We are often asked what the best campaign length is for a Search Marketing Google Ads campaign. Will two 3 month campaigns bring the same results as one 6 month campaign? Where is the sweet spot? To find out, we dug into data from the Search Marketing campaigns that we are managing. The short answer is that, yes, there is a difference. And it’s bigger than expected.
We looked at fifteen typical Saskatchewan businesses and measured Search Marketing conversion activity – a phone call or an email to the business that was generated by the Search Marketing campaign. We typically see some volatility in the first 3 months of the campaign as the advertising messages work their way through the Google universe, and we did with these fifteen businesses. After that 3 month period, however, the growth was significant.
The table below shows the growth that we saw each month, compared to the third month of the campaign.
So what does this mean in terms of the actual numbers of conversions that a business could expect? For the sake of simplicity, in the example below we made the assumption that the customer averaged 100 conversions per month during the first 3 months. Things really take off from there.
Our 6 month campaigns are providing much better value than 3 month campaigns. And the difference in value between a 6 month campaign and a 12 month campaign is staggering.
Based on this information and our experience, we highly recommend the following steps for your own Search Marketing campaigns:
- Be open to considering a 12 month campaign.
- If you currently have a 3 or 6 month campaign, make sure to renew it before it expires to capture that future growth potential.
- Keep your creative design, campaign direction and landing page consistent throughout the campaign period.
- Note that delaying a renewal, making major changes in the midst of a campaign, or launching a new website during the campaign can actually create a 50% to 70% drop off in conversions (when compared to month 3).
- Stability and consistency throughout the campaign period provides our Search Marketing team and Google with the freedom to optimize the campaigns and maximize your returns.
As always, our Search Marketing team is happy to discuss how we can help your business reach its full potential. Contact us today!
This article was co-written by Directwest’s Allan Millham, Research Manager, and Nelson Hackewich, Search Marketing Specialist.
