Google Ads and PPC Agency in Harrogate

PPC can be seen as a “quick win” channel compared to SEO, but it still takes time to build and refine an approach. Google Ads aren’t suited for everyone but can be extremely valuable to many organisations, as we’ve experienced with our own PPC clients. There are several different campaign types you can utilise, so whether you’re looking to simply increase levels of brand awareness, or would like more sales leads in your pipeline, Google Ads can be an effective channel for attaining your objectives. As a very data-driven marketing approach, it’s also one of the best for measuring direct ROI.

When undertaking Google Ads or any PPC management in general, you’ll need two budgets – one for ad spend, and one for PPC agency fees. Fees should generally be lower than your ad spend, but they do vary depending on factors such as the scale and the number of the campaigns required. In general, the higher the monthly ad spend, the more you can expect to pay per month for an agency managing your Google Ads.

There’s not necessarily a minimum spend, but you do need enough budget to generate clicks, conversions, and collate data from your campaigns. Ad budget isn’t the only factor in success – we have Harrogate clients spending less than £1k per month, and clients spending upwards of £10k per month, with both seeing conversions – but it plays a big part.

It doesn’t have to be! One key benefit of Google Ads is control over your spending – if you have a monthly budget you don’t want to exceed, Google has tools in place to ensure you don’t overspend. Cost per clicks do vary by industry, ranging from pennies to pounds, but feel free to get in touch with to find out how much you could expect to pay for your organisation. We’ll gladly run some PPC forecasts for you!

The honest answer is, it depends! Every organisation is different, and one that benefits well from Google Ads may not reap the same rewards from SEO. The two do go hand in hand really well, of course – ranking number one organically and number one for paid results provides more prominence for your brand and increases the likelihood of acquiring clicks from your target audience. Plus, Google Ads data can help provide more data-driven decision-making for your organic efforts. At the end of the day, they’re different approaches with different outcomes. Used together, they can be incredibly powerful!

You can, but we don’t necessarily recommend this approach unless you have an good understanding of how the Google Ads platform works. PPC can be risky – one small setting can have a detrimental impact on your Ads. It is possible to overspend, and to direct budget at the wrong locations or keywords. Set the wrong parameters and leave it running over the weekend, and thousands could get spent on clicks that aren’t even relevant. It’s rare, but it happens! So be careful, and don’t’ be afraid to ask questions. As well as PPC management, we also provide training and consultancy services to set you on the right path.

We believe that we’re unique in Harrogate – and indeed in the rest of the UK – in being a truly full service digital marketing agency with the broadest experience, while still being a small, approachable studio. We don’t outsource any aspect of what we do, and are recognised as specialists in both digital marketing and web development – our approach to PPC is informed not only by the ads themselves, but also by the technical underpinnings and on-site content that set a website up to convert.

We’ve worked with everyone from small local start-ups to UK cultural institutions, and international Blue Chips, across both B2B and B2C markets. All of this while remaining a team of less than 20, many of whom have been with us for years – we’re a team you can really get to know and work closely with. Or, at least, we like to think so!

Success is dependent on your key performance indicators. For most businesses in Harrogate, it’s website conversions, be it completed forms, purchases, donations, calls or emails. Using an analytical approach, you should be setting up and optimising PPC campaigns based on the data it outputs. If you’re a plumbing business in Harrogate, and notice that the keyword “plumbers near me” is performing poorly, troubleshoot it until you find out why! Is this keyword driving the correct intent, and are your ads aligned to your user’s search? If they are, are your users finding it easy to navigate your website and book an appointment? It’s highly likely that one of these 3 reasons is impacting a low conversion rate.

Local Service Ads (LSAs) are ads that appear at the very top of Google’s Search Engine Results Page (SERP), similar to Search Ads, however these Ads are focussed specifically on location based searches. If you are a business that operates locally in and around the Harrogate area, Local Service Ads could be a really cost-effective lead generation tool to increase calls and messages to your business. Check out our recent blog on Local Service Ads and view a list of Local Service Ads Categories currently available to see if you could be eligible.

Keyword research is required if you plan on launching a PPC search campaign. Keywords are critical, as these are the engine to which search users you’re going to be driving to your website. Therefore, you should only be adding keywords to your account that are highly relevant to your products or services. If you’re a plumber business in Harrogate, you’re conversion rate would be much stronger on keywords such as “plumbing services near me” or “plumbers in Harrogate, rather than users searching “how to fix a leaking kitchen sink”, as these users are not looking for a service, but DYI instructions.

Go after the search keywords your product or service provides. As you’re paying for the clicks, you’ll want to make sure any PPC traffic is extremely relevant to your business. If you’re a plumber in Harrogate, go after service-based terms, like “plumber services Harrogate”. You’ll know that these users are exactly who you want your ads to appear for.

If you had some budget to spare, this is where you could consider broadening your search keywords, going after users more top-of-funnel. For example, targeting users searching “plumbing help” or “kitchen sink leaking”. Remember, though, with these terms, you’ll want to set the PPC targeting location to Harrogate, so you don’t appear to users outside of your business location.

The strategy allows you to start off by adding in keywords that are really relevant to your services, then where budget permits, broadening your search results, allowing you to save spend.

If you had some budget to spare, this is where you could consider broadening your search keywords, going after users more top-of-funnel. For example, targeting users searching “plumbing help” or “kitchen sink leaking”. Remember, though, with these terms, you’ll want to set the PPC targeting location to Harrogate, so you don’t appear to users outside of your business location.

The strategy allows you to start off by adding in keywords that are really relevant to your services, then where budget permits, broadening your search results, allowing you to save spend.

Well, from the first day of going live! It all depends on your campaign structure. If you’ve added keywords to your PPC account that will drive relevant traffic, with incentivised ad copy which will drive a high click-through rate and a website that has easy-to-complete conversion actions, you’re on for a winning formula. However, when launching an account, this is rarely the case. You’ll often find that your keywords are driving search queries with incorrect intent, or users simply aren’t far enough down the marketing funnel to complete a conversion on their first visit to a website. For consistent conversion success, the best tool is smart bidding since it can take the guesswork out of whereabouts in the marketing funnel a user is; only appearing to those it feels will convert. However, to use smart bidding, you’ll need at least 15 conversions per 30 days, per campaign, to see effective results.

The best way to track and measure your campaign performance is through correct conversion tracking set-ups, typically through Google Tag Manager or GA4. Creating goals or events that fire, when a user completes a key conversion on your website, allows you as an advertiser to see which campaigns, ad groups, keywords and search queries are driving high performance and vice versa. You can report on this performance with Google’s Looker Studio, which allows you to connect datasets into a reporting format. You can schedule these reports to pull each month into a PDF file, making it convenient to share around within your business.

Regular campaign optimisation is critical to PPC success. Often, marketers make the mistake of creating a new PPC campaign and then simply leaving the campaigns to run as they wish. However, you should be frequently checking your conversion tracking, search queries, keyword performance and bid strategies every 30 days at a minimum. Keywords can often pick up irrelevant search queries. If you were a plumbing business in Harrogate and targeted the keyword “plumbing near me”, you might find that users searching for ‘plumbing apprenticeships” or ‘plumbing jobs’ may trigger your ads. These users are not after plumbing services or appointments. A key optimisation here would be to add negative keywords that are causing your ads to trigger search queries with incorrect intent. This helps save your ad spend and improves a user’s experience since they’re more likely to find a webpage that meets their needs.

Yes, the SERP (Search Engine Results Pages) can now be so crowded with various results that mobile users often have to scroll multiple times before even reaching the first organic search listing. This makes it even more important for your website to stand out prominently on the first page of Google, as this will significantly increase the chances of attracting clicks.

For example, here at Splitpixel, we rank well organically for terms like ‘Google Ads agency Harrogate.’ However, because Google Search Ads appear above organic listings, we also want to have a strong presence in the paid listings. Without this, even if we rank first organically, a highly relevant user searching for Google Ads support in Harrogate might end up clicking on a competitor’s paid ad instead – a missed opportunity!