AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 15

This is the latest in a series of interviews we're conducting with AdWords advertisers who got unusually high scores using our AdWords Performance Grader. We're reaching out to high scorers to find out what strategies contribute to their strong AdWords performance. For more in this series, see:

• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 1
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 2
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 3
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 4
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 5
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 6
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 7
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 8
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 9
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 10
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 11
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 12
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 13
• AdWords Experts Share the Secrets of Their PPC Success, Part 14

This week’s interview is with Christian Hinze. Visit his website at www.oppars.com.

Tell us a bit about yourself. How long have you been using AdWords? Are you an Agency or an Advertiser? What is your primary goal for AdWords marketing?

I am a web designer, advertiser and on-page optimizer from Munich. I have been using AdWords for my own business and clients for several years now.

My primary goal for AdWords marketing is high rankings in search engine results for low prices.

There are tons of metrics in AdWords – what are your top 3 Key Performance Metrics in AdWords and why?

1. Conversion Rate - The primary goal of advertising is that users take a certain action on a website, so we have to do our best not just to optimize the ad-text in AdWords but also the website the customer will visit after clicking on the ad.
2. Quality Score - You should do everything you can to reduce spending without lowering rankings. Quality Score is more than just a number from 0 to 10, it’s like an internal rating system for your ads, so it is very, very important!
3. Return on Ad Spending - One of the most important key performance metrics for me is finding out if the campaign is worthwhile or not. When the campaign isn’t profitable, you either improve it or delete it.

Can you describe your AdWords management strategy? How do you set your campaign objectives, and how do you know what’s realistic or not?

Listen to the client and have some discussions about the goals they want to achieve. Prearrangement is everything.

We put the 3 most important goals together and align our strategies with those goals.

No one can really say what is going well and what’s not without testing.

It’s clear that nothing works at the same level forever, especially in our business, you’ll have to change your strategy from time to time to be effective.

Care about your clients and their needs and then the rankings!

Describe your AdWords management workflow. When you’re doing your account optimization work, how do you decide what to do next in your account? How do you prioritize your work?

Actually, I don’t have a strict workflow. I ask myself every morning, Which 5 things are so important you have to do them today? It doesn’t always work out, because on some days you have more or less to do, but it gives you the opportunity to concentrate on the most important things.

I normally check all the clients’ campaigns once a week to find mistakes or poorly performing keywords, but as I said, if you did the prearrangement well, you won’t have to do so much afterwards.

Any advice or tips for AdWords marketers that didn’t score as well as you?

Keep it up! If you don’t make mistakes, you won’t get better. It’s important to learn from mistakes and then make it better the next time.

This post originated on the WordStream Blog. WordStream provides keyword tools for pay-per click (PPC) and search engine optimization (SEO) aiding in everything from keyword discovery to keyword grouping and organization.