If you’ve been running Google Ads for your business, you are already familiar with the basics, like the difference between manual vs. automated bidding.
But, as with all things digital marketing, you can always go deeper. There are always more ways to drive more clicks, capture more sales, and boost return on ad spend (ROAS).
Today, we’re looking at three of those ways with an overview of advanced Google Ads bidding strategies, including:
- Enhanced CPC
- Target CPA
- Portfolio bid
All three of these Google Ads bidding strategies are designed to maximize ROI and boost ROAS. Let’s dive in.
Sections
1. Enhanced CPC bid strategy
Fans of manual bidding, meet Enhanced Cost-Per-Click, also known as enhanced CPC or ECPC. This bidding strategy uses your manual bids as a guide, and then raises or lowers them according to the likelihood of a click turning into a conversion. Think of it as manual bidding with a twist.
Here’s how the Enhanced CPC bid strategy works. Each time your ad can appear, ECPC assesses whether that click is going to become a conversion, and then adjusts your bid accordingly — lowering your bid in situations where a conversion is less likely and raising it in situations where a conversion is more likely. The whole goal of Enhanced CPC is to maximize conversions while keeping your CPC steady, or even reducing it.
With Enhanced CPC, you can optimize for either conversion or conversion value depending on the campaign. Optimizing for conversions is available with Search, Display, and Hotel campaigns, while optimizing for conversion value is available only with Search campaigns.
2. Target CPA bid strategy
Target CPA is another bidding strategy for advanced advertisers. It’s an automated bid strategy that maximizes conversions based on a target cost-per-action (CPA). While Enhanced CPC relies on manual bids that you set yourself, Target CPA generates bids on your behalf, with the goal of maximizing ROI.
Part of what makes Target CPA such an effective bid strategy is that it relies on your own conversion tracking data. Using your Google Ads campaign history, Target CPA bidding generates an optimal bid for each auction, based on the likelihood of that click turning into a conversion. If the likelihood is high, it will generate a higher bid. If the likelihood is low, it will generate a lower bid.
Target CPA can help boost ROAS because it’s designed to maximize conversions while staying within your budget. As a result, you can enjoy more sales while paying less for some clicks.
3. Portfolio bid strategy
Formerly known as flexible bid strategies, portfolio bid strategies enable you to group multiple campaigns, ad groups, and keywords together that use the same Smart Bidding strategy. Smart Bidding strategies leverage artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to optimize for conversions, or conversion value, in each auction in real-time — a feature Google calls auction-time bidding. Smart Bidding strategies include:
- Target CPA
- Target ROAS
- Maximize conversions
- Maximize conversion value
- Maximize clicks
- Target impression share
The major benefit of using a portfolio bid strategy to manage your Google Ads campaigns is that you can change your bid setting for multiple campaigns with a single click. With a portfolio bid strategy, you can not only maximize ROI and ROAS, but also your personal productivity and efficiency. Who doesn’t love that?
Boosting ROAS with advanced Google Ads bidding strategies
Which of these advanced bidding strategies deserves a spot in your Google Ads strategy for 2024? Enhanced CPC, Target CPA, and portfolio bids strategies can all be efficient ways to boost ROAS and maximize ROI.
Get personalized advice for your campaigns by contacting the experts at Your Marketing People today.
