Google Ads Funnel Strategy: The Recipe for Successful Ads

Google Ads Funnel Strategy: The Recipe for Successful Ads

Google Ads funnel is a powerful PPC strategy to maximise your ROI. It will help extend the reach of your campaigns, attract new prospects for a low cost, and make your conversions much more profitable.

What is a Google Ads funnel?

The Google Ads funnel is a marketing strategy that uses a sequence of various campaigns that guide prospects through the buyer’s journey. It’s intended to attract strangers, generate interest and demand, warm-up prospects to actively begin searching for your products/services and convert them into paying customers with targeted content and offers.

The Google Ads funnel is divided into three main stages:

  • Top of the Funnel (TOFU) – Awareness stage
  • Middle of the Funnel (MOFU) – Consideration stage
  • Bottom of the Funnel (BOFU) – Conversion/Action stage

Sales Funnel - Infographic

Why should you use a Google Ads funnel strategy?

Google Ads continues to be the most effective advertising platform for generating leads and sales. It is ideal for direct response marketing where you want to drive people to take action and convert on your offers.

Google’s core campaign type is the search ads that can help you capture the hottest prospects as they google things related to your products/services. What makes these campaigns so effective is the ability to target users with high buying intent based on the keywords they use.

Google Ads funnel can help connect with more prospects that could be interested in your offerings with upper-funnel campaigns. With a good combination of ad messaging and content, you can introduce your brand to completely new audiences and generate demand.

However, people don’t want to buy from strangers, no matter how good your keyword targeting is or how appealing your offer is.

A Google Ads funnel strategy solves this problem by introducing your brand at multiple touchpoints throughout the buyer’s journey. As a result, when a prospect is ready to act and buy, they are more likely to convert on your offers.

How to create your ideal Google Ads funnel

1) TOFU – Raise awareness and attract cold audiences

tofu

Users to target:

  • Cold audiences who aren’t familiar with your brand yet

The main goal is to get your brand in front of strangers who could become loyal customers.

Cold prospects are unlikely to be looking for your company or products. They might not even be aware that you exist, what you offer or that they even need what you offer.

Make sure your ad messaging and offers are aligned to provide informational and educational content rather than pushing sales or other high-commitment requests.

Concentrate on introducing your brand by educating users about solutions to their problems, emphasising the “life-changing” benefits of your products and/or service.

 

Google Ads campaign types to help you reach a broad audience raising awareness in the TOFU stage are:

  • Display campaigns
  • Discovery ads
  • Video campaigns
  • Search campaigns

 

Target audiences for the TOFU stage based on:

  • Demographics
  • Affinity (interests and habits)
  • Topic targeting
  • Life events
  • Custom Affinity audiences
  • Managed placements

 

Top of the Funnel keyword targeting includes the following:

  • How-to keywords
  • Informational keywords
  • Question oriented keywords
  • Very broad product/service keywords

 

The best bidding strategies for the TOFU stage:

  • Manual CPC
  • Max CPV (i.e. Video campaigns)
  • Max Clicks
  • Max Conversions/Target CPA (for Discovery ads)

 

2) MOFU – Drive consideration with warm audiences

Mofu

Two kinds of users to target:

  • People exposed to your ads in the previous stage (that haven’t converted yet)
  • People that started researching solutions on Google

 

The best performing Google Ads campaign types for the MOFU stage are:

  • Search campaigns
  • Intent-based display and video ads
  • Remarketing 

 

Audiences to use in the MOFU stage of your Google Ads funnel:

  • In-market audiences
  • Custom Intent audience
  • Similar audiences

 

Middle of the Funnel keyword targeting includes the following:

  • General industry keywords 
  • Generic product/service keywords 
  • Product category keywords 
  • Comparison keywords 

 

Some of the highest-performing bid strategies for the MOFU stage are:

  • Max Conversions
  • Enhanced CPC

 

3) BOFU – Generate conversions with hot audiences

Bofu

Two kinds of users to target:

  • Users that previously interacted with your ads or website
  • Users that search for high buying intent keywords on Google

 

The best performing Google Ads campaign types for the BOFU stage are:

  • Search campaigns
  • Remarketing (Video and Display)
  • RLSA ads

 

Audiences to use in the BOFU stage of your Google Ads funnel:

  • Qualify leads who are ready to buy
  • Narrow audience

 

Bottom of the Funnel keyword targeting includes the following:

  • Specific product/service keywords
  • Action keywords
  • Geolocation keywords
  • Branded keywords
  • Competitor keywords

 

Ad copy should have the following:

  • Price
  • Financing options
  • Fast delivery
  • Free shipping
  • Best rates
  • Special deals and discounts
  • Free gift
  • Social proof
  • Sense of urgency

 

Automated bidding strategies for your Bottom of the Funnel PPC campaigns:

  • Target CPA for lead gen
  • Target ROAS for e-commerce

 

Conclusion

Classic approaches for Google Ads funnel strategies focus on closing the sale, but we also need to remember that it is important to nurture new customers.

It all comes down to establishing the proper campaign structure in accordance with your typical customer journey. Choose the best targeting, offers, and bidding strategy to match potential customers and guide them through the conversion process.

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