The Role of a PPC Specialist: Driving Success Through Paid Advertising

You’re investing valuable time and resources into your SEO efforts, hoping to experience a boost in search engine rankings and organic traffic. Just one question: Is it working? 

In today’s fast-paced digital world, businesses like yours need a way to outpace the competition. As you look closer at your competitive edge, it’s a good idea to turn your attention to paid advertising—your PPC (Pay per Click) strategy. 

You can’t afford to ignore PPC. Why? Because 75% of consumers say paid ads make it easier to find what they’re looking for. That’s a solid majority.

PPC marketing is a powerful way to earn high returns in the realm of paid marketing platforms. And a PPC specialist at the helm of these efforts can make a world of difference. 

But do you need a PPC specialist? Ask yourself: 

• Am I seeing a good return on marketing investments?
• Am I reaching the right audience?
• Are my search engine rankings ideal?
• Are my organic traffic metrics high?
• Am I keeping up with competitors?
• Am I attracting new leads?

You see where we’re going with this. Paid advertising is a world of its own, and its successful navigation is your ticket to enhanced revenue potential. In fact, paid ads have a 200% return on investment (ROI).

That’s where a skilled PPC strategist steps in. 

PPC specialists (also called PPC strategists) understand the intricacies of paid advertising. A good one can transform your ad campaigns, optimize your ad spend, and, ultimately, drive the success and growth of your business. 

A PPC specialist becomes your trusted partner. They’re not just there to do the work but to strategize with you. They immerse themselves in your business to become an extension of your team. Discover how, with a PPC specialist in your corner, you can unlock revenue potential and achieve new levels of growth and success. 

Table of Contents:

• What Is a PPC Specialist?
• The Power of a PPC Specialist
• How a PPC Strategist Transforms Your Campaigns
• PPC Specialists’ Expert-Level Skills
• Advice from Our PPC Specialists
• What to Look for in a PPC Specialist
• PPC Case Study: Truvy

What Is a PPC Specialist?

A PPC (pay-per-click) specialist is a digital marketing expert who manages and optimizes pay-per-click advertising campaigns. They primarily focus on driving targeted traffic to your website through the strategic use of paid online advertising platforms, including Google Ads and social media. 

PPC revolves around clickable ads to drive quick conversions. The ads are instrumental in promoting new products or services, targeting specific demographics, announcing time-sensitive events or promotions, and increasing brand visibility. PPC drives immediate results, especially to complement other long-term SEO strategies. 

PPC specialists are well-versed in various aspects of online advertising, like:

• Keyword research
• Bid management
• Ad copywriting
• Campaign optimization
• Performance tracking

A PPC specialist brings a sharp understanding of digital marketing platforms, targeting options, and industry best practices to the table. They are a master of strategy and recalibration, offering insight to empower companies like yours to make informed decisions and optimize ad efforts for maximum results. 

The Power of a PPC Specialist

In short, a PPC specialist can be a game changer for your digital marketing efforts. There are several forms PPC can take, and a good PPC specialist knows where to direct their efforts. They may focus on:

• Search ads
• Display banners or images 
• Social media content
• Video ads
• Product listings
• App install ads

Each PPC type has its advantages and targeting capabilities, and one avenue may be better than another for a specific product or service. A PPC specialist works their magic to combine these types to create a well-rounded strategy that supercharges your marketing efforts. 

The expertise of a PPC strategist is essentially a powerful toolbox to propel your business forward with more targeted, effective, and profitable campaigns. Learn how PPC increased return on ad spend by 2500% through boosted social posts. 

How a PPC Strategist Transforms Your Campaigns

A PPC strategist take very calculated actions that pave the way for your business’s resounding success. 

Here’s what that looks like.

1. Goal Alignment

For starters, a PPC specialist begins by understanding your goals and how to make them a reality. The specialist takes time to grasp your unique business objectives and align your strategies accordingly. Whether increasing brand awareness, driving sales, or boosting conversions, specialists dedicate themselves to achieving the outcomes that matter most to you and your business. 

2. Market Research

Research is the cornerstone of a specialist’s approach. A PPC specialist gains valuable insights by delving deep into the landscape of your industry, target audience, and competitors. Armed with this information, they can better identify trends and gaps and leverage them to your advantage. 

3. Campaign Audits

Do you know what’s working and what isn’t? To determine your PPC campaigns’ direction, it’s essential to understand where they’ve already been. A specialist audits existing campaigns and other marketing efforts to identify strengths and weaknesses and create a path forward. 

Audit points drive results. Learn more about how in-depth video audits helped one company see a 132% jump in YouTube traffic.

4. Plan of Action

A PPC strategist creates a clear, comprehensive roadmap outlining steps and tactics to achieve the campaign’s goals. This roadmap encompasses all stages of the campaign strategy from start to finish, including budget allocation, research, creation, testing, and follow-up to keep things on track and deliver results. 

5. Precise Targeting

Any good PPC specialist knows that well-optimized, well-targeted campaigns are crucial for success—and they pull this off like the experts they are. They’re masters of crafting the proper message to reach the right audience at the right time to increase engagement and conversions. 

6. Tracking Results

Reporting and analytics are a PPC strategist’s bread and butter. They continuously monitor key performance metrics, including click-through rates and return on ad spend, to help them make informed adjustments and optimize campaigns for even better results. 

7. Retargeting Strategies

Retargeting is a powerful tool that a PPC strategist uses to re-engage with customers who may have already interacted with your brand but have yet to convert. Strategists nurture leads through the customer journey to keep your brand top-of-mind and reinforce your message through better-tailored ads. 

“I recommend setting this up every time you build out a new campaign so that you can always have retargeting for every effort … so nothing is lost.” —Stephen Peterson, Big Leap Paid Media Manager

PPC Specialists’ Expert-Level Skills

Mastering the art of PPC advertising requires a unique set of skills and expertise. It’s not a task anyone can jump into and execute flawlessly. There are many nuances involved to really get it right. These essential skills and qualities benefit PPC efforts in almost any digital context:

• Keyword Research

A strong foundation in keyword research is a vital skill for PPC specialists. Through comprehensive keyword analysis, a PPC strategist identifies relevant, high-performing keywords that align with your campaign’s objectives to ensure effective targeting. 

• Audience Understanding

Effective PPC advertising hinges on a concrete grasp of the target audience. A PPC specialist takes the time to research and analyze the intended audience’s demographics, preferences, and behaviors. By gaining insight into what resonates with potential customers, they can design campaigns that speak directly to audience needs. 

• Knowledge of Paid Ad Networks

A PPC strategist understands the nuances, features, and targeting options offered by paid advertising networks like Google Ads, Bing Ads, and social media platforms. This understanding helps them optimize campaigns effectively across different platforms. 

• SEO Skills

PPC and SEO go hand in hand. PPC specialists are experts in SEO principles, which allows them to align keywords, pages, and content strategies to complement SEO efforts. This expertise enables them to carve opportunities for organic visibility and digital marketing success. 

• UX Insight

A good PPC specialist considers the user experience throughout the entire customer journey. They optimize landing pages, ad formats, and messaging to create a seamless and engaging user experience. 

• Creativity

A PPC specialist flexes their creative skills to brainstorm innovative strategies and craft compelling and appealing campaigns. They understand how to captivate the audience’s attention and stand out in a competitive marketplace.

• PPC Campaign Analytics

Analyzing campaign performance metrics is crucial. PPC specialists track and interpret data on click-through rates, conversion rates, cost-per-acquisition, and other key metrics to enable them to make informed decisions and optimize campaigns for better results. 

• Communication

Specialists excel in clearly conveying campaign goals and strategies to clients and team members. They articulate complex concepts concisely and understandably, fostering solid relationships and alignment with your goals. 

• Experience Across Verticals

A PPC specialist can navigate different verticals and adapt strategies to diverse business objectives. They have broad experience spanning multiple industries. Through this experience, they become familiar with specific audiences, trends, and market landscapes.

• Proactivity

PPC specialists are proactive problem solvers who anticipate challenges, identify opportunities, and implement effective solutions. Rather than set it and forget it, they keep their eyes on progress, bringing new ideas and strategies to the table. 

Advice from Our PPC Specialists

Straight from the experts, these Big Leap resources feature valuable information, strategies, and techniques to optimize your PPC campaigns and set you on the path to success.

What Exactly Is PPC?

As an online advertising model, PPC differs from other forms of marketing in the digital world. To grasp the potential, it’s essential to understand the many ways to use PPC and the advantages of each type. 

We look at how PPC works on popular platforms to provide insight into the fundamentals of PPC ads and its potential impact on businesses.

PPC Costs & Beyond: How Much Should You Spend on Advertising?

If you’re planning to embark on PPC marketing campaigns or looking to optimize existing efforts, you’ve likely asked yourself this one question: What’s the appropriate advertising budget?

Because of industry competition, keyword choice, and ad quality, the answer is not always so simple. Fortunately, we offer practical guidance and insights to empower marketers to ensure their PPC investments will pay off in the long run. 

8 PPC Optimization Strategies You Need to Try

How can your business enhance PPC campaigns to maximize your efforts? You can do this with mindful strategies that reinforce and optimize your content. 

Strategies can take many shapes, such as keyword targeting, implementing ad extensions, and upgrading your ad copy. To increase click-through rates, we dive deep into eight optimization strategies—including how to apply them and why they work. 

9 PPC Trends to Guide Your 2023 Digital Strategy

Keeping tabs on trends is a vital part of a digital marketing strategy. More importantly, effectively leveraging those trends is the only way to stay ahead of the curve, especially for PPC advertising. 

In the rapidly changing world of PPC marketing, our experts offer valuable insights and tips to take advantage of this year’s trends, including new ad formats, automation, video ads, audience targeting, and more. 

Using Post IDs to Boost Engagement

“People often ask me what they can do if they start a new campaign or a new audience … One of my favorite hacks to get engagement running quicker is to run a post ID. Post IDs are a great way to test out a new audience and to hopefully jumpstart the audience.” —Stephen Pereson, Big Leap Paid Media Manager

Watch: Using Post IDs to Boost Engagement

6 PPC Metrics You Need to Track

It isn’t enough to simply implement PPC campaigns. You must monitor essential performance metrics to gauge success. 

Specifically, you need to monitor these six key metrics to get a good picture of a campaign’s impressions, audience engagement, and market reach. Monitoring equips marketing teams with the knowledge to measure performance and analyzes whether you’re spending your money effectively in a competitive ad space. 

Fix These 11 PPC Mistakes Now

Like any marketing effort, PPC advertising is not without its pitfalls. While finding what works sometimes takes trial and error, you can take steps to rectify common PPC mistakes before you can say “ineffective ad copy.”

With these actionable tips, you can avoid costly errors and elevate the success of your campaigns by understanding how these issues impact campaign performance ahead of time. 

What to Look for in a PPC Specialist

Whether it’s an individual or an agency, there are various factors you must consider when hiring a specialist. To ensure you make the right choice, pay close attention to the following key aspects.

Experience and Expertise

Your specialist should have a proven track record and substantial experience in managing successful campaigns. Assess their knowledge of various PPC platforms, industry trends, and best practices. A specialist who has worked with clients in your industry or vertical provides valuable insights and tailored strategies. 

Communication

Effective communication is vital for a smooth partnership. The PPC specialist you hire should actively listen to your goals, ask relevant questions, and offer a clear picture of their strategies and processes. They should also be responsive and readily available to connect throughout your campaign. 

Transparency

Regular updates help you understand the impact of your PPC investment, allowing you to make informed decisions about future strategies. A reliable strategist is always transparent in their practices and reporting regarding your campaign, including key metrics, conversions, and your return on investment. 

Adaptability

Because the digital world is ever-evolving, so are PPC strategies. A good specialist embraces these shifts and stays abreast of industry trends, algorithm changes, and emerging platforms. They adjust strategies and seize new opportunities, adapting to the shifting landscape to capitalize on the potential benefits for your business. 

Customer Reviews

Customer reviews offer valuable insights into a strategist’s capabilities, expertise, and track record of results. Positive reviews, like those on Clutch, serve as testimonials of a strategist’s proficiency in driving successful campaigns. These reviews can also provide peace of mind that you’ve partnered with a trusted professional.

PPC Case Study: Truvy

Truvy, a rapidly growing online retailer, set out to scale its online presence and boost sales in the highly competitive beauty and wellness industry. The goal? Use PPC marketing to improve Truvy’s online visibility and drive qualified leads. 

Big Leap’s PPC team focused on paid advertisements, retargeting, and sales campaigns with the following results:

• Increased generated revenue by over 10,000%
• Increased return on ad spend 6:1
• Increased search impressions by over 200%

Read more about this PPC strategy and the resulting success accomplished through the partnership between Big Leap and Truvy.

Leverage PPC for Success

With expert-level skills, a PPC specialist can craft an action plan to transform your paid advertising game and help you optimize every click and conversion opportunity. 

Ready to speak with a PPC consultant to build brand awareness and boost your revenue? Get in touch with us to take advantage of Big Leap’s PPC experts and unlock the potential of your digital marketing efforts.