9 PPC Tips: Creating Keywords

Creating PPC keywords can seem daunting at first. But don’t worry. We have some PPC tips for achieving a keyword list that achieves clicks and conversions. Plus, there are a lot of keyword tools out there that can help you create a comprehensive selection of keywords.

1. Do Your Research - There are too many great ways to do keyword research to not do your research. We’ve already mentioned Trada’s favorite keyword tools that are an excellent jumping off point. Dig into your Google Analytics to see what is already bringing in the traffic.
2. Keep SEO and PPC in Sync – Always be refining both your SEO and PPC campaigns and keeping them in sync. For instance, we know PPC Tips converts really well for our campaign in the Trada Marketplace that advertises for Trada itself. So as you can see, we’re developing a series of blog posts around PPC Tips because we know our current and potential customers are always looking to improve their paid search campaign. If you rank high in both SEO and PPC, your clickthrough rate goes up significantly. Check to see what keywords are converting both organically and through paid search.
3. Easy There On The Keyword Generators – As we mentioned earlier, keyword generators can be incredibly helpful. But common sense still applies when using keyword tools, so vet every suggested keyword. We have more PPC tips on how to use keywords from keyword generators.
4. Love Long-Tail Keywords - Long-tail keywords (keywords with three or more words) occur when searchers are looking for really targeted terms. Such as “blue sneakers with yellow laces” is a long-tail keyword. Long-tail keywords have less volume, so they’re cheaper to bid upon and convert better because they’re more targeted. While time consuming to generate number long-tail keywords they are immensely valuable to advertisers.
5. Create Keywords for Different Positions in the Buying Cycle - An oft-neglected PPC keyword tip is that depending on where people are in the buying cycle, they’ll be searching for different terms and your keyword list should reflect that. It’s important to target buyers by stage.
6. Protect Your Brand – Is your company name trademarked? Then don’t let your competitors do pay-per-click ads when searching for company name or products. File a complaint because trademarked names are protected by Google, Yahoo and Bing.
7. If You Love Broad Match, Learn to Love Negative Keywords – Google has a variety of different ways you can modify your keywords. These methods are referred to as exact match, phrase match and broad match. If you modify your keywords with broad match, it will search for not only your keywords but synonyms, plurals and misspellings. Amazing, right? Not always because broad match can bring a lot of untargeted keywords. This is where negative keywords can be incredibly handy. When you input negative keywords, it means your ads WON’T come up when people use those search terms.
8. Take a Peek at Your Competitors – Don’t worry, it’s not underhanded but rather an essential part of paid search.
9. Keep Your Keywords Tidy – Like every part of PPC, don’t set and forget. Constantly be refining the keywords in your ad groups. Create ad groups for the best performing keywords. Turn keywords that only generate clicks but never conversions into negative keywords.