Inside Google Ads podcast: Episode 80 - Setting Expectations

I spend every week telling you how to get better results for your business with Google Ads. But there's a really important thing that we haven't discussed before.

What types of businesses should not run Google Ads?

Many of you have asked me this question, so today we're getting to the answer.

I'm your host, Jyll Saskin Gales. I spent six years working for big brands at Google, and now I work for you. 

This is Inside Google Ads, Episode 80: Setting Expectations.

Our first question today came worded slightly differently from two different people.

Harrison Jack Hepp asked on LinkedIn, how do you determine if Google Ads is right for a business? For example, determining a budget, whether margins make sense, can you track accurately enough, is there enough search volume, et cetera.

And Jason King on LinkedIn asked, when would you recommend someone shouldn't use Google Ads?

So who should run Google Ads and who shouldn't?

Well, I always say that ads should follow organic. You should prove out the core thesis of your business before running ads. 

What do I mean by that? You need to figure out what is it that you're offering - the product or service, the thing people can buy. How are you communicating that? And who are you communicating it to?

What that comes down to is your offer, your website, your messaging and your audience.

If you do not have any of those things figured out, then you can use ads to do that, but it's going to get pretty expensive, and it's unlikely the ads will work. So that's why I say you should try to prove those things through organic, whether that's SEO, appearing on podcasts, social media marketing, PR, et cetera. Then, once you've driven a lot of traffic and figured out what are the ways you should and shouldn't be talking about your product, who's the right kind of customer and the wrong kind of customer, what's the best way to position your offer, et cetera, then once your business is going, ads are amazing fuel on that fire.

If you're someone who likes a more prescriptive rule, then here's my rule of two. If your conversion rate times your average order value does not equal at least $2, you are probably not ready to run ads. 

Why is that? Well, your conversion rate means of all the people who visit your website, how many do the thing you want them to do? So if 100 people visit your website, 2 of them make a purchase, that's a 2% conversion rate. Your average order value tells us: of the people who do the thing you want them to do, how much money do you make? So perhaps your average order value is $100. In this example, 2% times $100 equals $2, and we call that your revenue per session because, on average, every time someone visits your website, given a 2% conversion rate, and given a $100 average order value, you make $2 - on average. 

I use $2 for my rule of two because it's very unlikely in this day and age to get a CPC from Google Ads that's below $2. You're more likely to be $5, $7, $10, and even more depending on your industry. But if you have at least a $2 revenue per session, then you have a much better shot of ads working for you. 

Let's say you have a 2% conversion rate, but your average order value is only $20, ads are not going to be profitable for you. And let's say you have, I don't know, $1,000 average order value, but a 0.01% conversion rate, ads are probably not going to work for you. 

So conversion rate times average order value, at least $2, and that suggests that you're at least on your way to figuring out that offer, website, messaging and audience. If you don't have that figured out, if you're not at least $2, please don't spend the money on ads. Invest in organic marketing instead.

If you're enjoying this episode so far, please give us a thumbs up or a five star rating wherever you're watching or listening. 

Our next question comes from keep it real on TikTok in response to a video where I shared that Broad Match is end game. They said, “Love this, but unfortunately my clients don't think it works. I tried explaining to them that this is the best way, but they always say, I am not going to pay Google to learn. They should already know.”

I've been quoting this so much ever since I saw this comment, keep it real. “I'm not going to pay Google to learn.” I love that and here's why your client's wrong.

Google knows a lot, but the key thing that Google doesn't know until you start advertising is your business.

• Google doesn't know how your website converts or doesn't convert

• Google doesn't know which queries work well for you and which don't.

• Google doesn't know which of your headlines are going to have a higher click-through rate.

• Google doesn't know what audience segments are going to resonate with your messaging. 

Google knows how to determine all of those things once you start advertising, but it needs to learn from your data in order to drive good results for you.

You know I love a good analogy, so here's one for you: Google Ads is like a car. It's got four-wheel drive and comfy seats and a good engine. I'm not a car enthusiast, but it can get you from point A to point B swiftly in style.

The thing is, when you sit down in your car, it doesn't just magically take you to your destination. You need to turn on the car. You need to put your foot on the pedal. You need to turn the steering wheel. You need to know where you're actually going.

Expecting Google to just know your business and know what to do is like sitting down in your car and expecting it to just take you to your destination. It's such a silly idea! You have to give the system what it needs - gas, steering, directions - in order for it to give you what you need, which is safe arrival at your destination.

Now, if you're having trouble giving Google those directions or it feels like Google's not listening, you can book a call with me. You'll see why I have 50 five-star reviews on my Google Business profile from happy customers and clients just like you. You can learn more on my website, jyll.ca. That's J-Y-L-L dot C-A to book a call with me.

Our final question today comes from Showbizfishing on YouTube in response to my answer to a previous Insider Challenge. They said, “I liked your ending. It's so hard to explain to clients that part of your decision-making process is based on experience-based vibes. Media buying and paid ads is truly an art form. “

It really is. I've done more than 500 Google Ads coaching calls in addition to more than a 100 marketing coaching calls since starting my business four years ago, so I'm at the point now where I can look at a Google Ads account and within a few minutes, have a pretty good idea of what I'll find once we pop the hood and look at the search terms, the ad copy, et cetera. 

People ask me a lot, how do you become an expert in Google Ads? How do you know so much about Google Ads? And my friends, let me tell you a little secret. It is not because I worked at Google. Google does not teach its employees how to run Google Ads. That's why I have so many of them in my Inside Google Ads course.

I became an expert in Google Ads by getting my hands dirty in a ton of different Google Ads accounts. I worked with more than 10,000 different ad accounts in the time I worked at Google, and thousands more since leaving. I became an expert by asking a lot of questions of other people in the industry and of my clients, who know their businesses best. I became an expert by being resourceful in figuring out how to solve problems and figuring out how to find answers to the questions I had.

I became an expert by staying humble. Even as a top expert in the world, I will still get on calls sometimes where initially I don't know what the heck is going on. So, I figure it out. Or I will see something that just doesn't seem possible, like a PMax campaign with $0.01 CPCs that's driving good results, a Search campaign with 10 out of 10 quality score on all non-brand keywords, or a small business owner running a Search campaign with Broad Match and Search Partners and hundreds of keywords and no negatives and literally everything that should be wrong yet…it's driving good results. Not great results, that's why they booked a call with me, but surprisingly good results.

Here's the thing: paid ads is an art as much as it is a science, which is why all of these AI advances don't faze me. I welcome them. I focus on the fundamentals with my clients: offer, audience, landing page, and creative. And I stay humble because as much as I know about Google Ads, I know that there's still so much more I can learn. And that's thrilling!

On that note, today's Insider Challenge is this. Let's say that you, like me, started working with a client like the small business owner I just mentioned who has a $20 a day Search campaign set up completely, for lack of a better word, wrong. You know, hundreds of Broad Match keywords, Search Partners turned on, no negatives, no assets, mediocre ad text, but to their credit, conversions are set up correctly and using Max Conversions bidding. So you know what? Performance is pretty good. Would you leave the current setup or would you change it up?

The beauty of the Insider Challenge is there's no right or wrong answer, just an opportunity to stretch your brain on real life Google Ads problem solving. 

The last Insider Challenge was Episode 74, because we've had a series of special in-depth episodes. Let's say you're running a Google shopping campaign and it's not working well. It is not meeting your goals. What are three things you'd want to look into for potential optimization?

If my campaign is hitting its goals, as determined by its bid strategy, and in turn hitting my business goals, then I'm not worried. So if my target CPA is $50, let's say, and the campaign is achieving that, and those are either true purchases or its leads, but the leads are quality, then I'd let it be. The automation is automation-ing. It's doing what it's supposed to do.

If I'm not hitting my goals, then I would try to figure out why are so many of my search terms not visible? How are the other search terms performing versus the visible search terms, and what does that tell me about what I might need to do? 

Negative keywords could potentially be helpful here, but more likely if a ton of the spend is going towards “other” and it's not performing well, there's likely a more fundamental issue with the conversion tracking, or a disconnect between my ads and my landing page contributing to a low conversion rate, or maybe just the landing page itself or the offer needs work. Something is going wrong, which is why the campaign is not getting the data it needs to drive me towards the searches that are going to perform well.

Remember to always look for the root cause of an issue rather than just slapping band-aids on top.

Do you agree? Disagree? 

I'm Jyll Saskin Gales and I'll see you next time Inside Google Ads.