As PPC marketers we thrive on the users choice of search query, on search engines such as Google. A user will spend the majority of time searching for whatever they are looking for on the SERP, and this is where we can gain traffic via paid ads. As soon as a user leaves the SERP, in terms of traditional ads, we’ve lost them to the wilderness that is the internet. This is where the Google Display Network comes in. Boasting a pool of over 2 million placements, providing PPC marketers with a wealth of opportunity and increased chances of engagement.
The Display Network can aid the PPC marketer by remarketing to a user across the internet, along with outbound display campaigns, which outwardly target users using a selection of targeting methods.
One of the key strategies to running a successful outbound Google Display Network campaign is to be restrictive in your targeting, and to target YOUR audience. There are a number of targeting methods to restrict the targeting of your campaigns for example categories, demographics and others such as the ones below.
A useful tip that had been commonplace among PPC marketers was to restrict mobile app traffic, after many people felt the bite of Flappy Birds depleting their budget at an alarming rate, this was discussed by Cassie Oumedian in a 2014 blog post. The blog post highlighted a work around to restrict traffic of this sort. The method was to add this nifty placement exclusion: adsenseformobileapps.com. Budget allocation rejoice!
I would however argue that this commonplace Google Display Network technique is outdated. Of the 2 million+ placements on the Display Network, 300,000 of these are mobile apps, and with a large number of mobile websites redirecting users to the mobile app experience, for example Ebay and Gumtree, it could be argued that this placement exclusion needs to be removed, to fully capitalise on these users.
With the increase in companies creating apps and preferring users to use these rather than mobile sites, there is an increasing pool of apps to gain real estate on. We’ve seen great results by allowing advertising on these apps, driving high quality leads as well as high ROI sales. The fear of being bitten by the dreaded mobile games budget depleter can also be avoided by adding In-game as an exclusion within Site Category options.
Mobile is becoming the focal point for digital marketing, with Google announcing new plans, such as Mobile-first indexing. With more people using mobiles rather than desktop to search on Google, it’s becoming increasingly more important to apply this fast moving trend into our marketing strategies.
Do you add adsenseformobileapps.com as a placement exclusion? Have you seen good results on mobile apps? Let us know in the comments below.
