Scott Carruthers’ Post

💙 What are you proud of this week? Working in PPC can get a little overwhelming sometimes - you can get lost in the numbers, or caught up chasing your tail with client requests - and sometimes, you can lose track of why you're doing it. Which is why our PPC team meeting yesterday was a breath of fresh air. In a change from our usual programming (read: debating over which order your metrics should go in in a report, or complaining about Performance Max), Sophie and the Manchester team took us through all the reasons that they are proud this week. This included; 🏦 Delivering best ever results on an account, despite a very limited budget! ☎ Forging a stronger relationship with a client - being the go-to person at the agency for the client to reach out to. 📝 Getting on top of organisational skills with fresh roadmaps for clients. 🤝 Working more closely with other teams in the agency to deliver strong results. Sometimes, with how busy we can get, it's difficult to see the wood for the trees, but taking a step back can really put things into perspective and make you realise how much you have to be proud of - even if it's just the little things! 🐝 Huge thank you to Team MCR for putting things in perspective! What have you done this week that's made you proud? #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads

🎁 Struggling with Enhanced Conversions? Google have a shiny new product to help! At this point - if you're using Google Ads Tag conversions, you should also be using Enhanced Conversions to send hashed first-party conversion data to Google to better power your Google Ads tools (such as Smart Bidding) - however, it can be a little tricky to ensure it's set up correctly. That's where EC Assist comes in... Released in the last week, EC Assist is a Chrome Plug-in that helps you troubleshoot your Enhanced Conversions set up - providing in-depth validation across the areas that you're using Enhanced Conversions. Simply install the Chrome Plug-in, run a test conversion and get a full diagnosis as well as suggested next steps for your Enhanced Conversion set up. Grab the Chrome extension from the link here; https://lnkd.in/et2sqFke #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads

🐢 Imagine the Ninja Turtles without Michelangelo. Or Green Day without Billie Joe. Or even imagine FRIENDS without Phoebe (God forbid! 😱). Just like all of those groups, our PPC Team is amazing... but we're missing something important... YOU! 🤓 Are you a data-driven PPC expert with a passion for helping clients to succeed? 🤝 Do you thrive in a collaborative environment - discussing and debating new features to stay ahead of the game? 🎉 Do you get excited all things Google Ads - sharing knowledge and analysing data to drive strong results? 👴 Or do you think you could help me get my pop culture references out of the 1990s? If you're ready to bring your skills to a team that values your contributions and supports your growth, we want to hear from you! Apply at the link below - we're on the lookout for analysts in Leeds, Manchester and London! 🎯 Work with a team who are as passionate about PPC as you are. 🚀 An ever changing landscape means there are always opportunities for development and career progression. 💡 We're always on the lookout for fresh ideas and new strategies to keep us ahead of the curve. 🌟 Join a supportive and fun-loving team that values creativity, collaboration, and success. https://lnkd.in/eKpKzemS #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads

🐤 Meanwhile, over on X... Strong opinions on Brand bidding... but should you or shouldn't you? The anonymous public say no! To be honest, the opinions over here on LinkedIn seem to be just as strong. And unfortunately, I think that the answer is... "it depends" 🤷♂️ There are lots of justifications for either running Brand campaigns (Brand protection, unpredictable competition etc) or for stopping them altogether (unnecessary additional costs) - but whether or not you run them is down to you as a Brand - there are no hard and fast rules. If you want to find out how your Brand campaigns are performing, it's really easy to run a Brand incrementality test - pausing and unpausing your Brand activity on alternating days and measuring the impact on your Branded Organic traffic. But this wouldn't paint the whole picture around the other positive effects your Brand ads are having, and wouldn't answer for a changing field of competition. Given there are so many different elements to Brand bidding - are you asking the right questions? What is your approach? #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads

💸 PPC Budget Quiz Time... Do you know how much your account can spend following changes to your budget in Google Ads? #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads

🛒 One of the most overlooked areas of PPC Optimisation is Product Feed Testing! Too often, we see agencies just manipulating what they have in the Google Ads interface, and not thinking about external data sources or other things they could have control over. In today's landscape, we've spoken again and again about how the AI is only as good as the quality of data that you give it - and one of (if not the) biggest data sources a retailer has is their product feed. This is particularly important with products like Performance Max where you have less control over the creative or which platforms the products are showing on. In this Case Study for a large retailer, we used a 3rd Party Shopping Feed Tool to A/B test changes to the feed. 🎯 Adding additional data (size and colour) into the visible product name drove a 127% increase in revenue (at a stronger level of efficiency). 🎯 Improving how the product was categorised in Google's eyes drove a 69% increase in revenue (again, at a stronger level of efficiency). This shows it's not just about what you're showing the end user in your ads, but also the information that you're providing to Google to help serve those ads, that can help drive better results. Do you have a process in place for feed optimisation? Are you looking at what data you're feeding into the machine learning? #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads #shoppingads #shoppingfeed #productfeed

📚 When you work within a team, there are lots of opportunities to "gather", whether that's regular meetings, team updates or larger events. Since reading it, this book has been my go-to for inspiration on how to make those meetings and events work better for the people involved. The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker ⭐⭐⭐⭐ This book provides practical advice for creating gatherings that foster genuine connections and purpose - whilst there are a lot of recommendations that fit across the wider-world, I found a lot of the advice to be very practical for the working environment; helping to facilitate meetings that encourage teams to work better together. "Routine is the enemy of meaningful gathering" - every gathering should have a clear purpose that drives how it is organised and executed. Avoid blindly following "what has always been done". Quality over quantity - be very intentional with your guest list and ensure you invite those who will contribute in a meaningful way. Even if people don't actively disrupt your meetings, they shouldn't be invited if they're not contributing. Use your power as host - don't be a "chill" host. You should be using your position to direct the meeting, using your authority to get the most from your guests, rather than sitting back and letting the meeting happen. There are also lots of smaller, very practical pieces of advice throughout, for example, never starting or ending your event with logistics. There are incredibly important parts of your meeting and will be remembered by the participants, so treat them as such! Key Takeaway Purposeful gatherings can transform the way we connect and engage with each other. Therefore, your gathering (or meeting) should always have a purpose. Understanding why you are meeting leads you to be able to better organise, run and host the meeting - and ultimately leads to a better experience (and better results for all involved). "Routine is the enemy of meaningful gathering". With these takeaways in hand, I regularly look at the recurring meetings in our calendars and take a step back - carrying out a reset and getting to the root of why and how we meet as a team. It feels like now might be the time for one of those resets!! ---- Each week, I'm sharing a book I've read, a quick summary, and my key takeaway. I'm always on the lookout for new reads, so if you've read something great recently, let me know in the comments👇 #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads

⚠ PSA - if you love the content that someone has posted on LinkedIn and want to share it with your network - there's literally a button for that! I get that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but LinkedIn is getting a little silly now! In the past few weeks, I've seen people; - copy and paste posts from other users. Literally posting someone else's detailed thoughts and opinions verbatim as if they were their own. - copy and paste peoples opinions into ChatGPT and then post the result onto LinkedIn - the original creator's thoughts and opinions shining through. - take content that others have created and post it without credit or mention of the original author. I get it - once something is on social media / the internet, it's free game - but I really believe that we can do better. Give credit where it's due (and without having to be asked!) Bonus tip - if you've taken someone's content to share (ideas, images, whatever...), if you type "@" and start typing their name, you'll be able to tag them in your post to give them credit 😁 #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads #linkedin

👍 Since Search Terms are the topic of the moment - do you want to download all* of your Performance Max Search Queries without a script? They're there in the interface waiting for you! *actually around 75% of your search terms - Google aren't going to give you everything now are they?! 😂 - Head over to your Performance Max campaign - Click into the insights tab - Find your search terms insights page (under Consumer Spotlight) - Click "View detailed report" Now, you could go through and open up each of your categories to see the search terms under each one. - But if you hit the download button, you'll get all of your PMax search terms in an Excel / Google Sheets doc 😍 This is super useful for identifying new search opportunities, seeing where PMax is picking up terms where you don't think it should be and giving insights as to how your PMax campaigns should be structured. Have you downloaded your PMax SQRs yet?! #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads #performancemax

💪 Was last night's announcement about Search Terms the most excited that the collective PPC community has ever been? Not a bad word to be said! That increased Search Term visibility has been a long time coming! 🙌 #ppc #ppcchat #google #googleads #wwf