshots of information to help you access more diverse and comprehensive content quickly.

How Google’s AI Overviews affect rankings

There has been a noticeable decline in click-through rates (CTRs) because AI Overviews serve the user enough information that most don’t feel the need to click through to the actual article.

In fact, the top link in the overview receives a less than 10% click-through rate.

However, DeGeorge points to a necessary mindset shift around SERP performance from rankings to real estate.

Instead of thinking:

“I rank #1 for this keyword.”

Marketers should shift how they see performance to:

“How much of the SERP am I taking up and how often am I showing up?”

DeGeorge’s goal for clients is to achieve multiple placements in the organic search results and AIO.

“As the AIO combines information from various sources to present answers to users,” explains DeGeorge, “if multiple webpages from your site are consistently featured as primary sources in the Overviews, your website is perceived as the most credible authority on that particular topic.”

How to appear in AI Overviews

All the content and niche authority you’ve built won’t go down the drain just because of this updated SERP feature. You just need to optimize your content with AIO in mind, and DeGeorge offers tangible tips to do just that.

1. Make your content more specific
2. Beef up content with authoritative sources and reviews
3. Answer common questions for Google’s AIO on your website, Reddit, and Quora
4. Level up the conversation with video content
5. Ecommerce businesses: Optimize product description pages

1. Make your content more specific

Your customer funnel includes top-funnel (awareness stage), middle-funnel (consideration), and bottom-funnel (decision-stage) customers.

Brands use more strategic digital marketing tactics like PPC ads and personalized remarketing to promote a sale from bottom-funnel customers.

As for the top funnel, focus on sharing informational content to showcase niche knowledge and build brand awareness.

Middle-funnel content dives deeper into product features and competitor comparisons to move audiences into the bottom-funnel.

Thought leadership for top- and middle-funnel content will still be vital for your content strategy. But DeGeorge says Google will prioritize more high-quality, specific, and granular content that answers your audience’s questions:

“Companies should still produce thought leadership, more generalized pieces to showcase on their website or to promote their brand identity on social platforms,” says DeGeorge. “But the primary focus of their content strategy should be creating helpful, specific content that answers specific questions.”

Here’s an example for an ecommerce wetsuit company:

• Thought leadership content: General articles about scuba diving
• Specific SGE Content: How different wetsuits are designed to cater to specific water temperatures

But no matter your content, Google’s crawlers still expect clear proof of expertise.

2. Beef up content with authoritative sources and reviews

Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) already require brands to beef up their content with value to rank higher. DeGeorge says this is even more critical with Google’s AIO:

“There should be a dedicated author with an author bio on every post,” says DeGeorge. “For agencies like us who write content for our clients, adding “Reviewed By” with an author bio will be key.”

Our SaaS client Datadog exhibits this beautifully by highlighting the expertise and credentials of the perspective in this blog article:

We know the author is an executive within the company — and if readers want to learn more? Datadog also links to Garcia’s Twitter account in the top-right corner, and even includes a photo icon:

3. Answer common questions for Google’s AIO on your website, Reddit, and Quora

Google’s AIO results highlight snippets that answer common audience questions just like the organic search results. That means brands still need to offer helpful, accurate answers to long-tail queries if they want to earn those highlights.

But how do you make sure a competitor doesn’t steal the spotlight?

DeGeorge recommends competitive analysis to ensure your answers stand out:

“If competitors answer similar questions in their content, how can your response be better? Go the extra mile to provide a more intricate and helpful answer,” says DeGeorge.

Here’s what that extra mile might look like:

• Conduct message mining: Identify FAQs from user feedback and customer conversations, and answer them with your content.
• Include supplementary materials: Include infographic, data, and stats within your content.
• Verify your content: Have credible experts write or review your content and make sure they have author bios on your site.

DeGeorge takes it a step further and shares ways to answer audience questions beyond your website:

“Quora and Reddit have become increasingly popular on the SERP,” says DeGeroge. “Is there an opportunity for your business here? Are you utilizing social media to answer questions?”

If not, it’s time to start.

4. Level up the conversation with video content

One benefit of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in search is the enhanced user experience.

The average person might not have the time or expertise to assess so many Google search results at once to find the information they need, making the AI snapshot’s conversational summary helpful and efficient.

Guess what else shares information efficiently and conversationally? Videos.

That’s why Google’s Multitask Unified Model (MUM) helps identify relevant information in videos for new search queries, even if the video doesn’t share the query’s topic in its title or description.

And it’s made videos, especially YouTube videos, more prominent on the search results page than ever before.

Here’s what DeGeorge recommends for brand owners new to YouTube who want to increase their reach and authority:

Complete setup

• Use your Google account to set up a YouTube profile
• Fill out all required details
• Include a high-quality, professional header image and logo
• Tell viewers what to expect in your description
• Add links to your website and social platforms

Once you’ve got the basics down, she moves on to the actual content.

Create how-to videos

Time to fill up your content calendar. The good news? There’s no shortage of engaging, relevant video content topics to get a head start on the AIO.

DeGeorge recommends creating a content ideation log that launches from your existing content.

“Is there content on my website that would also serve as great video content? A great example of this would be how-to topics,” she suggests.

“Having a guide of step-by-step instructions with graphics for the user to reference, but also creating a video so the user can see it in real-time.”

NordVPN puts this advice into practice. The Virtual Private Network (VPN) provider shared an article about how to set up a secure home network:

And they demonstrate their guide in greater detail with this YouTube video tutorial:

The cherry on top?

“[You’ll get] brownie points for both SEO and user experience by embedding the video directly within the article and creating a backlink from the YouTube video to the article. It’s a win-win,” says DeGeorge.

Showcase your products

You can describe your products in a search ad, but why not help your audience picture their value even more with videos? You’ll appeal to the 62% of people who rely on video content to learn about a brand’s products, and Google’s AI in search.

DeGeorge especially recommends this tactic for ecommerce businesses:

“If you are [an ecommerce brand] and don’t have a lot of SKUs, make a video on each of your products detailing the key features, benefits, etc.,” she recommends.

“If you are a large enterprise and that isn’t an option, there’s the option to create videos on your top-selling products, or create more general category videos that highlight a few top-selling products in each of our main categories.”

Our client Vintage Tub & Bath highlights their gorgeous freestyle tubs and striking vanities in these videos:

But what if you don’t have any physical products to showcase? Take a page from SaaS brand Bardeen’s playbook with an animated product explainer video:

DeGeorge says while pricey, these video types are especially strong if you use them on both YouTube and your web content.

While long-form videos are the best medium for product explainers like the ones above, you can’t underestimate the power of a YouTube short in the right context.

Promote sales with shorts

Need to update your audience quickly? Maybe there’s a limited-time sale you want to put on their radar. Don’t hide the goods in a long-form YouTube video — get the word out with a viral YouTube Short instead.

Sephora does a great job with this effective, interactive video that promotes a 20% discount on fragrances:

YouTube Shorts are viewed over 70 billion times every day. But DeGeorge reminds us to be strategic:

“Shorts are disposable, and people are unlikely to watch them more than once,” DeGeorge explains. “Any video that is more important or central to your brand should be a long-form video.”

But using them for quick wins along the way? No short-changing yourself there.

Connect with your audience with brand videos

Sprout Social found that 64% of consumers want to feel connected to the brands they buy products from. DeGeorge says brand videos on YouTube are great windows to your brand’s soul, and help you forge a connection with your target audience:

“Who are you? What is your mission statement? What differentiates you? This can feature either the founder or CEO, chief marketing officer, et cetera,” says DeGeorge.

Here’s a HawkSEM intro video featuring our President, Rambod Yadegar:

Another example? Skincare brand Caudalie knows they have an international audience, so the brand created videos about the company vision in not just English, but many different languages to appeal to its diverse audiences:

5. Ecommerce businesses: Optimize product description pages

Although products were included in Google’s AIO before its massive expansion, it now offers a very detailed product comparison.

(Image: Product comparison on Google)

While some industry experts see this as a negative feature, the emphasis on product comparisons makes it pivotal for marketers to keep up with their optimizations regardless.

“This is another sign for ecommerce SEOs to ensure their product description pages (PDPs) are fully optimized,” says DeGeorge.

“I’d recommend doing both a competitor analysis and analysis of top ecommerce brands (think Wayfair and Walmart) alike for examples on how their product description pages are formatted.”

How to track your AIO position

AI Overviews has become yet another SERP ranking to prioritize, which means keeping track of your position is important for ongoing optimization efforts.

You can manually track your AIO position by simply performing searches for your targeted keywords in incognito windows:

However, we recommend using a tool like Semrush’s Position Tracking tool that enables you to track your site’s visibility on the SERP feature.

To do this with Semrush:

1. Create a Position Tracking project (identify your website and target keywords)
2. Navigate to the Overview tab
3. Filter for SERP features and find the AI Overviews in the drop down menu
4. The report will show the keywords in your campaign where Semrush found an AI Overview and whether your site was featured

The takeaway

Undoubtedly, Google’s AI Overviews is a game-changer for SEO. While this search feature can decrease online traffic, it also breaks open the door to achieve unprecedented visibility when navigated strategically.

Our staff of highly qualified and experienced SEO marketers know that no strategy continues to bring results when unchecked.

But if you want to stay on top of Google’s AIO and featured snippets? You’ll need a firm hand on your content strategy that prioritizes meticulous specificity in answering long-tail queries, creative video content, and authoritativeness.

Traditional search is the past, but the future of search is bright for audiences that level up their content.

Google’s AI Overviews can give your brand prime real estate on the SERPs when you position yourself as the leading authority in your industry. We can help you get there.

This article has been updated and was originally published in February 2024.

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