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With what seems like an endless amount of PPC metrics out there, it can be challenging to navigate all those numbers to find out what’s actually making you money in your PPC campaigns.
By having a better understanding of the various Google, Facebook, Twitter and other PPC analytics, you can drill down on the benchmarks that truly matter.
Kissmetrics and KlientBoost have partnered up to bring you these PPC analytics tips that can help you increase your revenue stream with more conversions, sales, and revenue, all with less traffic.
That way, you can measure the PPC stats that matter most, when it comes to reaching your business goals.
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You’re Optimizing for Traffic Without Thinking About Other Factors
Sure, attracting the most amount of traffic to your site and landing pages sounds exciting.
After all, it’s a numbers game right?
Not if all that traffic isn’t the right type of traffic. If you’re not drawing in quality traffic, then more visitors does not mean more revenue.
Rather than focusing solely on PPC analytics like clicks, impressions, quality scores and click through rates (CTRs), take a look at the bigger picture and analyze macro metrics that tell you more about revenue streams.
Find out if your optimized traffic is quality traffic that’s actually converting into sales.
Ask Yourself: How do I lower my cost per conversion first? Are my landing pages optimized for the type of traffic that’s coming in?
You can focus on lowering your cost per click once you understand the conversion cost metrics first. This will keep you focused on your overall business goal.
You’re Optimizing for Conversions Without Accounting for Revenue
Are your conversions turning into actual money-generating sales?
If your PPC campaigns are focused more on increasing conversions and lowering your cost per conversions, you’re headed in the right direction. A lower cost per conversion can help you afford more effective ad spend.
When optimizing for conversions you naturally put your attention toward making your landing page offers convert by being relevant and valuable to your visitors.
In this stage you are no longer focused on cost per clicks and see a more full story.
Here’s an example of when you might think a certain cost per conversion is outperforming the other:
Keyword 1 looks better in this example
But what if you had more information and more details to the story?
Here’s the same keyword example but with sales metrics:
Now Keyword 2 looks like it’s winning
Dig a little deeper into your PPC analytics to uncover sales related info. This can tell you more about your conversions and whether or not they’re actually helping you reach your revenue goals.
Optimizing for conversions can be a step above optimizing for traffic, but if you’re still confused about whether or not those conversions are making you more money, then you still need to think more macro.
You’re Optimizing for Sales and Know Your Costs and Margins
The next level of macro thinking is optimizing for sales, which should be directly related to your bottom line.
Knowing how much revenue is coming in from your PPC campaigns is especially beneficial if you’re zoned in on the profit margins and knowing which PPC tactics margins are tied to those margins.
Tracking your sales at various levels like keyword, placement and audience level can help you zero in on where to give credit within your PPC campaigns.
Optimizing for sales instead of conversions can help you save ad budget
That way you can boost your ad spend on those keywords generating sales, and decrease budget for those specific parts of your PPC campaigns that aren’t.
You Attract Customers and Know What Their Lifetime Values Are
Now that you’re clued in on optimizing for sales, it’s time to look at the long run and plan for future revenue streams.
Ask Yourself: Do you know the lifetime value of your customers?
Do you know everything about your valued customers and the PPC journey they took to get to you, and then convert and become a client?
If you can answer these questions, then you should be able to pick out the specific ads, ad formats, keywords and landing page URLs that drove specific visitors to become customers.
Once you have that golden information, your future should be bright… now you can put some extra muscle, energy and budget into the PPC targeting and PPC optimization that’ll win you more of the same sales success.
You Run Revenue Split Testing That Goes Beyond Conversion Rates
Without conducting diligent testing, you could be missing out on opportunities you may not even know about.
The best way to make sure capturing as much potential revenue as possible?
Split test your PPC campaigns and landing pages with not just conversions in mind, but revenue goals.
Find out which elements of your PPC campaigns perform the best when directly comparing two variants for revenue generation.
Tip: Consider the various stages of the conversion funnel and test out different keywords that speak to the various intent levels.
Visitors from your various PPC channels have different intent levels
Closing Thoughts
As you’ve learned, it’s not about the amount of traffic you’re driving, but more about the quality of your visitors.
Not only that but you need to make sure those quality visitors are converting into actual sales and generating you revenue that aligns with your profit margin goals.
Once you’ve got that down, you can break down the PPC analytics and repeat that golden recipe for more of those valued lifetime customers.
Now it’s your turn to uncover useful insights in your PPC analytics, so you can reveal the bigger picture and repeat the sales success for the long-term.