Fleishman-Hillard reports that 89 percent of consumers turn to search engines before making a purchase. Paid search ads allow businesses that currently do not rank highly for target keywords to bid for top positions, giving brands first-page visibility and an advantage over competitors.

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What’s the first thing you do when you need to find a product, answer a question or figure out where on earth you’ve seen that actor before? You turn to a search engine, and there’s a good chance that’s where your customers are looking for solutions to their problems, too.

It’s more important than ever for your company to not only be where consumers are looking, but also to have visibility there. Paid search advertising can be one of the best ways to do that, given its ability to target precisely the people looking for what you have to offer.

“Paid search advertising has the ability to dramatically impact the bottom line for businesses because of its ability to target specific consumer audiences in ways that are not possible with traditional marketing,” said Kim Giroux, VP of paid advertising at ZOG Digital. “An optimized paid search advertising strategy has the ability to supplement search engine optimization, increase awareness and drive sales.”

If your business is harder than it should be to find in search, Giroux shared a few tips for making sure your page gets all the visibility it deserves.

1. Study up on keywords. Before you can show up where your customers are looking, you have to know what they’re looking for. That means brushing up on the most popular keywords, but not only those. “Brands should focus on both the most widely used keywords, which are often the most expensive, as well as niche keywords,” Giroux explained. “Marketers should use free tools such as Google Adwords Keyword Tool and Bing Ad Intelligence to find the most effective keywords to bid on.”

2. Take targeting seriously. Paid search targeting isn’t just about keywords, though, it can also help you break down your audience based on other factors. For busy B2B clients, you could target mobile users, or if you have a retail storefront you might aim for local searchers. “Businesses can also set up campaigns that actively change bidding based on these targeting factors, allowing businesses to have more control over their bids,” Giroux suggested.

3. Create specific content. One of the biggest advantages of paid search ads is that they allow you to create specialized content for different target audiences. “Brands should focus on creating not just one ad, but a series of advertisements that appeal to different target consumers,” Giroux recommended.

4. Don’t forget about ad extensions. Search engines make it possible to customize your ads in numerous ways, including links to social media accounts, directions or even aggregate ratings and reviews from other sites. “By utilizing these options, brands can stand out from organic search results and other ads, as well as increase their click-through-rate and return-on-investment,” Giroux said.

5. Measure, adjust, repeat. There are plenty of free tools out there that allow marketers to gauge the effectiveness of paid search ads in real time. This should be a continual process, Giroux said, keeping an eye on key metrics like click-through-rate and conversions to make sure you’re able to tweak keywords, targeting and content to get the most out of them.

This article was originally published on FierceCMO.