It’s high time that you get familiarized with various PPC tools for marketers since paid advertising as a marketing avenue is used by most business owners and marketers to promote their businesses.
45% of small businesses involved in doing that are involved in doing some kind of business online depend on PPC marketing to give their brand exposure and generate traffic.
But due to a lack of knowledge on how to properly implement PPC marketing strategies and make use of PPC tools to track its performance to derive valuable insights, many of us fail to make the most benefit out of the money we invest in these ads.
Before we delve into learning about the best PPC tools for marketers, let’s quickly understand what PPC ads are and how they are helpful in growing our business online.
Pay-per-click ads or PPC ads as we commonly call them are a type of online advertising model where the advertisers only have to pay if a user clicks on their ad. We call it cost-per-click (CPC).
They commonly appear alongside search engine results giving them more visibility, which also is one of its many advantages.
The benefits of carrying out PPC marketing for your business include:
- Ads appearing in highly visibly placed on the SERP
- Being cost-effective and getting quicker results
- Ability to control and test your PPC ads
- Being able to target your ideal customers
- Resistant to changes in algorithm updates
- Complements your SEO strategies smoothly
When someone carries out an online search using a search term that includes a keyword or a phrase that is relevant to your ad, the SERP (Search Engine Results Page) displays your ad which will encourage the user to take the action you desire. This will incur a fee which is your CPC or cost per click.
PPC marketing campaigns are really very helpful in generating good quality leads for your website and if done right using the best PPC tools for marketers, you will get a good return on investment from your PPC campaigns.
So now that we have a clear understanding of the importance and benefits of PPC marketing, let’s jump into our main topic-
18 BEST PPC TOOLS FOR MARKETERS IN 2022
For a better understanding of the usage, we will classify the tools into the following categories:
- Insight Tools
- Management Tools
- Reporting and Performance Tools
PPC Ads INSIGHT TOOLS:
Before we begin our PPC marketing, carrying out research to gather insights that will help us plan our PPC campaigns and target the appropriate audiences in a cost-effective way is imperative. This is where the insight tools will help us gather accurate information on the basis of competitors’ data, keywords, and demographics.
Google Search Engine
To get started with gathering insight about trends on Google, related to what people are searching for, keywords frequently used, and competitors’ websites appearing during a search; the best place is the Google search engine itself.
When you google a keyword, on the SERP you will find your competitors who are using the same keyword to target their PPC ads.
Similarly, you can get alternative keyword ideas from the “searches related to” section. Look at the kind of PPC ad copy your competitors have and the landing pages of the competitor’s PPC ads.
With just a simple search, you get lots of insight quickly for free and that is why Google can be considered one of the best PPC tools for marketers.
Google Keyword Planner
This PPC tool is specific to PPC ad campaigns that are created using Google. Keyword Planner not only helps you research and discover new keywords, but it also gives you suggested bid estimates for each keyword and the volume of searches it gets.
This will give you an idea about keywords you should invest in for your PPC ad campaign and the required advertising budget.
Microsoft Advertising Intelligence
Apart from Google, Microsoft’s Bing is one of the most widely used search engines. The PPC ads through Microsoft Advertising appear on Bing, Yahoo, and MSN; so we should also make sure to not miss the opportunity of reaching to users on bing and other related search engines
Just like in the case of Google, you can run a simple search of a keyword or your competitor on Bing to gather data for your PPC ad campaign.
You can also make use of tools provided by Microsoft like Keyword Planner to do keyword research, find out the bidding prices, and so on.
SEMRush
SEMRush is a power PPC tool that comes with a lot of different functions. It not only helps you find the right keywords for your PPC ad campaigns but also helps you find successful ads by your competitors.
However, we would like to highlight again that if you have extensive digital marketing needs as a professional, then this is the best tool for you. If not, SEMRush with its many features will be expensive and difficult to explore for those looking for basic PPC ad requirements.
SpyFu
SpyFu is a paid PPC tool that helps you find out your competitors' ad campaigns and their variations to plan your PPC ad campaign better. It has extensive features that include AdWords templates that you can import into your Google AdWords.
Using SpyFu you can boost your PPC campaigns by gaining insight into competitors and grouping your keywords for each ad group.
iSpionage
This is another great competitive intelligence PPC tool that gives you a lot of insight into your competitor’s PPC ad campaigns. This helps you to generate more leads and conversions by taking advantage of the areas your competitor is lacking in terms of targeting, competing for keywords, placing bids, or ad copies.
Keyword Spy
This free SEO and PPC tool for marketers will disclose all the secrets of your competitor’s PPC ad campaigns right from the keywords they are targeting to how much they are spending on Google AdWords. You can also get information on the effectiveness of the PPC ad content that has been used.
Pathmatics
Pathmatics is not only a PPC tool used for gaining insight into competitors’ advertising strategies on Google AdWords but it goes beyond that. You can find out about the creatives they are using, their ad copies, and landing pages, and it also tells you about the number of mobile users who clicked on your PPC ads by tracking different ad networks.
PPC Ads Management Tools:
Once you have gained insight from the gaps in your competitor’s PPC ad campaigns and have enough information, it’s time that you start your own. With the help of management PPC tools for marketers, you can better manage your various PPC ad accounts in one place with the added advantage of many other functions as well
Google/Bing Ads Editor
Using this PPC ads tool for editing, you can download the application on your computer and sync it with your accounts which will enable you to work on them and even make changes when you are offline to update your revisions later. You can make bulk changes, manage various campaigns, and view performance statistics all in one place.
Optmyzr
If you run PPC ads through both Google and Microsoft then Optmyzr is the best PPC tool that has won several awards. It helps you create and manage campaigns very easily by optimizing your bidding, budget, keywords, scores, and ad copies, and it even provides performance reports, in all-in-one!
AdEspresso by Hootsuite
AdEspresso is another PPC tool that is a one-stop solution for all your PPC ad management needs. You can manage your PPC ads on Google, Facebook, and Instagram using just this one platform. It is integrated with Canva as well and has an easy-to-use interface that makes managing your PPC ads smooth and efficient.
Lunio
A lot of times, marketers tend to lose money on their PPC ads due to bots or fraudulent clicks that cost them money. So to prevent such bots or fraudulent clicks, Lunio uses an IP blocking system to protect your PPC ads and save you money.
CHEQ for PPC is also a similar PPC tool that saves you money from spending on invalid clicks across major PPC channels thereby resulting in good ROI.
PPC Ad Editor
One of the best things about PPC Ad Editor is that you not only get to manage and optimize your various PPC ads but also review your ads through mockups to provide faster solutions and report about their performance which will help you to create better ads.
PPC Ads Reporting and Performance Tools:
As discussed before, your PPC ad campaigns are more like an investment that needs to be tracked and reviewed to see if they are performing well and bringing the desired results with respect to the money you have invested. The following PPC tools will not only help you analyze the performance of PPC ad campaigns but will also give you informative reports to assist you in making corrective action.
WordStream Performance
This PPC tool is one of the best in terms of grading your Ad campaign’s performance to provide you insight on wasted clicks, click-through rates, impressions, mobile friendliness, etc through its scoring system. It works with other platforms as well to analyze all your PPC campaigns.
Optimizely
The conversion rates of your PPC ads also depend on the effectiveness of your landing pages, and this is precisely where Optimizely can aid you. It tests various versions of your web pages to see which performs better through testing, and behavior study for you to create a more targeted PPC ad campaign.
Adalysis
Using Adalysis you can boost your PPC ad campaign using its automation strategies to monitor, analyze, and report on the performance of your PPC ads across Google and Microsoft. It provides scores and recommendations as well to make improvements by eliminating keyword conflicts, broken links, negative keywords, etc.
Google Analytics
If you have a website then you must have already set up a Google Analytics account for your website. Through Google Analytics you can pull up data and gather reports on your PPC ad campaigns given if you have also set up and connected your Google Ads to your Google Analytics.
Google Data Studio
With the help of Google Data Studio, you get aggregate performance reports from various Google platforms like Google Ads, Google Analytics, Youtube Analytics, and more. Using this one tool you can track the performance and gather data from all.
Depending on the various aspects involved in creating and running PPC ad campaigns you can make use of the above-discussed PPC tools for marketers to increase your ad visibility, generate leads, and bring more conversions.
Based on quick research or in-depth study you can either go for free PPC tools or pay for the tools to get more extensive services
Either way, you are now equipped with tools to create successful PPC ad campaigns.
If you need help in setting up PPC Ad Campaigns, our Digital Marketing team, consisting of professionals with vast experience and an in-depth understanding of PPC marketing tactics, is always available to assist you with your PPC ad campaigns, to help grow your business.