Field Guide to Digital Event Marketing: Intro to AdWords and Writing Your First Ad

  • By Amy Mrazek | Monday, April 21st, 2014
Digital event marketing

Now that you’ve seen how Google AdWords can help you maximize your ticket sales, how do you accomplish this?

To get started, there are a few basic concepts you need to learn before you can run your own successful paid search campaign. I’m going to start by covering these concepts in the next two posts, and I hope that I can help you achieve your digital marketing goals for your next event!

Account Structure
It’s time to get familiar with your AdWords account — you’ll be spending a lot of time here if you want to succeed. Your account holds all of your campaigns, ad groups, ads and keywords, along with your settings and reporting tools.

First, it’s important to understand that the way you structure your account can affect performance. Google looks at your structure when it determines what’s known as the Quality Score metric. Quality Score is Google’s algorithm that determines the relevance of your ads to the people searching for them. (We’ll talk about that in more detail in the next post.)

One important way to keep your structure tidy is to maintain your structure as a series of closely associated groupings. These groups should be small enough that your keyword list matches the language in your ads and the page where you’re directing them. Also, a clear structure helps you stay organized and identify your opportunities more quickly.

Choosing Keywords
Google AdWords uses your keywords to ensure your ads are displayed to the right people. The more effective your keywords can pinpoint what potential customers might be searching for, the more clicks you receive. The most effective keywords are between two and three words in length, and they must be closely related to your event, your location or your industry.

A couple of other important things to consider with your keywords:

• Are you using the correct keyword match types (i.e. how specifically they relate to a customer’s search query)?

• Did you specify negative keywords to block out unwanted clicks?

To learn more about keyword standards, you can check out AdWords’ keywords guide.

Writing Your First Ad
AdWords uses your keywords to determine who will see your ads, but it’s your job to write ads that will ultimately compel people to reach your website.

Title: Start by thinking what a customer would search for if she was looking for your event. Even if it doesn’t match exactly, your headline should always be relevant by including their search query or your keyword.

Description lines: Add helpful details that customers can read at a glance, such as the event date or location. Also, be sure to use a clear, strong call to action, like Purchase Tickets or Buy Now. You will be working in a strict character limit, so you’ll need to be as succinct as possible.

Sitelinks: Include text links to other relevant pages on your site. You could include a link to direct customers to the page where you sell merchandise for the event or a page with contact information for the event.

To learn more about ad copy success, visit AdWords’ ad copy guide.

Missed the other posts in the series?

I. Finding New Customers and Helping Them Find You

II. Intro to AdWords and Writing Your First Ad

III. AdWords for Advanced Users

IV. Choosing the Best Keywords for Your Event

V. AdWords on a Budget

VI. Essential AdWords Ad Tips

VII. What Is Event Remarketing?