In the fiercely competitive digital insurance marketing space, the secret to making your Google ads stand out isn’t just a hefty budget — it’s through strategic planning and understanding the search engine’s Quality and Optimization Score system.
Let’s dive into how Google measures the quality and optimization of an ad and some strategies you can incorporate into your paid search campaigns.
How Google’s Quality & Optimization Score System Works
Think of Google’s Quality Score as a diagnostic tool that can give you a rough idea of how your ad quality compares with other advertisers.
The score ranks your ad’s keywords on a scale of 1-10—the higher your score means your ad and landing page are more relevant and useful to someone searching for your keyword compared to other similar advertisers.
The score is based on three factors:
- Expected clickthrough rate (CTR): How likely your ad will be clicked.
- Ad relevance: How closely your ad matches a user’s search intent.
- Landing page experience: How relevant and useful your landing page is for people clicking your ad.
Notably, higher quality scores are directly correlated with lower CPCs since Google rewards relevant, user-focused content.
While Google’s Quality Score focuses on individual ad components, the Optimization Score takes a more holistic approach to your entire ad account on a scale from 0 to 100 percent, with a higher score being closer to full realization. This broader perspective also offers recommendations for improvement and can identify how closely your account’s setup aligns with achieving your advertising goals.
By prioritizing both your Quality Score and Optimization Score, you can create high-performing Google Ads campaigns that reach your desired local audience and maximize your return on ad spend.
How to Improve Your Google Ads
Check out our 10 strategies for getting higher-performing Google Ads!
- Adapt to Market Trends: Staying ahead by adapting your campaigns to current market trends and consumer behaviors is essential. Try using Google Trends to refine your keyword strategy and ad content to match the evolving interests of your target audience.
- Expand Your Keyword List: Regularly update and expand your keyword list based on search query reports. Try throwing in some negative keywords to exclude irrelevant traffic and refine your targeting to improve ad relevance and efficiency.
- A/B Test Ads: Continuously test and update your ad creatives. It never hurts to experiment with different headlines, descriptions and calls to action (CTAs) from time to time to see what better resonates with your audience, aiming to increase engagement and CTR.
- Leverage Smart Bidding: Google has smart bidding options, such as Target Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) or Return On Ad Spend (ROAS), to optimize your bids automatically based on the likelihood of conversion. This ultimately can help you reach your goals more efficiently by leveraging Google’s machine-learning capabilities.
- Utilize Audience Targeting and Segmentation: Refine your audience targeting by using segmentation and tailored ad messaging. Consider making personalized ad experiences based on user behavior, interests or demographics to increase ad relevance and performance.
- Optimize for Cross-Device Conversions: Remember, not everybody is searching for you on a desktop. Considering that 50 percent of insurance searches happen on mobile devices, having phone-friendly ads and landing pages is crucial for maximizing engagement and conversions.
- Regularly Review Account Structure: Ensure your account structure is organized and efficient. This includes segmenting your campaigns and ad groups logically, based on product lines or services, to improve manageability and targeting precision.
- Strategically Schedule Your Ads: Adjust your ad scheduling to align with when your target audience is most likely to search for your services. By focusing your ad spend on these peak times, you can improve engagement and efficiency, potentially lowering your CPC by ensuring your ads appear during moments of highest relevance and activity.
- Implement Ad Extensions: Use structured snippet extensions to highlight specific aspects of your products or services. This can provide users with more information directly in the search results, improving ad relevance and performance.
- Use Google Analytics to Improve Your Strategy: Don’t set and forget! Utilize Google Ads’ analytics and reporting tools to monitor your performance. Review data on conversions, CTR and other key metrics to identify areas for improvement and adjust your strategies as needed.
Ready to Take Your Google Ads Even Further?
We get it— there’s a lot that comes with managing your Google Ads on top of all your other obligations as an agent. Thankfully, you don’t have to do it alone when you go with Melon Local!
All these tips we mentioned above? We can do them, along with a few other secret tricks!
Our expertise in quality score optimization and strategic campaign management is designed to ensure your ads not only stand out but also deliver tangible results with lower CPCs and higher ROI. And let’s not forget to mention we’ve consistently maintained a 30 percent average conversion rate on our ads!
Ready to grow? Schedule your demo today!