So, you’re running an AdWords campaign.
And your results are varied at best.
One day, your PPC efforts might bring in a decent chunk of leads, but another day it falls dormant.
What gives?
Why is it working one day and not another?
Well, there are a lot of factors that can contribute to your successful or flailing AdWords campaign.
I want to talk about one of the ways that you can give your failing PPC budget a better chance.
As you probably already know, search engines represent a wealth of lead-, traffic-, and revenue-generating potential.
And Google is the best of them.
And you can only leverage that potential if you optimize your AdWords campaigns to rake in impressions, clicks, and leads.
Otherwise, you’re sending your budget to the trash can.
Luckily, there is a way you can increase the effectiveness of your PPC ads.
And it revolves around using the best AdWords extensions that Google has to offer.
What are AdWords extensions?
AdWords extensions are just a fancy way of saying, “The stuff that you can change, add, and alter about your AdWords campaigns.”
Different extensions do different things.
With some, you can add reviews or a call button.
With others, you can add a discount or brief testimonial.
That’s why, when you search on Google for something, you often see sponsored results that look different from each other.
You’ll see results like these.
Or maybe you’ll get results like these.
Can you see the differences?
The reason shy different results look different is that the marketers behind the scenes are leveraging different AdWords extensions.
Some of them are doing it well, while others aren’t doing it quite so well.
But how can you ensure that you’re in the former category rather than the latter?
You need to make sure that you use the right extensions for your business.
You want to use the ones that raise your click-through rate, lower your cost per click, and increase your ROI.
In case you’re still not convinced, here’s one more reason that you should consider using AdWords extensions, even if you’ve never done it before.
Why should you use them?
Budgets are tight.
All around the Internet, digital marketers are struggling to (1) get enough budget to do all the things they want to do, and (2) get the best ROI possible with their current budgets.
And it’s no surprise.
You, the marketer, know that you need to please your boss. But you also need to please and appeal to your target market.
Otherwise, you won’t bring in sales.
That’s a difficult spot to be in.
Just consider that 28% of marketers listed securing enough budget for their efforts among their top business challenges.
In other words, you need to make the most of the budget you have.
That includes your SEO budget, your content marketing budget, and, for our purposes, your AdWords budget.
But you can only make the most of your AdWords budget if you’re at least somewhat familiar with all of the extensions they offer.
And that’s exactly why you’re here.
So without further ado, here are ten extensions that you should be using but probably aren’t.
1. Sitelink extensions
The first extension you should know about is the sitelink extension.
These little beauties are additional links that sit under your primary result link.
They go to other popular pages on your website — maybe your blog, special offers, menu, reviews, or pricing page.
Whatever the case, you can use these extensions to encourage users to choose where they’d like to go instead of having them visiting your homepage or landing page when they click on your result.
These are particularly useful when someone searches for your brand name on Google.
Think about it.
When someone searches for “buy email automation software,” you already know what they’re looking to do, so you don’t need the additional links.
But when someone searches for your brand name, what are their intentions? There’s no way to know. Your guess is as good as mine.
So, having additional links in your AdWords result allows searchers to navigate your website quickly from the SERP.
When I searched for “Domino’s,” for instance, this came up:
And when I searched for “MailChimp,” this was the first result:
By using the sitelink extension, you allow users to quickly and easily get where they want to go on your website.
Because, when people type in your brand name, they want to go somewhere on your website.
It’s best to let them do that quickly.
2. Call extensions
Imagine that you’re waiting in the car with the baby while your spouse shops.
But you’re planning to get dinner at the local pizza joint afterward.
Now, you’re browsing on your phone in the car. You type your favorite pizza place into Google, and the first result is the one you want.
But there’s a problem. You don’t see a phone number.
So you go to their website and look around. But after a few long moments, you get sick of searching and decide to get pizza from somewhere else.
That pizza place just lost a sale. But they wouldn’t have if they had been using the call extension on their AdWords campaign.
It looks like this.
And that call button isn’t just important for local food places.
It’s important for any business that offers customer support or sales via phone.
Which are most businesses.
Here’s what the extension looks like on a real estate advertisement.
By adding that button, you tell customers that you’re just a phone call away, which builds trust and makes you feel more approachable.
Without it, you’re sure to frustrate certain prospects.
But you might do more than just frustrate them. You could even lose their attention altogether.
The point is, if you don’t have this extension, you run the risk of frustrating prospects and customers before they even contact you.
We’ve all gotten angry trying to find a hidden phone number.
But the call extension will avoid that by putting your phone number front-and-center.
3. App extensions
Do you offer an app for your business?
Today, having an app is practically a must for any serious SaaS or e-commerce company.
MailChimp, Shopify, and Amazon all have native applications for their services and products.
And the reason is that browsing on an app is often easier than browsing on a mobile website.
App designers create native applications so they’ll function smoothly on the device, instead of just fitting the device like mobile websites.
That’s a noteworthy difference.
Even mobile websites can sometimes get tricky to navigate.
But navigating a native application is almost always a breeze.
If you do have an app, you might want to consider using the AdWords app extension. It looks like this:
Here’s another example:
And the popularity of native applications isn’t just my opinion. The data backs it up.
51% of people buying products on their smartphone use an app rather than a website.
It’s hard to blame them. Since the app is so much easier to use, buying on it is practically instinctual.
For that reason, you should consider using this extension if you have a dedicated application for smartphones.
Your visitors, leads, and customers will prefer using it.
4. Review extensions
Few things in the marketing world are as powerful as customer reviews.
When someone says they like your product or service, other people want to like it too.
It sort of says, “This product is amazing! Everyone loves it, and you will too!”
A review is a way of assuring the visitor that they’re going to love your product or service before they even buy it. And they’re important because everyone looks at reviews.
That isn’t just marketing speculation.
It’s science.
When consumers are looking to make a purchase, 64% of them seek out customer reviews to support their decision.
And 77.3% of buyers in a study claimed that reviews impacted their decision.
But how does all of that information apply to AdWords extensions?
Well, the review extension allows you to add a short testimonial to your AdWords advertisement. It gives searchers the review they’re craving upfront.
Review extensions look like this:
You don’t have to wait until people click on your website to leverage the power of social proof.
You can exploit its power right in the search results.
That means that you’ll get more clicks, traffic, leads, and conversions.
5. Callout extensions
If you’re a marketer, then you’re probably familiar with the power of callouts in advertisements.
You know, the part where you say, “Calling all women frustrated with their makeup” or “Are you sick and tired of having to vacuum your carpet?”
I know. It sounds kind of like an infomercial.
And that’s because it is.
But infomercials and QVC have used this strategy for a long time for one reason and one reason only:
It works.
And you can leverage it with the callout Adwords extension.
The extension looks like this:
Or it’ll look something like this:
You can use the extension to say a variety of different things.
You can use it to describe the kinds of products you offer, promote a special deal you currently have going, or call out your specific target market.
In other words, who is your target market, and how can you grab their attention quickly?
If you tell them all that, you won’t just win their attention. You’ll win their click.
6. Structured snippets extensions
The structured snippet extension offers another opportunity for you to tell searchers what your business sells.
And the more chances you get to do that, the better.
The reality is that a lot of times when people see your result, they don’t know who you are, what you’re there for, and how you can help them.
A structured snippet can solve that problem if you use it correctly.
Here’s what it looks like in action:
The purpose of this snippet is to explain to customers the kind of products, styles, or services you offer.
You can quickly list a few different options that visitors will have if they click through to your website.
Ask yourself this: what exactly is it that you offer? Is it email marketing software, clothing, sunglasses, or CRM software?
Whatever it is, include those details in your structured snippet.
That way, searchers will know who you are and what you offer before they even visit your website.
Here’s what a Walgreens advertisement looks like for example.
After all, if people know who you are and what you offer, you won’t only get clicks. You’ll get the right clicks.
7. Location extensions
It’s probably pretty obvious to you what the AdWords location extension does.
Still, tons of businesses don’t use it.
A lot of online businesses and SaaS companies think that because they are online, they don’t need to provide their address.
But that’s not necessarily true.
After all, when you’re considering working with a new business, you want to know that they aren’t scamming you, right?
Including your address in your AdWords result is a great way to show the legitimacy of your business. That means that people are more likely to trust you and your company.
Your business turns from something ambiguous to something personal and tangible. And I don’t know about you, but I’m far more comfortable buying from a business that feels real.
It’s really simple to include your address on your result, and it’s well worth the trust that you’ll build with searchers.
Here’s what a desktop result looked liked like when I search for “verizon near seattle.”
Here’s what a mobile result looks like for T-Mobile.
Even if your business isn’t local, including your location on your AdWords result will likely increase the trust people have for you.
It’s a must for serious business owners and marketers.
8. Offer extensions
I’m willing to bet that you’ve experienced the power of discounts.
You’re familiar with how people flock to the clearance section of your digital store or how you get more conversions on days that your service is 20% off.
The truth is simple:
People love discounts.
They love the opportunity to save money on awesome products or services.
And who can blame them?
We all like to save money.
But what you might not have thought about is that offering discounts can make for a great AdWords strategy.
And you can use the offer extension to do so, just like this:
But just in case you’re not convinced, consider that everyone from the ages of 18 to 64 who abandons their online shopping cart is more likely to buy those products if they receive a follow-up discount.
People love saving money.
And, ironically, you can make money because of it by offering a discount on your PPC ad with the offer extension.
9. Social extensions
Few things in this life are for sure:
Death, taxes, and social media.
OK, I added the last one.
But with the rising power of social media, its influence isn’t something to take lightly.
Consumers and business people alike use, trust, and leverage social media for their own benefits.
But did you know you can use social media to enhance the effectiveness of your PPC ad?
In fact, the social extension allows you to do just that.
Unfortunately, you can only connect it to your Google+ account. But that’s better than nothing, right?
Here’s what it looks like.
Here are a few more examples.
If you have a particularly high number of followers or likes on your business’s Google+ account, then it would definitely be worth your time to include this extension.
It might just add the extra bit of incentive that browsers need to click on your ad.
After all, you’d hate to lose a click to competitors who are already doing this, right?
10. Keywords Everywhere Chrome extension
OK, you caught me. This extension isn’t technically an AdWords extension.
In fact, it’s actually a Chrome extension for AdWords.
But it’s well worth your time to hear about. It’s called Keywords Everywhere.
Here’s how it works.
Once you’ve installed the extension, whenever you type a search into Google and hit enter, you’ll see the average search volume for those exact keywords and the average cost per click for any AdWords campaigns surrounding those keywords.
This is incredibly useful because, often, the most difficult part of choosing which keywords to target with your AdWords budget is determining the volume of the search and the average cost per click.
Keywords Everywhere immediately gives you both of those things.
With it, you can quickly find out which keywords will be most worthy of your time and budget rather than trying and failing to find which keywords are most effective.
Conclusion
Few things in your life are as frustrating as an unpredictable AdWords campaign.
One day, it brings in leads. Another day, it doesn’t.
But mostly, it doesn’t.
Luckily, your problem might require a simple solution:
Adding the right extensions to your advertisements.
In particular, you should consider adding the sitelink, call, app, review, callout, structured snippet, location, offer, and social extensions. Then, for your AdWords research, consider using the Keywords Everywhere Chrome extension.
Though the marketing world is often unpredictable, you don’t have to bow to that flailing campaign.
Instead, control what you can with the right AdWords extensions and drive clicks, leads, and conversions like never before.
Which AdWords extensions do you find the most useful for increasing your click-through rate?
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