Why do we need a PPC competitor analysis?

Why do we need a PPC competitor analysis?

Paid search advertising is one of the most efficient and quick forms of marketing for those who prefer instant growth results. With PPC marketing being a top priority for many, it is important to run detailed competitive research to get the ball rolling in your court. This blog will guide you with all the 5 W’s (What, Where, When, Why, and Who) of PPC competitive marketing.

Pay-per-click (PPC) is an essential digital marketing resource for businesses to boost brand awareness and generate efficient leads that have higher chances of conversion. With PPC marketing being a top priority for many, it is important to run detailed competitive research to get the ball rolling in your court.

Paid search advertising is proven to be one of the most efficient and quick forms of marketing for those who prefer instant growth results. Around 74 percent of marketers believe that PPC is a great driver for their business. Here, marketers only pay for the clicks they receive through Google ads.

One can never doubt the expansion and efficiency of paid search as it helps businesses generate faster and more measurable results with more qualified leads. PPC online marketing is one of the most budget-friendly options to enhance a brand’s presence in the digital world. According to research, more than 80 percent of the internet audience is captured through Google paid ads.

The PPC marketing story runs between the more the value, the higher its competition. So, are you doing a complete PPC competitor analysis? Are you monitoring your competitor’s impacts on your paid ads? Do you know your impression share? Well, if these questions make you feel uncertain, don’t worry! This blog will guide you with all the 5 W’s (What, Where, When, Why, and Who) of PPC competitive marketing.

Who are your competitors?

Before creating strategies for competitor research, it is essential to first identify your competitors. There is always a difference between offline and online competitors, and even if you are a well-grown company, always pay attention to the continuously changing competitive market. As you identify competitors, next is to learn about the keywords you are bidding on. You should be able to compare your Google ad insights with that of your competitors by analyzing the impression share, overlap rate, position above rate, top-of-page rate, and outranking share.

What kind of competitors are they?

All competitors are not equal. Each has its own strengths and weaknesses. However, for a detailed PPC analysis, it is essential to know the ins and outs of your competitors and make your strategy accordingly. Some of the common competitor types are – Affiliates, resellers, online travel agency sites, comparison shopping engines, partners who promote your brand’s services and products, search arbitragers, etc. To get a full-fledged overview of your competitor’s actions, research the keywords your competitors are bidding on and track weekly impression fluctuations.

Where are they competing with you?

Tracking every minutest impression can be tiring and monotonous. To the task more efficient, make use of the relevant tools to bifurcate your focus points. Label the top-performing keywords and constantly monitor their changes. Set up automated search impression reports and alerts for your top-performing campaigns and keywords.

Why are they competing?

Competitors often try to show their ads on your keywords and gain leads through it. Beating them with just bidding is not enough, reviewing your competitor’s strategy on SERP and developing an action plan of your learnings is important. Take the help of multiple tools to review your competitor’s strategies for messages and ad copies on a regular basis. It will help you identify the need for such chases and the ways to tackle them.

When to take action?

Instead of just spending every minute reviewing your competitor’s activities, focus on driving results for your own account. Efficient PPC marketing analysis requires a balance between researching your competitor’s actions and the ways to steer your ship when competitors try to rock your boat.

Key features in PPC competitor analysis tools

Whenever looking for the best full-fledged PPC competitor analysis tools, search for the ones that offer maximum metrics. Below is a list of six common metrics that your preferred tool should offer.

• Keyword insights – It helps you explore the most popular, least preferred, current, and past valuable keywords used by your competitors. You also get to know about unique and overlapping keywords and other PPC opportunities your competitors are missing out on.
• Ad copy insights – It allows you to track the changes in ad copies, whether in past or current ones. Hence, providing the accurate past and present data used by your competitors.
• Ad group insights – Before creating your business ad account, it is important to have a keen look at your competitors’ ad accounts to avoid starting from scratch.
• Context and guidance – Having proper context and guidance during the competitor’s digital analysis helps you deal efficiently with more extensive data.
• Landing page insights – Landing pages are at the core of any paid search campaign. Once a lead comes to the landing page, its creative design and user interface decide whether the lead will convert or not.
• Clear user interface – It is important to have a tool that offers easy to understand interface and provides data that is intuitive, organized, and easy to navigate.

Top PPC competitor analysis tools

Our PPC experts at SkyTrust, have listed the top PPC competitor analysis tools that every digital marketing agency should use.

• Ahrefs – It is one of the best tools for keyword research and backlink. Its paid search option allows exploring PPC keywords, top-ranking ads, top-ranking landing pages, and ad history.
• SpyFu – This is one of the widely used tools for developing robust marketing strategies. Its key feature, ‘Google ads advisor,’ gives information about the most profitable keywords based on the data extracted from competitors.
• SEMRush – It is a comprehensive digital marketing tool used widely in PPC advertising analysis. Its ‘advertising research’ feature lets you examine the ad copies, ad history, and position changes of your competitors.
• Search Monitor – It helps you track ads across multiple locations and devices. Its two primary services include – Brand protection and competitive insights.
• Buzzsumo – It helps you enter any competitor’s domain and analyze their content. You can discover their shared content, filtered content, and networks driving the maximum traffic and exportable list of sharers.