By Lydia Chen Shah, Director Marketing Communications
This week, the most savvy search marketers across the globe infiltrated the northwest corner of the left coast at SMX Advanced Seattle. We sent a few from our team to check out the happenings and pick up some great insights from the industry. WebMetro also had the good fortune of being selected to present in the Amazing PPC Tactics session. (Yes, a-ma-zing. No pressure, right?)
Our VP of eMarketing Michael Behrens shared how PPC advertisers can build their own portfolio forecasting tool using Google’s Bid Simulator. Why is this relevant or bear any importance?
For years search marketers have said, “Give us a seat at the table when strategy and budget decisions are made.” And now, that we have a seat at the table, we’re asked to forecast what we will generate based on the allocated budget. Furthermore, we’re asked to demonstrate or essentially prove we’re spending the budget as efficiently as possible. All about max ROI. Logical requests from the c-suite, wouldn’t you say?
But a lack of transparency into the bid landscape, the competitors’ ad rank and the potential volumes in higher positions have kept search marketers from being able to properly forecast and optimally bid. That is, until now.
Enter – Google’s Bid Simulator. It’s a remarkable tool that helps PPC advertisers forecast how clicks change with bids by providing transparency into the auction model. The presentation we gave at SMX shows the how-to steps for:
1. Using Bid Simulator
2. Creating a portfolio model
3. Using Excel Solver
There are some limitations to consider using Bid Simulator, i.e. it doesn’t account for market changes – it is based on historical activity, it’s only available for head terms, and it’s not compatible with some campaign settings. But it’s still A-MA-ZING. (Even more so when it’s automated with the Google API, which is what we’ve done with our DSMM Advantage™ technology.)
You’re left with a power curve to help you predict the return of your online advertising investment and the effects of your bid changes.
We were really glad this went over well with some of the SMX attendees.
For the how-to details, check out our presentation on Using Bid Simulator for Forecasting and Improving Efficiency - SMXPPCBidSimulatorWebMetro (pdf).
Last but not least, thanks to the entire SMX team for a great conference!