New Year, New Google Ad Innovations

Google AdWords is, of course, one of the most useful advertising tools any company has available. And, as 2010 draws to a close, Google is preparing a whole slew of new AdWords Ad Innovations to help businesses reach even more customers, quicker, easier, and more directly than ever before in 2011. With all of Google’s new developments, it’s important to know how to use your AdWords account to its full potential.

Google AdWords Call Metrics adds a unique phone number to your Google-search listing (different than your regular business phone number), and automatically tracks every time this number is called. It helps track your business’ pay-per-click numbers and conversions from searches to actual customer contact. AdWords Call Metrics makes it easier for customers to get in direct contact with your business, without even having to click through to your website.

In the industrial sector this is particularly useful, as there is not as much e-commerce involved in B2B connections, and a phone call is often more likely to be useful to both parties than an e-mail exchange. Adding Call Metrics is a fairly simple process, requiring only a few additional steps.

Another new way to reach your customers is with Google’s Ad Innovations Product Listing Ads. With Product Listing Ads, your company’s products will show up in a Google search with a photo of the product, price, your company name, and a direct link to the product’s page on your site, for quick and easy online purchases.

This makes it easier for customer’s to find exactly what they’re looking for straight from the search page, without the need to navigate through your website. The fewer steps involved in making a purchase, the more likely customers are to make said purchase—easier is always better. And, though I’m not 100% sure on this, the last news I heard was that Google won’t count Product Listing Ads on your pay-per-click count unless the customer actually purchases the item from you.

Google has also created Ad Innovations Ad Sitelinks, which allows Google searchers to click on direct links to more relevant pages within your site, rather than being able to land only on your home page. This also lets customers go directly to the content they’re looking for, rather than navigating through your site.

You can add up to four additional destination URLs, letting you highlight specific information and features of your business/site. Again, easier is better—with the above example, customers who are looking for a quote for insurance are far more likely to continue on to the Nationwide site if they can go straight to what they’re looking for, instead of having to find their way to “Get A Quote” through the rest of the site. According to Google, businesses using Ad Sitelinks have had their clickthrough rates increase by an average of 30%.

Another shiny new development is Google Ad Innovations Seller Rating Extensions. This is the easiest-to-use new innovation of them all, as the Seller Rating Extensions will be automatically attached to your Google AdWords ads. All you need is a minimum of four stars and 30 or more reviews in Google Product Search.

Clicks on your Google Products reviews page are free, so it only counts toward your pay-per-click if someone clicks on the actual headline of your ad. As more and more consumers are becoming concerned with on-line retailers’ customer reviews and overall ratings (and rightfully so), Seller Rating Extensions makes it easy for them to see your customer feedback and ratings. If your business has good reviews and a high rating, you can expect more business from new customers than from a site with no star rating and/or no easy-to-find customer reviews.

Not all of these Google Ad Innovations are fully launched yet, but it’s likely that they will be up and running before too long. There are many more new Ad Innovations in the works as well, so be sure to keep an eye on your AdWords account to take advantage of all the possible marketing tools that are at your disposal. With just a few tweaks to your account, you can make it easier and more efficient to reach your customers, while making it easier and more efficient for your customers to find you and your products.

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