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The premise behind PPC is a simple one. You pay a fee every time a potential client, customer, etc. clicks on your ad. It allows you to jump ahead of the organic search results, so you show up first.
While the premise is simple, the sheer array of options can be overwhelming. With privacy concerns mounting both locally and abroad, PPC is losing some of its ability to target as efficiently as in the past.
This coupled with it being harder and harder for content to be seen on social networks without promotion, you can easily spend more and get less.
As you can see cost per click (CPC) and click through rate (CTR) varies widely by industry. While this is just for Google, the same is true for other PPC platforms.
This is an area of contention for many physicians. Advertising can feel uncomfortable. I like to help our clients think of it as awareness building and education. If you do not promote your business, patients will not know you are available to help them solve their health issues.
Advertising does not have to be cheap or tawdry. It can be tactful, respectful, and ethical. This is one of the reasons you may want to consider an agency with medical experience.
When it comes to PPC for health and medical, you are going to want to be cautious. The average CPC for attorneys is roughly $4 a click, and the CTR rate is average.
Since the general public has limited awareness of medicine, so you will likely have a fair degree of early stage patients exploring options. This means you should expect longer conversion times and lower conversion rates (appointments).
For physicians with a known practice, I would save paid search for the lower end of the funnel when patients are trying to decide between which doctor in a given specialty is right for their needs.
As I said earlier, people need to know you to work with you, especially in a field where there are unequal levels of knowledge. Said differently, where they are dependent on you.
For awareness building, you could choose a lower cost method like Google Display or Facebook. Instagram, Twitter, and the others are not likely your best choice given their advertising platform design.
As we cover in Web Design for Doctors, the first step is to write down the questions you think a searcher might ask at each stage of the funnel.
We defined our target audience as part of our Marketing Strategy for Doctors.
As we did for other parts of the marketing mix, we will use our target audience to help select our keywords, which we will discuss in a moment.
However, unlike those other parts of the mix, we need to adjust our target audience to fit the options available on the platform we choose. At best, it will be a rough approximation, as the ability to micro-target has diminished greatly as has retargeting.
There are affinity groups and in market signals, which can help. However, the loss of micro-targeting and re-targeting makes selecting the right keywords all the more important.
Similar to what we discussed in SEO for Doctors, we will need to build a search keyword strategy for each stage of the funnel. In addition, we need to understand which platforms are best suited to the different stages of the funnel. We will cover keywords first.
There are several ways you can use to build a keyword strategy. In this example, we will use Google Keyword Planner.
When you first logon to you will see this screen.
First, we are going to discover new keywords. You can start with keywords or start with a website.
If you are at the top of the funnel, starting with a website is useful. For example purposes, we will start there.
Similarly to how we managed selecting keywords in SEO for Doctors, we would look for reasonable volume, lower competition, and lower cost. In this example you see a wide range of costs from $4.50 per click to $12.00.
As we demonstrated in the example above, search is not generally the best option if you are targeting the top of the funnel. You will likely be spending a significant amount of money for browsers.
Plus, you can couple this with in market signals, which can further restrict your audience to those who are looking for products or services in the near future.
As you can see, with Facebook the CPCs are generally much lower. Even though the costs are lower, that does not mean that your end result will be better.
It is important to remember that Facebook and Instagram are more discovery based. A user is scrolling through a feed of related content, but he or she is not actively seeking information. Google’s Display Ad Network is similarly passive.
This passive behavior is common at the top of the funnel. It is characteristic of low involvement and high bounce rates. You need to be active at the top of the funnel if you want to convert people at the bottom. Therefore, your best approach is the lowest cost method.
Choosing the right mix of platforms is highly dependent on industry, audience, and location.
Most legal marketing strategies will be focused on lead generation. Therefore a law firm PPC campaign would be better served in building awareness through either Google Display or Facebook, if consumer facing.
B2B is more challenging. There are lead generating services on LinkedIn, but they are becoming less effective as the market is saturated. A PPC ad on LinkedIn is quite expensive. Depending on your law firm’s marketing budget and practice area, it might be worth the spend if the lead is that valuable.
PPC marketing is best used at the latter stage of the funnel, once the prospective client has a clear understanding of the legal services he or she needs. At this point search marketing and search ads become more cost effective.
Pay per Click (PPC) lets you skip the line. While the premise behind PPC is simple, the execution is challenging because
Unlike the other parts of the digital marketing mix, we need to adjust our target audience to fit the options available on the platform we choose. At best, it will be a rough approximation, as the ability to micro-target has diminished greatly as has retargeting.
Developing a keyword strategy is similar to developing one for SEO or web design. When selecting keywords, we would look for reasonable volume, lower competition, and lower cost.
As search can be costly, it is better suited for later in the funnel, closer to action. Social media platforms and Google Display Networks are better for the top of the funnel by their nature and cost.
Choosing the right mix of platforms is highly dependent on industry, audience, and location.
Digital Marketing for Doctors provides a holistic overview of all the digital media marketing mix.