Packaging PPC Management

How PPC Benefits Packaging Businesses

Packaging is a very diversified industry, with companies facing a variety of challenges in the marketing of their products, equipment and services. PPC is well suited for situations such as:

• Niche packaging companies seeking to expand into new geographic markets
• New packaging companies and companies with new offerings that want to build awareness and lead pipelines quickly
• Large packaging enterprises that offer products, equipment or services of which prospects may not be aware
• Packaging companies with seasonal products and services
• E-commerce packaging firms in need of more qualified website traffic
• Prominent packaging brands that want to defend against competitors using their branded keywords in their PPC ads

Advantages of PPC Advertising

PPC is especially useful for the situations described above for several reasons.

• Immediate results. Unlike search engine optimization (SEO), while effective, may take months or longer to produce high visibility on Google. PPC enables companies to get immediate high visibility on Google.
• Ultra-specific targeting.
  • In a packaging PPC campaign, the company selects a basket of keywords (that is, phrases used by Google users when they do a search) based on several criteria, including relevance to the product/equipment/service, intent and volume.
  • Then, after a campaign budget has been established, the PPC campaign manager bids on these keywords when a Google search is made using them. If the bid is successful, the user sees the company’s ad. Bids can be further targeted based on the geographic location of the user, time of day, day of the week, and many other factors.
• Cost control. PPC campaigns can be turned off immediately, and ramped up or scaled down quickly — ideal for seasonal offerings and when campaign results are very good or not good.
• Continuous improvement. Effective PPC campaigns involve ongoing testing and refinement. As certain keywords are identified as generating more click-throughs and conversions, more emphasis is given to them.

How to Best Execute Packaging PPC

Packaging is an extremely large and extremely competitive industry, so a great deal of care must go into keyword selection. The more popular a keyword is, the more expensive it will be to enter a successful bid. A small or midsize packaging company that selects, say, a basket of the most popular corrugated box keywords, may run out of budget after only one or two successful bids — which, of course, is not nearly enough ad exposures to produce dial-moving sales leads or revenue. In this situation, the company would be better served targeting long-tail keywords — that is, keywords that are less popular but very relevant and have a high degree of buying intent.

At the other end of the spectrum, packaging companies that sell six- or seven-figure packaging systems or whose customers have similar lifetime value, a PPC campaign may need to produce only a handful of sales leads every year to pay for itself several times over. In these situations, PPC is almost always worth a six- to 12-month test.

In all situations, ad composition and landing page design/content must be executed with a blend of creativity and adherence to best practices. Because PPC is popular in the packaging industry, excellent execution is often what makes a campaign attain maximum success.