The PPC Search Network Campaign Launch Checklist
Even the most diligent PPC managers can let things fall through the cracks. Here are few checklists to use to ensure that your PPC search network campaigns go off without a hitch.
Even the most diligent PPC managers can let things fall through the cracks. Here are few checklists to use to ensure that your PPC search network campaigns go off without a hitch.
Even if you can launch a PPC campaign in your sleep, sometimes, things get overlooked; items slip through the cracks, and months later, you’re scratching your head wondering how a scarf ad landed users on a hat page.
It happens to the best of us. No matter how focused and experienced a PPC manager, there are endless details that go into a streamlined campaign launch.
Organization is a PPC manager’s best friend, and creating repeatable processes through detailed checklists is one way to ensure everything you can think of gets done pre-launch.
In this post, we’ll look at all the key areas of a PPC campaign, and give basic checklists for each part in preparation for making a new campaign go live.
It’s worth mentioning that the checklists in this post apply to PPC search network campaigns that are both being built from the ground up, and those being copied and pasted from existing campaigns, where all the settings are carried through. Even though the copy/paste approach is convenient, appropriate adjustments always need to be tended to, or the campaign can go off path.
First, we’ll start with the keywords. Follow these steps to be sure you’ve tackled common obstacles in this area:
The next thing we want to do is double-check on our ads before they go live. Consider the following checklist:
Now we move onto ad groups. Standard checks and balances on the ad groups side for optimal account structure include:
Reviewing the campaigns is next, and here are some of the things to watch for before launching a new one:
Ad extensions help businesses and prospects get the most from PPC ads. When reviewing your campaigns for launch, make sure you:
The landing page is an important part of your Quality Score. As you’re gearing up for launch, take a moment to review your landing pages, looking for all those items that help ensure the page is relevant, like:
Finally, ensure your tracking is on the up and up, so you can begin measuring performance from the launch of the PPC campaign. Consider the following:
Although we almost always build campaigns in AdWords Editor, often we’ll post a campaign in paused mode, and view again in the live AdWords interface. The different view can sometimes be helpful in catching errors.
Once you have your campaigns up and running, be sure to check out the guide to PPC operations, which gives daily, weekly, quarterly, semi-annual, and annual checklists for your PPC campaigns.
Now that you have my checklist, what’s yours? Anything you’d add that you don’t see here? Let me know in the comments!