The Essentials of PPC for B2B Lead Generation

Using paid advertising for B2B lead generation is a process that goes beyond assigning a budget and bidding on keywords.

The first step for implementing a successful PPC (Pay Per Click) campaign relies on having a full comprehension of your target audience and of how the market works in today’s digital world.

Where do your leads come from?

According to Quick Sprout, 54% of B2B companies reported that Paid Advertising successfully generates leads for their businesses. Therefore, PPC warranties you an increase in your lead volume.

Let’s dig into Google Analytics

When running a PPC campaign, Google Analytics is a helpful tool that allows the generation of a custom URL to track your campaign’s performance. Fill the URL Builder with the following information:

• Website URL.
• Campaign source.
• Campaign medium.
• Campaign name, for the keyword analysis of a specific item or campaign.
• Campaign term, to identify your paid keywords.
• Campaign content, a field used to differentiate the ads that will derive in the same URL.

Once the system collects the data, it will generate a personalized URL that will function as a “digital badge” so that you can know exactly how your ads are performing through different websites. This is very important for your B2B lead generation for two reasons:

• You acknowledge what publishers you want to focus on. That is the websites where your ads generated more B2B leads.
• Lets you know the most profitable keywords. If you are wasting money on keywords that are driving little traffic to your digital media, check the keyword performance on a regular basis, so that you know what terms you should be bidding on to get the expected outcome.

1. Audience segmentation: a key factor for your B2B plan

Once you defined the keywords that best apply for your business, product or service, then you can leverage each one of them by segmenting your audience for best performance.

Let’s say you sell big capacity air conditioning equipment to different types of industries. You decided to execute a PPC campaign to reach two target audiences: public buildings and service industries. The results you got where from average to good.

But if you want to run a top-notch campaign, you need to go further. You will have to segment your audience in five specific groups instead of two general audiences. This way you will reach high schools, fitness centers, beauty salons, hospitals, and government offices.

Since all these groups represent a very profitable type of audience, you can run your PPC campaigns throughout the year knowing that you will get the best out of your budget.

Since you research your audience before running your campaign, you can expect a considerable ROI increase and a better performance in general. Basically, this means that you will get a bigger revenue for every dollar spent on your campaigns.

2. A proper Ad scheduling: the next big step

The exact time of the day in which your ads are shown to the audience does count. More than you know and that is why you must schedule your PPC ads according to the performance you expect.

Google Ads includes a time scheduling feature to get this job done. If you have run a successful PPC campaign before, schedule your ads according to your best previous results. In case you have not, consider the following recommendations:

• Ads should be displayed during business hours. Any successful B2B company knows that client support is crucial in the lead recruiting process. Therefore, you want your ads to be displayed when someone will be able to handle the leads. This is crucial to increase your conversion rate.
• Think about your audience. If you have already segmented it as explained before, a 24/7 campaign will work with part of your audience while the rest needs to see your advertising only from 8am to 6pm. Research your target audience to know exactly how you should schedule your PPC campaigns to get great results.

3. Choose your keywords carefully

This is one of the crucial about PPC for B2B lead generation. Choosing keywords for a campaign will make the difference between wasting money and getting qualified leads. Keep in mind a basic Google rule:

Choose terms with an exact match. If you offer Digital Marketing services, bid on keywords that will be 100% relevant to the user’s intent, like “Email Marketing AI software”, “Content Marketing for a better ROI”, “Augmented Reality Video Marketing” and so on.

All these examples are very specific and targeted to users looking for information in a pinch. So, make a list of the most useful and relevant keywords before investing. This will prevent you from bidding on useless keywords that have nothing to do with your business or will attract the wrong audience.

4. Build impressive landing pages

Each time you get a click, the user must be redirected to a visually engaging, personalized landing page with all the information they need to become one of your customers. Do not overdo it, remember that the main goal is to be useful, attractive and factual.

As a rule, never include misleading information just to make it fuller. The key is to offer brief and relevant content with a colorful Call to Action button to improve your conversion chances.

Think big when designing your ad copy

Include the elements to reach the most important leads in your ad copy. For example, if you are targeting companies that can spend a substantial budget on your AI-based payroll management software, then create a line like “The key strategy that will take care of your 10k-plus employees right away”.

A PPC B2B lead generation process requires a lot of research and detailed work. As soon as you become aware of who is your target audience and their needs, you will be able to implement an adequate PPC plan.