Source: Bing
The landscape for internet marketers has changed once again, as Bing announces that it will be introducing Expanded Ads to the Bing Ads program. This announcement is significant to internet campaign managers and SEO specialists, as well as business owners since this makes targeting positive online presence much easier and more fluid.
What are text ads?
Text ads are blocks of text that serve as online advertisements for business, and one of the more common ways to maintain an online presence. Businesses usually maintain these ads as paid promotions. Moreover, standard text ads work together with your business website, since a short ad contains links to your business pages. However, it works much like how a tweet is created – characters are limited that ads only contain one or two lines of general description, along with the website hyperlink.
Although text ads are important in maintaining an online presence, its structure limits the impact of how a business can be advertised, so it is welcome news that standard online promotions are being improved into expanded text ads.
Google Expanded Text Ads
Google, one of the tech giants on the World Wide Web, has introduced Expanded Text Ads this year. With this new setup, internet campaigns can have twice the space to put out their promotions and general ads. In the old AdWords, headlines are constrained into one 25-character line, while the description line is limited to two 35-character rows. In the new Expanded Text Ads campaign, business owners can write at least two 30-character lines for the headline, while the description rows are expanded into one consolidated 80-character line. This means that rather than having a phrase-type description, business ads can be made into meaningful, impact-driven promotions.
Meanwhile, the new AdWords update also automates the domain for the display URL, instead of the manual website address input in the old one. This means that the data is extracted automatically from your website, making web redirects error-proof.
This new setup is a blessing to internet marketing campaigns and online promotions for your business. With more leeway in constructing your ads, it means that you can create promotions and announcements with additional content and higher chances of leaving impressions.
Bing adopts Expanded Text Ads support
With a number of search engines already put up online, some internet specialists think that the expanded text ads program are only applicable to Google-supported searches. However, the additional good news is that Bing Ads has confirmed that it is adopting support for Expanded Text Ads.
According to Jamie Chung, program manager at Bing Ads, the new AdWords program will be available for Bing-related searches later this year, possibly rolling out before the end of summer.
Chung emphasizes, “With Expanded Text Ads on the Bing Network, we will embrace the trend of providing an improved text ad experience that provides more information to the customer about their destination.”
With a lengthier ad with more content, business owners and advertisers can assure faster and higher chances of click-through rates (CTR), which in turn helps drive customer traffic to the website.
Meanwhile, not only is Bing Ads adopting the Expanded Text Ads program for Bing-related searches but will also integrate some major updates and improvements of their own. Chung adds, “The ability to Import from Google AdWords will ensure that you can seamlessly move your carefully crafted Expanded Text Ads between platforms.” This means that advertisers who have already set up expanded text ads on Google only need to import the data to Bing Ads, without starting from scratch. With this feature, you can save time and effort in constructing expanded ads that will “take advantage of all the real estate on the Bing search result pages and 60 million searchers found only on the Bing Network.” In addition, it adopts consistency for your ad placements across multiple platforms, since you can seamlessly move and import the same data across search engines.
Preparing for Expanded Text Ads
However, both Google and Bing is expected to roll out the new setup in a staggered release, so it may take up to the end of the year for all advertisers to adapt to the Expanded Text Ads program. Meanwhile, though the full release hasn’t been confirmed yet, you can already prepare and adapt your online marketing campaigns to take advantage of the new program.
- Check your Quality Score. This is Google’s measure of how relevant your ads are in terms of keywords, content, and URL. There are different measures for good QCs, among them high CTR, landing page quality, and account performance in AdWords. More often, it is best to consult with internet marketing specialists who have the necessary background and skills to place your QCs on top of Google metrics.
- Redesign landing pages. Sometimes, while the click rates are high, conversion rates may be listed as below the expected result since customers will not push through with checking out your website. Your landing page layout may be the culprit – with the design aspects for web pages constantly fluid and changing, it is best to check your landing pages regularly and to update them to the latest, user-friendly themes as soon as possible.
- Restructure your ads. Since there will be more characters in Expanded Text Ads, make sure that your new, additional information is not redundant, and the new ad copies are created with the best structure. Having additional lines means that you can now add meaningful, impact-focus descriptions and call to action lines. One simple way of checking if your new ads are search-friendly is to list active verbs in the copy. Active verbs on headlines and descriptions can double the click rate for your new ads.
- Use an unconventional call to action. With the new program, advertisers have more leeway in including longer descriptions. Use this to your advantage by using eccentric call to action lines, instead of the usual “Find out now” and “Click this ad” clichés. This arouses curiosity and interest on readers and will help in achieving higher conversion rates.
