Our First Order of Business: Creating a Campaign. Let’s get started with a dummy campaign. Here are the standard details that you’ll have to enter—just use the settings that I’m suggesting in Column 2.
We’ll pause the advert immediately after creating it. You’ll also get a chance to experiment with the different settings later. It is easier to learn AdWords if you first focus on the structure and not the content.
Campaign field | Your first selection | Notes |
Campaign Type | Search Network only | Uncheck “Display Network” option for now. You’ll usually target only one network at a time, depending on whether you’re eyeing immediate sales or new sale leads. |
Campaign Name | Dating site for farmers | Please, please do not name your campaign “Campaign #1” or “Test Campaign”. It is good hygiene to develop sensible naming conventions and avoid confusion later. You will eventually have more than 10 campaigns. We’ll discuss more naming conventions later. |
Location | Wherever you are | Google fills in a default list of countries based on the information you provided and their clever GPS technology. After all, Google is Big Brother. How wide an area should you target? Bromley, London or the entire Europe? We’ll get into this later. |
Languages | Whatever language your customers use | |
Devices | Desktop and laptop computers | If you’re selling takeaway Chinese food, it might make sense to target customers using mobile phones. However, your website must be mobile-friendly if you choose to go this route! |
Bid Strategy | I’ll manually set my bids for clicks | This option gives you the most control over your ads (and money). We also recommend that you start here as it helps you learn AdWords at a greater level of understanding. |
Budget | £6 per day | Start with a harmless amount and we’ll refine this figure later! A good rule of thumb goes, how much money can you afford to spend without batting an eyelid? £6 is a magical number with Google. If you invest any more than £6, Google’s team of experts will help get you set up at no extra cost. |
Ad Extensions | Ignore for now | We’ll come back to this when you’re an “Intermediate” Adwords user. |
Advanced Settings > Ad Delivery | Rotate: Show ads more evenly | Here, it is best not to stick with Google’s default, which is “Optimize for clicks.” In our circle, we read that option as “Give more money to Google.” After you set up conversion tracking (explained in the further chapters), you may change ad rotation to “Optimize for conversions.” |
Click “Save and Continue”. Now, we’ve built your first Campaign shelving unit.
It’s time to curate books to fill these shelves. On the next page, Google will invite you to write your first ad. How exciting! Don’t worry about crafting the most compelling copy just yet, we’re still creating a dummy campaign.
AdWords field | Your first entry | Quick tips on writing your ad |
Headline | Finding a date for Friday | What problem are you solving? |
Description Line 1 | Browse guys online for free | How can your product help? |
Description Line 2 | 100 profiles of single, handsome men | What can you tell me about your product in 35 characters? |
Display URL | Love.com | What is your website’s name? |
Destination URL/ Landing Page | http://www.love.com/home-page | Where will your customer be directed to if they clicks on the ad? |
Keywords | Single men, handsome men, dating buddies, free dating sites | If someone is searching for your business, what would they type into the Google search bar? If you’re writing an actual ad, you’d have to specify 15-20 keywords! |
Maximum Cost Per Click | 20 pence | How much you’re willing to spend? The higher your bid, the more likely your ad is to appear. Let’s just experiment with a safe bid. We’ll give you our top-secret formula to money-management later. |
Finally, just enter your billing information and click “Finish and Create Ad”.
Not ready to advertise yet? Remember to pause your campaign.
Quick Tip
Don’t worry about getting the details perfect. You can change all of the details, even after the ad goes live. The trick to AdWords is to iterate many, many times. Explore AdWords. It also takes more than a day for you to see results. Rome wasn’t built in a day; AdWords is a marathon not a sprint; and so on. It may take few minutes to set up your account, but it’ll take four to six weeks to develop a full-fledged strategy. Be prepared to commit some money and time to establish this. We’ll dive deeper into this topic in Part 2.
Warning
Don't Get Caught Out!
Although this ad is a dummy ad and will not actually be published on the Internet, check that you do not violate any of Google’s editorial guidelines. Google charges penalties even before your first click!