PPC advertising is one of the most powerful ways to grow your business. It’s also one of the easiest and most affordable. But like anything else in life, you need to avoid pitfalls if you want it to work well for you. Here are seven common mistakes that could be holding back your PPC campaign.

1. Not Having a Specific Goal or Conversions in Mind

There are two common mistakes that people make when writing ad copy for PPC advertising. The first is not having a specific goal for each campaign, and the second is not tracking conversions (sales/leads). Without both of these things in place, you wouldn’t know what’s working. You could be wasting money or missing out on potential business.

2. Not Using Negative Keywords

Negative keywords are words or phrases that you want to exclude from your campaign. This ensures that your ads won’t show up when someone is searching for the term. There’s no need to waste money if they’re not looking for what you’re selling.

3. Not Using a Relevant Landing Page

There’s no point in driving traffic if they land on a page that is not relevant. You could be wasting money and losing potential sales this way. Be sure your landing pages are specific to the keywords you’re targeting for each campaign.

4. Having Too Broad of Keyword Phrases

You also want to make sure that you don’t use broad match keywords for every keyword. You’ll get traffic, but some of it won’t be the right kind. Over time, this could lead to high costs and poor results.

5. Using the Same Keyword Phrases for Every Ad

You also want to vary your keyword phrases so that you can track which ones are working best. You don’t have to have unique keywords for every ad, but try to target different ones as much as possible. This allows you to test out different variations and discover what works best.

6. Setting Excessive Budgets

One of the worst PPC advertising mistakes you can make is to set a really high budget and let it run indefinitely. This might seem like a great idea, especially if your conversion rates are good, but the reality is that traffic won’t last forever. You could be throwing away money just because you’ve got plenty to spare.

7. Not Using Ad Extensions

Ad extensions allow you to get more ad real estate on the page, meaning more clicks. They’re also a great way to boost your CTR and give you an edge over the competition. This is especially true for location extensions. People are more likely to click when they can see where you are located.

Almost half of all searches conducted on a mobile device are looking for local results, with 61% resulting in a purchase. PPC advertising is an effective way to get your business found wherever a buyer might be searching. The key to success with any form of marketing is understanding what works, and it doesn’t hurt to learn from others’ mistakes.