Split Testing Affiliate Marketing PPC Ad Campaigns

by PPC Bully on May 11, 2009  –  Share This

If you are a newcomer to affiliate marketing one of the elements you want to consider in your pay per click advertising campaign is split testing. Split testing is an effective strategy for maximizing the profitability of your niche product.

Failing to split test your pay per click ads means that you are leaving money on the table. The whole idea behind a successful affiliate marketing campaign is to make the most money possible. Let’s take a look at split testing along with a few tips and strategies on maximizing your marketing campaign.

Split Testing Google Ads

Split testing your Google ad copy involves creating ad groups with one keyword per ad group. Setting up split testing is relative simple and is a very effective way of measuring ad results.

Create Titles: Create several different titles to your ad that are based on the results of your keyword research. Use a different keyword combination for each title to allow for measuring specific test results.

Create Description Lines: You will be working with two description lines. Try to write the description according to the keywords people are using to find your product. The description will need to be compelling, create a call to action, and must reinforce the message you are trying to convey regarding your product. Since you will be testing more than one ad, use a different keyword combination for each description.

Disable “Ad Optimization”: Disable the “ad optimization” feature inside the campaign settings. By doing so you are assuring that all of your ads receive equal exposure.

Test Ads Based on Impressions: Determine how many ads you can test based on the number of impressions you are receiving on a daily basis. For example, if you are currently getting thousands of impressions per day, then you can successfully test more ads than if you are only receiving several hundred impressions per day.

Use Google Conversion Tracker: You should typically test run your ads for about two to three weeks before performing an analysis in Google Conversion Tracker. You can select AdGroups for testing to find out how different titles and description lines are performing across your account.

Google Conversion Tracker will allow you to see the click through rate, conversions as well as rates, transaction rates, and an overall performance of ad titles and line descriptions. You can run these reports periodically to obtain the information you need to optimize your ads for maximum profitability.

Perform Thorough Analysis: Remember to do a careful analysis of all of the ad campaign components. Many affiliate marketers tend to concentrate only on the return on investment (ROI) and the click through rates. It is important to dig a little deeper into the analysis to determine if one title or description worked better than the other because this will give you the leverage you need to create a more compelling ad that will produce the highest profit margin.

Take the highest performing ads and add small modifications to see if it further improves the performance of the ad. You will need to continually test, test, and test again, to maintain a profitable affiliate marketing campaign and…..remember the ad spy tools such as PPC Bully that make this task a lot easier and even more profitable.

{ 3 Comments }

3 Comments ( add yours now )

1. ImagesAndWords says:

   May 11, 2009 at 6:22 am

   Taking the extra time upfront to split-test as many elements as possible is the key to wasting as little money as possible, and find success sooner.

   Ads are one thing – another is landing pages:
   http://profitapolis.com/featured/how-to-split-test-landing-pages-with-tracking202.html

   Btw, is there a “new features” list for the upcoming PPC Bully 2.0 anywhere?
2. Yefi says:

   May 11, 2009 at 6:42 am

   Hi,

   PPC Bully 2.0 Launches on June 9th, 2009.
   Join our alert list and receive all info plus some great videos -
   http://ppcbully.com/9june2009/

   Cheers,
   Yefi
3. Jeff Heath says:

   June 11, 2009 at 3:26 pm

   First, Google Ad Words scare me. I can just imagine all these clicks and no one buying anything and money out the window. I put up my first campaign yesterday and today I have 397 impressions and 5 clicks with a 1.26% CTR. My question, is it to early for me to get excited about a 1.26% ctr, or does it need a couple of weeks. I think PPC Bully 2.0 is great but we’ll see how the ROI turns out. The webinar was great.
   I am using 2 ads and the Title is different on each one, for the first 3 days.
   Jeff