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Are Brand CPCs Increasing?

For any advertiser, we know that Brand campaigns are the essential bread and butter of any digital marketing campaign. The reasons for why all agencies should be maxing out of their Brand campaigns are endless (and more likely than not: already so ingrained in each one of our heads already!) One of the greatest pluses of working with Brand campaigns, besides their lowest-funnel/highest performing tactic, is the fact that the average CPC for Brand campaigns are usually the lowest cost per click your client will have to pay across all other campaigns. [This is also due to lots of reasons, being that a client’s Brand campaign should trigger the highest possible quality score (since their brand is exactly who they are).] However, over the past few months reports have shown that Brand CPCs have been steadily (and in some cases: rapidly) increasing. There are a few ways to combat these rising brand cost per clicks. We'll walk you through some sure-fire tactics for optimizing paid search Brand campaigns...

1. Review the keywords, and match types chosen within your Brand campaign. This may seem obvious, and likely, it’s something you’re already doing on an on-going basis during campaign optimizations. However, believe it or not, it’s often an overlooked strategy, specifically when it comes to Brand campaigns. Rethink the different match types – depending on performance and needs.
2. Ensure that [all of] your campaigns are utilizing any and all ad extensions. In 2013, Google officially made ad extensions configure into the ad rank algorithm; and ad extensions have a great tendency to directly affect quality scores, which will then affect click-through rates, and of course, ultimately: your cost per clicks. It’s important that you’re properly utilizing these tools which can easily [not only] promote your ads by offering more real estate on the SERPs, but also by increasing these stats to help your ads perform better.
3. Lower your max CPCs. This tactic should be done cautiously, and with heavy monitoring. Coming from one side, it might make perfect sense: lowering your max CPCs will lead to lower CPCs overall. However, the key is to do this step gradually. Of course, if you lower the bids too far (especially initially), you run the risk of drastically losing the amount of presence, and therefore clicks. However, if you implement this strategy slowly, you might find that Google is factoring in the highest possible CPC in order to beat out the competition – it might not need to be that high.

It’s a very rare occasion that an advertiser wouldn’t want to launch a Brand campaign, as they typically out-perform all other campaigns, and digital marketing strategies in general. Therefore, you’ll want to ensure your best performing campaign(s) remain the best performing, and lowest cost per clicks! Good luck with these best practices for optimizing paid search Brand campaigns!

If you’re looking for someone to assist you with optimizing paid search advertising, or any other digital marketing services, don’t hesitate reaching out to THAT Agency – located in the heart of downtown West Palm Beach, Florida.