I covered ad extensions in depth in the AdWords PPC Search Training Course but it’s worth covering in a live hangout.

Ad extensions allow you to help provide the full picture to customers and present yourself as being the solution to your clients issues.

The biggest benefit to ad extensions is the ability to boost your CTR (Click Through Rate). This can set you apart from your competition and you will attain more market share (Impressions) and very likely help to boost your quality score which will in turn help to drive down your CPC (Cost Per Click).

The boost in CTR comes from you having an expanded ad which gives the searcher more of an opportunity to click your ad.

Here is the hangout video for this written guide

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AdWords has several different ways to use extensions

• Sitelink Extensions
• Location Extensions
• Call Extensions
• App Extensions
• Review Extensions
• Callout Extensions
• Structured Snippet Extensions
• Price Extensions

Structured Snippet Extensions

A structured snippet is very similar to a call out extension. It’s not clickable but is intended to provide the searcher with more information about your product line and services.

You are able to select any of the following headers

• Amenities
• Brands
• Courses
• Degree programs
• Destinations
• Featured hotels
• Insurance coverage
• Models
• Neighborhoods
• Service catalog
• Shows
• Styles
• Types

It’s strongly recommended that you will in information for all the available headers that apply to your business. AdWords will show the header that it feels best matches the user’s search.

This information can be a great way to highlight what kind of products you sell or provide additional information about your services.

If you where a car mechanic and offered free break inspections then this would be a great place to say that. Under the Service Catalog you might also want to list the other main kind of services you provide for example.

At this time structured snippets only show on Search Network Only and Search Network with Display Select campaigns.

Price Extensions

Price extensions are for Mobile only currently. You want to ensure your site looks great and functions well on mobile before you start running this extension.

Local Mobile searches continue to increase month over month so this is a fantastic way of highlighting your services and providing the cost of your services.

Using the BRAKE Repair example you may want to include multiple Price extensions such as

• inspection cost
• pad replacement
• rotor replacement
• caliper replacement
• brake bleeding
• fluid flush

This is intended to showcase what products or services you offer and if someone taps on a specific item in your price menu they will be taken directly to your site.

You will want to include 5 of more price extensions and will want to customize the final url for each one to best match the product or service being described. You do not have to use different final urls but it’s always a good idea to ensure you are sending people to the most relevant page on your website.

The headline can be 25 characters max and each description can be 25 characters max. I strongly recommend you shorten the headline as much as possible to ensure it’s fully visible on a mobile phone.

You will be charged for each click through your price extension. The good news is you will only be charged a max of two times and if someone clicks let’s say Break Repair and then quickly moves over to Tune-up you may just get charged once because 1 click may be seen as invalid because it was in such a short time frame.

Sitelink Extensions

Sitelink Extensions extend you ad by adding 4 alternative top level links that may be relevant to the person doing the search.

For an ad targeting Car Paint I can ad site extensions expanding my product line.

The headlines for site links are clickable but the description text is not. The description text may not show in all cases so your main products or services should be linked in the header and describe what that page is about.

The above example is perfect for someone who may of searched for “car touchup paint” Are they looking for Spray paint, a Touchup Pen, a kit… This is where you can highlight closed related items to the users search.

Each Site extension can go to its own final destination so you can take people directly to the product or service they are interested in.  You will need at least 2 Sitelinks but should have 4 in place as up to 4 can show.

Call Extensions

Call Extensions will show a call button next to it on mobile and a forwarding number on Desktop. For service based companies this is a huge win and can really help to drive qualified traffic.

Having an image ad such as a phone icon or an extra line in your ad copy that shows the phone number can really help expand that ad and give people a clear choice to connect with a live person.

App Extensions

For 99% of all small businesses this won’t really apply to you but still it’s a good option if you have an app and that app offers value to the end user.

With this extension you can prompt users to install your app. This will link directly to the App stores location on that specific device. It will only show on mobile related devices that support that app.

Review Extensions

I’m a big fan of the review extension. More and more I keep using Google + reviews to help me make buying decisions on the local level. This is not for these kinds of reviews but for reviews specific to your company.

You cannot use your own customer reviews and the review has to be online.  It should talk more about your company as a whole rather than a specific product or service.  You need to have 2 reviews listed before they can be shown in your ad copy and the review needs to be over a year old.  The submitted reviews all go through a manual review process that is stringent.  Don’t be surprised if in the first go around the review gets turned down as they have multiple stipulations.

For many of my clients I find snippets of something someone says online in a forum and tend to use this.

You are not currently charged a click cost when someone clicks on the link to read the review of your site.

Callout Extensions

These links are not clickable. They are meant to highlight your products or services and expanded information about your company.

In the below example you can see this company mentions “Hurry, Limited Inventory”, “New Events Every Day” and “Apparel, Home & More

I will often put in things like “Free Shipping” if available. “Currently Open” if a local business or something else to highlight a benefit of your company, a benefit of your product or service and then a call to action or a fear of loss statement such as “Appointments Booking Fast”

Callouts are a simple way to extend your ad copy and provide more value to the user. Use them as they are not clickable and cost nothing.

Location Extensions

I saved location Extensions for last because there is a lot going on here currently with location extensions and will be even more in the near future.

If you services a local clientele then a location extensions is a MUST have. I can’t stress how valuable this can be.

In the above example both of these ads are using location extensions. This search was done on a desktop computer. When done you may get a better looking map icon and the distance from your current location to the store location may be present.

If I were to click the location button on my desktop I will be show Google Maps and can then put in my location to travel to the store location.

You also are able to show on Google Maps when you use a location extension for Search Only and Search with Display Select campaigns.

I can’t stress enough how many people are using Google Maps to locate businesses. This is a really great way to put your company out there so you need to be using this to drive foot traffic to your business store front.

In the future

Location extensions are expanding. Soon retailers who have store fronts will be able to track those who do a search and then click your ad as well as come to visit your store front location.

This option is not currently available to most AdWords accounts but most likely will start to roll out in early 2017.

I do not believe the tracking will be 100% as it requires the user to have their GPS on which not all will. However those like car dealerships who really want to drive foot traffic to their locations will benefit greatly from store visit conversions and will be able to optimize based on this metric.

See https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/6100636?hl=en for more details.

Another item that is soon coming down is promoted Map pins. This will allow your business to show on peoples maps when they are on their way to a destination. This could be used for branding purposes or if you are a food place used to help let people know where they can go to eat when they are already close to your business.

I’m really excited to try out these new features and will be talking more in-depth on them as they start to roll out to test accounts.

If you are feeling a little overwhelmed by all the ad extensions don’t. They are very easy to implement and should not take you long to implement.

These extensions combined can drastically expand your ad and give you a leg up over the competition not yet taking advantage of all these extensions.

The most important extensions for most people are going to be, site links, callouts, location, call extensions. I would nail these first then move onto the Price and Structured Data extensions.

Next Week

I have not decided on the topic for next week.  I think it might be time to try and cover some Facebook topics such as tracking because many people have a hard time setting that up.

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