How can you forecast future Google Ads costs to ensure your budget is realistic?
Forecasting future Google Ads costs is a crucial skill for any search engine marketer who wants to plan a realistic and effective budget. Without a reliable estimate of how much you will spend on clicks, impressions, and conversions, you may end up overspending, underperforming, or missing out on opportunities. In this article, you will learn how to use Google's own tools and data to forecast your Google Ads costs based on your goals, keywords, bids, and targeting.
The first step to forecast your Google Ads costs is to define your goals and how you will measure them. For example, you may want to increase traffic, leads, sales, or brand awareness. Depending on your goal, you will need to choose the appropriate campaign type, bidding strategy, and conversion tracking method. You will also need to decide how much you are willing to pay for each outcome, such as cost per click (CPC), cost per impression (CPM), or cost per acquisition (CPA).
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Los pasos que yo recomiendo seguir son los siguientes: 1) Definir objetivos SMART para ventas, branding, leads, etc. 2) Definir los KPIs principales 3) Hacer estimaciones de rentabilidad contextualizadas a la industria. Por ejemplo, Real Estate tiene subastas más caras que la venta de camisetas 4) Tener en cuenta los posibles ROAS a corto plazo y los ROAS o ROI a medio plazo con upselling, crosselling y downselling
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To forecast Google Ads costs, start by setting clear goals—be it traffic, leads, sales, or brand awareness. Choose the right campaign type and bidding strategy (CPC, CPM, CPA) based on these goals. Conversion tracking is crucial to measure success. Decide on your budget per outcome to effectively manage and forecast your advertising spend.
The next step is to research your keywords and their potential costs. You can use the Keyword Planner tool in Google Ads to find relevant keywords for your products or services, and see their average monthly searches, competition level, and suggested bid range. You can also use the Performance Planner tool to create different scenarios based on your budget, bid, and conversion rate assumptions, and see how they affect your projected metrics, such as clicks, impressions, conversions, and cost.
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Podemos usar herramientas como, por ejemplo, el Planificador de Palabras Clave de Google Ads, SEMRush, Answer The Public, Google Trends, etc para estudiar el mercado de demanda con búsquedas. Ahí luego tenemos que diferenciar los diferentes tipos de intencionalidades: comparativas, transaccionales, de marca, etc. Y fijar una estrategia de subastas en función de la cercanía o lejanía en la compra o conversión. No olvidar tampoco el Long Tail. Cada día hay nuevas búsquedas que se producen y nunca habían sucedido antes.
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Research keywords using Google Ads' Keyword Planner to understand their search volume, competition, and cost. The Performance Planner tool helps simulate scenarios based on budget, bids, and conversion rates, showing potential impacts on clicks, impressions, conversions, and costs. This step is crucial for strategizing and budgeting your campaigns effectively, allowing for informed decisions to optimize your advertising efforts.
Once you have a list of keywords and their estimated costs, you can adjust your bids to optimize your performance and budget. You can use manual bidding to set your own maximum CPC or CPM for each keyword or ad group, or you can use automated bidding to let Google adjust your bids based on your goals and historical data. You can also use bid modifiers to increase or decrease your bids based on factors such as location, device, time, audience, or seasonality.
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After identifying keywords and their costs, adjust bids for optimal budget and performance. Opt for manual bidding to control CPC/CPM or automated bidding for Google to adjust based on goals and data. Utilize bid modifiers to tweak bids based on location, device, time, audience, or seasonality, ensuring your ads are more effectively targeted and cost-efficient.
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Podemos empezar por Smart Bidding o, por el contrario, con Automated Bidding y gradualmente ir pasando a Smart Bidding. Para ello, es importante que los trackings de conversiones estén bien implementados y vayamos definiendo bien los KPIs y ajustando. La estructura de campañas por dispositivo, zona geográfica, hora del día, nicho de mercado, etc también es importante.
Another factor that influences your Google Ads costs is your targeting options. You can refine your targeting to reach the most relevant and profitable audience for your goals, and avoid wasting money on irrelevant or low-quality traffic. You can use different targeting methods, such as keywords, placements, topics, audiences, demographics, or geolocation, to narrow down or expand your reach. You can also use negative keywords, exclusions, or filters to exclude unwanted traffic sources.
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Antes de definir la parte de segmentación técnica, es importante o sería ideal conocer bien al Buyer Persona. A partir de ahí, podemos definir técnicamente la zona geográfica, dispositivo, etc. Y luego complementarlo con la parte psicológica de copys de mensajes, contenido en el aterrizaje web, psicología de colores, etc.
The final step to forecast your Google Ads costs is to monitor your performance and compare it with your expectations. You can use the Google Ads dashboard, reports, and analytics tools to track your key performance indicators (KPIs), such as impressions, clicks, conversions, cost, and return on ad spend (ROAS). You can also use the Google Ads Performance Grader to get a free audit of your account and see how you score on various aspects of your campaign management.
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Recomiendo dejar al menos 24h para ver ajustes importantes e idealmente unos días para ver muestras suficientes de datos y tomar decisiones importantes. Podemos hacer también test A/B de creatividades, formatos de campañas, subastas, etc Lo importante es tratar de conseguir resultados lo antes posible y mostrar implicación y, si no se consiguen los objetivos, tratar de fallar rápido y barato, analizar más todo y con el objetivo de que se reviertan los resultados y mejore el ROAS! Para ello, es importante haber hecho estimaciones de rentabilidad antes y contextualizar los datos en base a la industria y país.
Based on your performance and forecast, you may need to adjust your budget to meet your goals and optimize your ROI. You can increase or decrease your daily or monthly budget limit, or allocate your budget across different campaigns, ad groups, or keywords. You can also use the Budget Planner tool in Google Ads to see how changing your budget will affect your future results, and get recommendations on how to improve your budget efficiency and effectiveness.
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