When Google is no longer enough? How to market when throwing thousands at AdWords is simply not working?

The year 2000 was important for many reasons. The new millennia, Sydney Olympic games and launch of a little advertising vehicle called Google AdWords with ads running on the right side of the screen. At the time, 350 advertisers were beta-testing the program.

Today, globally, Google serves over 30milllion search ads per day, the Google Display network has millions of properties, including YouTube and Gmail, and Google Shopping Ads are estimated to make up 15% of the total ads placed via Google AdWords.

Google AdWords has been the go-to advertising platform for many companies to reach their potential new clients. And it’s been a successful strategy for many small or medium businesses to compete in their field.

The Self-Serve AdWords campaign set up system has made it more accessible for businesses of any size to run advertising campaigns – some with a higher degree of success than others depending on their understanding of the program. While any business can run campaigns, there is a high level of skill and knowledge that is invested to ensure the campaign is successful, delivering high quality leads through your website within your allocated budget. However, with so many simply throwing money at the platform, it as seemingly become a quick fix for many burgeoning businesses and industries.

As a marketing agency we are constantly confronted with the idea that the most searched words do not actually represent many of the businesses we work with.

The face we want to show to the market is not necessarily what they want to buy. We all want to offer a range of services to our potential customers, but this is not what they are searching. 

The power of lead attribution

The ability to attribute leads to the variety of digital pathways is both very powerful and rewarding. As the complexity of the digital offering is growing, as business owners and marketers it is the information that we can gather that tells the story of success. It is no longer good enough to have people present data, with the comment that says that’s interesting?? Data must yield information. Information must yield activities. Activities must yield results.

If your agency or digital people is just presenting a complicated report with lot of interesting facts. CHANGE agency or find a new digital people. The digital story will provide a pathway of activities and much to the surprise of many the answers may not be all digital. The lesson over the last 10 years of digital transformation is that there has never been a time when an integrated approach to lead generation is needed more.

To rely on Google AdWords alone will yield diminishing results in the absence of a plan and an integrated approach. If you are relying on just one activity to reach your next customer, that sound you hear is the sound of Silence.