Welcome to Cultivative’s weekly roundup for all things PPC from around the web—everything you need to know right now about PPC!
At Cultivative, we’re all about making your life easier. We’ve gathered the top PPC news and innovations from around the web and getting it into your hands. Check out what we found this past week.
Improve ad effectiveness with ad customizers
By Akshaya Pragadeeshram, Eugene Goldenshteyn and Parinita Rahi | Jul 10, 2019

Microsoft Advertising is introducing ad customizers to help reduce setup time and improve ad quality. The new ad customizers will let advertisers to create hundreds of different variations of a single ad. Microsoft explains the feature as, “Ad customizers are parameters within the ad copy which get replaced by dynamic text when the ad is displayed for the user. The text values are provided in the feed file and they are selected based on the targeting defined in the feed.” Ads can be set up to change based on targeting options such as location, audience lists, device, search queries, time of day, and others.
20 Things To Do With the Free Time PPC Automation Will Give You
By Pam Neely | Jul 10, 2019

Automation has been a hot topic in PPC for the last couple of years. Now that you’ve integrated automation into your marketing and advertising process, what in the world are you going to do with all of that extra time automation has afforded you? Pam Neely has 20 suggestions that will keep your accounts running at their best, keep your skills up to date, and make your life a little more balanced in the long run.
4 Tips to Write Your Best Google & Facebook Ads Ever
By Conor Bond | Jul 10, 2019

Even if your keyword lists and lookalike audiences are razor-sharp, what stands between your ads and your ideal customer is ad copy. At the end of the day, your ad copy is what will earn a click. For Google Ads, he recommends aligning your messaging with the various stages of the customer journey by writing ads that help them do what they need to do. He also recommends including ‘who’ your ads are meant to apply to in your ad copy in order to trigger only the most interested searchers. For Facebook ads, he stresses the importance of running A/B split tests and to try to blend in with the user experience as much as possible, ie, avoid looking like an ad.
#Ham4PPC: A Tribute to Digital Marketing
By Emma Franks | July 11, 2019

The PPC industry comes with unique and dynamic challenges that continuously keep us on our toes. Emma Franks shares some significant lessons she’s learned over her career and freely gives her advice in this article. She discusses the importance of investing in yourself and education, building rapport with clients, testing, and more.
July Updates to Paid Advertising Platforms
By Melinda Pettijohn | Jul 13, 2019

July has been a busy month for updates to PPC platforms. To catch us up on all the changes, Melinda Pettijohn has compiled a list of resources from Microsoft Advertising, Google Ads, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram. She also describes the impact all of these changes will have on the industry.
15 Must-Have Features for Ecommerce Sites
By Holly Gary | Jul 14, 2019

Are you using the most essential elements for your e-commerce site to your advantage? Holly Gary has 15 features she recommends adding to your site to attract the right customers. They include:
1. User-Friendly
2. Mobile-Friendly Website
3. High-Resolution Photos & Video
4. User-Generated Reviews
5. Special Offers
6. Wish Lists
7. Find-in-Store
8. Related Items
9. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
10. Social Proof
11. Security Features
12. Advanced Payment Options
13. Detailed Shipping Information
14. Multi-Touchpoint Contact Page
15. Return Policy
Paid Search Audience Testing: Zero Cost Testing
By Diane Chelius | Jul 15, 2019

Testing is crucial in PPC for improving user engagement, bring down cost-per-click, generating more leads or revenue. Clients may be hesitant to opt for testing because it can feel like a waste or loss of resource to them. Diane Chelius discusses how to approach your clients with zero cost testing so you can get the data you need while making your clients happy. She covers how to set Observations up, how to collect the data on your audience, and how to apply your insights.
Investigating Google Ads Disapprovals with Policy Manager
By Tim Jensen | Jul 15, 2019

Google Ads has made the process of reviewing disapprovals easier by adding a Policy Manager section to the interface. You can now view all policy issues in one place and take action on them. Disapprovals are par for the course in PPC for a number of reasons, but now it will be easier to address issues quickly. Tim Jensen shows us how to access the Policy Manager and how to apply changes to your account.
Four cool keyword research tools you can use for free now
By Ann Smarty | Jul 15, 2019

Keyword research is a fundamental task in digital marketing. Ann Smarty shares 5 free(mium) new tools you can add to your toolbox and help inspire great keyword research. They are:
1. Rank Tracker: Aggregated keyword suggestions from multiple sources
2. Answer The Public: Google Suggest driven questions and more
3. Text Optimizer: Related concepts and terms
4. Kparser: Clustered keyword suggestions
5. Analyze keyword performance
E-commerce brands: Track spend efficiency with this Google Ads Script
By Wesley Parker | Jul 16, 2019

https://searchengineland.com/e-commerce-brands-track-spend-efficiency-with-this-google-ads-script-319517
Wesly Parker shares a script for e-commerce brands that will track Google ad spend efficiently. The script pulls keywords from your account and their respective ROAS, which you define. The script takes this data and turns it into two charts that allow you first to visualize what percentage of keywords have a specific ROAS and secondly compare week on week to see if your ROAS has improved across your account. Parker covers how to set up and use the script and provides the script for you.
We hope you learned something new you can apply to your PPC business strategy. Let us know in the comments below what you want to start implementing. As always, we are happy to be a resource for your paid advertising needs. If you have any questions, feel free to contact us.