Pay-per-call for all numbers in Google Adwords

Google is to go one step further with its pay-per-call facility. Until now, if Adwords advertisers included a telephone number in their Google adverts, it had to be ‘clickable’ which meant setting up what’s known as ‘call extensions’ in their Adwords account.

From last Friday Google started rolling out the automation of that facility - in other words, any phone number appearing in a Google Adwords ad will be clickable. Don’t get too excited if you’re a Gloucestershire or even UK advertiser, as it’s on a roll out.

If you’re wondering how this works in practice, the answer is via mobile phones. Accessing the web via smartphones is where the growth is and this gives Google another way of extracting more cash from advertisers. Er, sorry, it’s another Google innovation to enable advertisers to increase response and hence return on investment.

Putting our world weary cynicism to one side for just a moment, for local businesses this should be a good thing. It makes sense that having found what you want via Google, the next step would be call and reserve a table, book a cinema seat or just to shout at a hapless customer service expert straight out of nappies (that’s ‘diapers’ to our US readers).

So what’s the damage? A click on your phone number will cost the same as a click on your ad and the caller will get charged too.

Definitely worth testing  but make sure you’ve got your website ready for mobile browsing first and that you’ve got call handling people in place for when the ads appear - preferably men in long trousers (pants to you US types) or women of a certain age.

Google now allows pay-per-click advertisers who use its Adwords platform to target users of smart-phones and tablets, such as the iPad.

Hold the front page!

Ok, maybe it’s not so thrilling but it’s a recognition of the trend towards accessing the internet via mobile platforms, a trend that will continue, even in Gloucestershire. And it’s important for business that want the most from their investment in search engine marketing.

If you’re a current Adwords advertiser and you want to either target users of mobiles or, conversely, stop your ads from appearing on such devices, go to your campaign settings and click on ‘Networks and Devices’ where you can select accordingly. You’ll then have another testing metric to add to your armoury. If you’re in a market such as retail, hospitality or perhaps selling something that appeals to young, tech-savvy types, it’s possible that your campaign will perform better on mobiles.

Local search is becoming more important. The ability to control the display of your ads, if say, you own a pub or restaurant, so that you control both the area and the devices in which your ads appear, has got to be a good thing.

BUT, is your website suitable for mobile browsers? If it isn’t, you could spend your precious click budget on traffic that goes to less than satisfactory pages. And if your site is built in Flash, it won’t be viewable on an i-Phone.

The good news is that those advertisers who take the time and trouble to test this new facility will be in the minority. When mobile internet really takes off - and it will - they’ll be the ones with a competitive advantage.