Have businesses faced a more unpredictable time in living memory? Whatever your personal feelings regarding the political and economic climate, the current uncertainty makes planning and decision-making tougher. With consumers experiencing the same volatility, it means many are reducing their spending. Whether the result is a downturn or recession, businesses need to be planning how to cope.

The temptation is to cut back and save on anything deemed non-essential. For example, UK advertising growth slowed to 4.2% in the first quarter of 2019. In the event of a no-deal Brexit, Enders Analysis predicts a £1.36bn cut in ad spending before the year is out. But years of research and examples demonstrate that this is a false economy. Businesses which review, optimise and continue to spend during economic downturns consistently emerge most successful.

• A McGraw-Hill study of 600 businesses in the UK recession between 1980-1985 saw advertisers who either maintained or increased their advertising budget grow sales by 256%
• 14% of companies increased growth during the last 4 economic downturns in the U.S with revenue growth accounting for nearly 50% of their shareholder returns (Harvard Business Review)
• A 1990 WPP study saw those companies which cut their advertising and expenditure in a recession lose as much in profitability as those who increase their spending. Which means short-term savings don’t work to hold onto revenue.
• “It is better to maintain SOV (share of voice) at or above SOM (share of the market) during a downturn: the longer-term improvement in profitability is likely to greatly outweigh the short-term reduction,” the IPA’s 2008 report on marketing during downturns states. “If other brands are cutting budgets, the longer-term benefit of maintaining SOV at or above SOM will be even greater.”

Convincing an executive board or client to keep spending in economic uncertainty can be tough. But a thorough review and optimisation plan showing direct revenue results can certainly help your budget survive, or even grow.

Online advertising has consistently grown over recent years and will account for 62% of UK advertising in 2020. The reasons include a lower comparative cost, the huge growth in scale, and the easier accountability and tracking to demonstrate the impact on revenue. A downturn or recession will continue the transition from offline to online ad spends, with direct response and direct-to-consumer most likely to thrive as brand marketing comes under fire.

How to optimise advertising in a downturn or recession:

• Plan for the medium and long-term
• Focus on core brand strengths
• Improve the functional elements of your advertising
• Investigate new opportunities and markets
• Double down on effectiveness
• Ensure everything is tied to the right objectives, reporting and KPIs to demonstrate profitability

A Nielsen study of advertising effectiveness highlights the importance of creativity and reach even above brand. The digital attributes of targeting and recency are the next areas to follow in sales contribution, with the ability to drive almost three times more sales if you advertise a weekend purchase on the preceding Thursday or Friday.

Meanwhile, a 2009 Admap study showed that creative treatment had a bigger impact on company profits than budget. But you may need to change the message itself to align with the times, focusing more on the value and utility you offer.

Are you using the right channels for a recession?

In a boom, it’s relatively easy to throw money at every available advertising and marketing channel. But as budget is reduced and scrutiny increases, which are the fundamental tactics to form the basis of your recession strategy?

SEO

Search Engine Optimisation is a key long-term marketing channel, which also integrates well with advertising. Prioritising keywords related to the customer journey will attract relevant traffic while improving on-page content can improve conversions.

It’s also flexible, allowing you to change content on-page to highlight value for money over more aspirational approaches. And the benefits can last potentially indefinitely depending on the competition in your industry.

• Review the basic SEO status of your site, ensuring basic technical issues are resolved
• Look at your keyword/phrase targets to focus on the right products and terms in a downturn
• Ensure an integrated approach to inform your content, social media and advertising

Google Shopping and CSS ads

Possibly the most underutilised opportunity in advertising, Google Comparison Shopping Services offer a way to increase sales and revenue without upping your advertising spend. Due to the EU requiring Google to open up their Shopping platform to third parties, the independent suppliers get the same level of access but don’t charge the same 20% bid cost margin.

Some, like RedBrain even operate on a CPA basis, operate their own websites and channels with large scale audiences, and will handle the work of targeting and optimisation. You can also use multiple providers, running your own Google Shopping campaign, and working with a Premium CSS provider at the same time. Best of all, if using a CSS provider on a pure CPA basis you are only paying for sales generated. Being creative with CPA commissions could prove to be an extremely smart move and unlock vast incremental sales volumes, even in a downturn.

Google Shopping adverts are increasingly prominent on relevant search results, particularly on mobile devices.

• Set up and optimise your Product Data Feed
• Choose a Premium CSS Provider – save your budget with a CPA commission-based option, and not paying any fees
• Use the data to adapt your pricing, or to offer sales promotions in a highly visible space on relevant search results pages

Direct marketing

Every marketer is probably aware that the cost comparison between a new and existing customer is approximately five times the expense. You also have a much higher probability of making sales to a retained consumer (60-70%) than someone new (5-20%). Which makes email a sensible option at any time for direct digital marketing. But it’s particularly useful during a downturn or recession.

It provides more accountability than brand-awareness campaigns, heightens relevance if it’s done correctly, and offers relatively low costs.

• Ensure your existing email lists are clean, up-to-date and GDPR compliant
• Don’t be tempted to bombard your customers with endless offers to shore up short-term profits at the risk of losing subscriptions
• Focus on rewarding valuable existing customers for their loyalty, increasing personalisation and segmentation as far as possible

Ultimately it’s more than possible to grow your business during a downturn or recession by optimising your advertising and marketing, rather than cutting your budget. And the growth in market share will provide dividends long after the economy has recovered.

But even if your ad spend is restricted in the short term, you can still deliver results by focusing on the key channels which are most effective.

The post Grow Your Business in a Downturn by Optimising Advertising Instead of Reducing it appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Want to reduce your advertising budget without losing sales? Or grow your profits without spending more? It may sound too good to be true. That is the opportunity being missed by many affiliates and brands. Ignore Google Comparison Shopping Services (CSS) and Product Listing Ads (PLA), and you could be losing a huge amount of potential revenue.

One example Google has shared saw a merchant achieve a 200% increase in click-throughs, with a 15% reduction in Cost Per Click (CPC) at the same time. That’s not untypical from our experience with 35,000 retailers and £1 billion in annual sales.

An unusual aspect of Google CSS is that it’s actually cheaper to let someone else do the hard work for you. A small number of Google CSS partners even bill on a commission only basis, removing a large element of risk. While Google Shopping Europe will charge a 20% margin of bid costs, most CSS providers don’t. The result is that more of your budget goes to advertising rather than costs.

As an affiliate, you can also benefit. Some leading CSS partners operate their own websites and channels which benefit from the large amounts of traffic they are able to generate. By placing your products on their owned channels, you could unlock fresh traffic sources.

It’s worth any business owner understanding how can you benefit from Google CSS and PLA.

How the EU has empowered Google CSS

Google Shopping has existed since 2002 when it first launched under the Froogle name. But the benefits of it were limited to the search engine giant and consumers. It was only in June 2017 that a European Commission antitrust fine changed the landscape for Google CSS.

This opened up the huge traffic and sales opportunities of Comparison Shopping Services to partners. As a result, non-Google properties increased their share of results from 2% to 33% in the first year alone. Any business operating in the European Economic Area and Switzerland can utilise one or more CSS campaigns via partners or Google Merchant Centre to access this share of valuable advertising space.

Initially, growth was fuelled by rebates and incentives from Google. But the results and competition between providers mean that these aren’t really needed to convince more businesses to sign up.

Easier for customers and sellers alike

It’s almost impossible to search for any products via Google without coming across a PLA or CSS in your search results. The result is that consumers have embraced them as a quicker way to shop, particularly on mobile devices. Google reported a 39% increase in paid clicks on their owned properties in Q1 2019, compared to the same period in 2018.

Google doesn’t split out the impact of Google Shopping in their annual reports. Third party analysis by CSS providers and advertising agencies generally measure annual growth at around 80% per year. Those figures are supported by the increase in size and number of Google Shopping adverts and the demotion of organic search results.
If Google CSS and PLA are good for consumers and the search engine giant, how do e-commerce sellers and affiliate merchants benefit?

The main ongoing reasons are the ease of set-up and the massive potential benefits to sales and revenue.

Access to Google CSS has never been better

Unlocking the benefits of Google CSS is comparatively easy, especially when compared to traditional paid search and display advertising. Because the product information is relatively concise, setting up a feed of your inventory is relatively simple.

The direct route from the advertising to product pages saves a lot of time and resources. There’s no need to test different creative text and display ideas. Or drive traffic to higher level landing pages, which all need optimisation to best filter customers through to buying an actual product. Every stage removed from a customer journey means fewer chances to lose a potential purchase. 

The way CSS and PLA advertising works together is that Comparison Shopping Service ads target more generic searches. Customers can then browse the selected results. Google PLAs are designed to answer specific product searches. Both advertising options will take customers directly to product pages to make their purchase.

Every CSS partner has access to the same advertising slots and features. That includes Google not letting merchants essentially bid against themselves via two CSSs. So you’ll always pay the lowest winning bid.

Although Google does try to filter out multiple bids for the exact same product from the same retailer, different products from the same merchant can be displayed. These can appear in one or more CSS blocks on a single page, without any increase in CPC costs.

How do you benefit with a CSS Partner?

The savings from avoiding the Google Shopping margin and commission-based pricing are just two reasons to consider a CSS partner. Not only do they have the same access as Google to CSS features, but they can also handle the heavy lifting of targeting and optimisation. Using machine learning and automation to deliver better results also means that cannibalisation and the impact on your other channels are minimal.

A leading provider will also supply third-party tracking you can trust, integration with the top affiliate networks and shopping platforms, and will be able to offer additional channels as required to enable engagement and remarketing beyond Google.

For affiliates, the benefits come from working with CSS partners and their websites. You can leverage the additional traffic those channels receive from advertising designed to promote transactions. Collaborating means you get the benefits of CSS and PLA advertising operated by specialist experts, without running any of the campaigns yourself.

Google PLA & CSS are taking a big bite out of Amazon

Anyone involved in e-commerce over the last 10 years will have seen Amazon making huge inroads into Google’s organic landscape on product terms and categories much to their concern.

Google’s continued push with PLA and CSS ads is their fightback to pull advertising revenues away from Amazon and make Google a retail destination for users again.

By positioning the PLA ads so heavily above the fold in the SERPS, some might argue that Google is managing to throttle the flow of traffic from Google to Amazon. Others might say Google is simply trying to monetise this traffic to its own financial advantage.

Either way, with visibility tools such as SEMrush showing that in the last month or so the occurrence of shopping ads in the SERPS has been as high as 60%, PLA ads are essential for any retailer looking for sales volume from Google. You could also argue that Google is doing retailers a huge favour by increasing the inventory of PLA ads to organic searches as users are able to find more products from more retailers creating greater choice for consumers.

Don’t delay your Google CSS and PLA plans any longer

You don’t always have to be the first to adopt a new technology to get all the benefits. But you do need to get there before the majority of your competitors. Choose a certified Google CSS partner working on a CPA commission basis, and it means there’s surprisingly little risk. Measured against the potential for higher sales at a lower cost, it seems a no brainer. 

The post It’s Time to Stop Ignoring the Huge Opportunity of Google CSS and PLA appeared first on PerformanceIN.