Google PPC – Can I “DIY” it?

Google PPC is the first choice for advertising of millions of businesses worldwide. And millions of marketers and marketing agencies offer PPC services. But do you have to use external services or can you Do It Yourself with PPC?

Here, we consider whether you can run your own PPC campaign and whether you should.

Can I Run My Own PPC Campaigns?

The answer is simple – yes, you can. And many businesses do. PPC advertising is available to everyone. It’s not exclusive to marketers, marketing agencies and experts. Anyone can set up a Google Ads PPC account and start running their own campaigns. And there are certainly a few potential benefits to that.

Advantages Of Running Your Own PPC Campaigns

• Familiarity and Commitment – No-one has a bigger commitment to seeing your business succeed than you do. And no-one is willing to work harder to make that happen. If you run your own PPC campaigns, you will probably put a great deal of time and effort into them. In addition, no-one is more familiar with the ins and outs of your business and exactly what you want to achieve. With a self-run PPC campaign, you can aim straight for your goal without explaining all that to someone else.
• Flexibility and Immediacy – If you run your own campaigns you are in completely in control. At any time of day or night. You don’t need to discuss them with anyone before they are put into action and if you feel the need to tweak them at 3am on a bank holiday you can. There’s no contract and no ongoing commitment. You can make changes immediately and start and stop campaigns whenever you decide to.
• Cost Minimisation – By running your own PPC advertising campaigns instead of using external help, you reduce your advertising spend. You are not paying agency fees on top of the direct PPC costs, so you get the same PPC campaign at a lower cost to you. In theory at least.

That all sounds pretty attractive, doesn’t it? But, on that basis, why do PPC experts even exist? Why are there PPC agencies, and why do businesses pay to use their services rather than run their own campaigns?

Advantages Of Using A Google PPC Marketing Agency

• Working Smarter vs. Harder – Almost everyone, at some point, has spent time, effort and frustration trying in vain to make something work, be it a spreadsheet, a car engine or a home improvement project. Only to eventually consult an expert who says “If I just do this…” and fixes the problem in a fraction of the time already spent. So maddening, and yet a simple fact of life; knowledge and experience counts. By using the services of a PPC expert, you can have your PPC campaign set up more effectively and more swiftly, saving you time, effort and potentially, a lot of frustration.

• Efficient Use Of Your PPC Budget – A mismanaged PPC campaign can be costly and timewasting, generating expensive clicks, clicks without conversions or simply no clicks at all. A PPC specialist will have the technical knowledge to optimise your campaign for effective spend of your budget, finding the best balance of advertising message, keywords and cost per click to achieve the most clicks and sales.

• Time is Money – The time you spend running a PPC campaign is time which you could be spending on other aspects of your business. And so it is still a cost, albeit an indirect one. What’s more, the outlay of time might be much less if the campaign is carried out by a PPC expert. So ultimately, it could be much more cost-effective to have the campaign run efficiently by an expert than to run it yourself if you lack the expertise to do it quickly and well.

• Proven Expertise – A PPC specialist will (or should) have Google PPC certification, showing an advanced level of knowledge and skill in creating and managing PPC campaigns. What’s more, certification must be renewed yearly, ensuring that those skills are continually kept up to date with developments to Google’s PPC platform.

• Learning Opportunity Or Drudge? – This all depends on your personal viewpoint. For some, learning the intricacies of PPC will be a fascinating challenge, while for others it will be a time-consuming and onerous chore. But in either case, there will be an investment in time and effort to learn about PPC campaign creation, implementation, analysis and optimisation. There are many free resources which enable you to do this, but you will need to choose wisely to get the most accurate information and the best advice. By using a PPC expert, you are tapping directly into their investment in PPC knowledge to get the best result for your business, with no need to learn the technical details yourself.

• An Expert On Your Side – When running a PPC campaign, it is always possible to run up against issues which you might not know how to fix, whether technical or platform policy-based. Your PPC expert is likely to have experienced similar issues and to have a good idea how to resolve them.

In Summary

There’s absolutely no reason why you cannot Do It Yourself with PPC. If you are willing to invest the time and effort into learning about PPC and running your own campaigns, and especially if you already have PPC knowledge or marketing expertise, this could be the ideal solution for you. You could combine your PPC skills with your dedication to your business to get great results.

However it is important to remember that by paying for PPC services, you are paying for quality and efficiency. A good PPC agency has spent time becoming expert in the field so you don’t have to. Its experts will spend the time to get to know you and your business. They will construct your PPC campaign taking into account not only your immediate sales goals, but also your broader company vision and ethos. They will monitor your campaign and optimise it ongoing for the best results, providing you with regular feedback. They will be responsive to requests to stop or adjust your campaign but will also advise when it might be better to stay the course and give the campaign time to work. And as a result your campaign is more likely to be successful from the get go than if you tackle it yourself without adequate knowledge and experience.

The choice is yours. Business owners have to balance where to allocate limited budgets, and they sometimes have to be all-rounders to make it work. Hopefully this article has given you an idea of some of the advantages and disadvantages of DIYing your PPC campaign and will help you in your decision.

Related: Your Google PPC Agency In Bristol

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