So you’re running your business. You’ve put everything into getting it to this point. And now you’re ready to embark on the next step – getting more customers. Everywhere you look people are talking about Google AdWords – Heck, you even got a voucher through the mail…. if you spend $25 Google are going to give you $75!
How can that be a bad deal?
And it’s simple. Google are going to walk you through it… So you open the box.
OK – What do I need? Website – check! Credit card – check! Wow – that’s it!
Five minutes later and your ads are running on the worlds biggest advertising medium. Fantastic!
And this is Google’s biggest advantage – it is readily accessible and offers a level playing field so that small businesses can compete with the “Big Boys” online.
$500 later…..
The ads sent 300 people to the website – but no-one called, no-one bought anything, and, maybe there’s something wrong with the contact form (must check with the web guy).
And this is Google’s biggest disadvantage – out of the box it just doesn’t work.
This is a little like someone walking into the BMW dealership and buying the top of the range X5. But they don’t have a driving license and have never sat behind the wheel of anything. But everyone else is driving around – how hard can it be, seriously? And the guy who sold the car just explained how it works – put your foot on this pedal to go – this one to stop and turn the wheel this way to go right and this way to turn left – there you go – Enjoy!
I’d watch that on YouTube.
Without a minimum of tweaking it’s hard for any AdWords campaign to be successful. As a result many business owners reach the conclusion that it just isn’t for them. It doesn’t work for their business – or in their town, or for their sector, etc…. and Google lose a customer.
As anyone in marketing will attest, customer capture is important, but customer retention is key to success. A model which is destined to alienate a proportion of customers is worrisome.
Some years ago, where the costs per click were counted in pennies this may not have been such an issue – but today, where a click might cost the same as a good lunch it will turn new customers off much more quickly.
If I spend $500 and get 5,000 visitors to my site – I am likely to blame my site. If I spend $500 and get 20 visitors to my site, I
