What is in the Google Ads (Formerly Google AdWords) Suite of Products?

Our team at helps businesses get found online. One of the many tools we use is the Google Ads suite of products. Note that Google Ads was formerly Google AdWords. The types of Google Ad products offered can be used to match the different stages of the buying cycle. We’ve all seen this before, a description of a customer’s journey: attract, convert, close, and delight. There are different types of Ad products that can be used for each of the stages within the cycle.

When someone searches on Google for something, ads will show up in their search results. Search is the quickest way to get onto search engines, as you can pay to be on there. Keywords are the building blocks of ads. When building out keywords, think about the keyword intentions that will address different parts of the marketing funnel. Search is most often thought of as the bottom of the funnel, but if you think about it, people are using different types of keywords in order to answer questions based on where they are in their funnels. So, when building campaigns and different ad groups, factor in keyword intention.

Search is also an excellent way to get ranking fast especially if you’re losing patience with SEO. Pay-per-click can help. If you have no website traffic, pay-per-click is a good option to start with.

Another place to advertise within the Google AdWords network is within the Display Network. There are literally millions of websites where you can place an ad on the Display network. There are different ways to target when you’re placing on these websites:

• Custom affinity: gives the ability to choose certain items that someone might like. For example, someone might be an avid shoe buyer but might be an avid running shoe buyer as well.
• In-market audiences: choose audiences based on people’s search behavior and are in the market for the products and services you are offering.
• Keywords: choose websites with the keywords that you are going after on their site.
• Placements: choose specific websites that you would like to advertise on.
• YouTube channels: choose specific YouTube channels to advertise on.

Once an audience has found you, keep them engaged. Remarketing is when you re-engage with or retarget audiences who have already interacted with your website. When remarketing, audience segmentation becomes important. There are many ways to segment audiences:

• Channel: organic, social paid, social organic, email, through an affiliate
• People who watched a video
• People who’ve been to your website but didn’t convert
• People who have converted so a new product can be shown
• Mobile traffic used to target people near your store
• People who bounced from your website
• Different service lines: target people who’ve seen one service line by showing them a new one.
• Geography
• Pages views, time on site, etc.

Remarketing using audience segmentation allows you to give your audience a different experience than when they arrived the first time. Ideally, your efforts should be moving them through the sales funnel.

Another way to use the AdWords networks is through email lists, considered bottom of the funnel in the sales cycle. Target an existing email list and show up when they search. You can use an email list for display, shopping, and video. So, your email list is available for many different items within the Adwords Network.

RLSA is sometimes a forgotten option in Adwords. With RLSA, you can segment visitors who have previously arrived at your website; build ads and keywords to bid to those particular users; then, convert visitors while they search for your products elsewhere. People who have been to your website before are already familiar with you making. These people are more valuable than people that are getting to your website for the first time.

Here’s an example where RLSA provides a solution. Create a Facebook ad with link clicks. From this ad create a segment of people that arrived at your website but didn’t convert. What do you show them next? You could be remarketing to them a display ad with a graphic that leads them to the next piece of content –  information that moves them along the sales funnel. You could be remarketing them by offering a discount. You could insure when they search for certain terms where you show up by bidding higher.

On the maps section, you typically see an ad in the very first spot. That’s on the maps section.  So, if you’d like to locally bid to be there in the maps section, you would go through the AdWords network. So, as you can see, Google AdWords products are more than just search PPC, there’s a lot that’s offered.

Another type of marketing that is available on AdWords is app or podcasting promotion. Promote an app or a podcast in several ways: through search, the display network, from within other apps, on YouTube channels, and within videos.