9 helpful tips: How to optimize your Christmas business with Google Ads
Christmas is just around the corner and you’re wondering how to prepare your Google Ads account for the holiday season? Here we give you some useful tips on how you can achieve a successful Christmas business with Google Ads.
Google Ads in the Christmas business – Start planning in time
If you want to be successful in the Christmas business with Google Ads, you should start planning early. This is because a lot of people do their first Christmas shopping many weeks before Christmas Eve. By the end of November, Black Friday is a popular time to buy Christmas presents. It is therefore important: Christmas business begins long before Christmas, and not just in Advent.
Evaluation of last year
Did you already use Google Ads for Christmas last year? Great, then you can gain important insights for this year. When analysing last year, the following guiding questions can be particularly useful:
- Were there any campaigns that performed particularly well (or not so well)?
- Which keywords performed well / not so well?
- Which ad texts had especially good click-through rates?
- Were the previously set goals achieved last year?
Based on last year’s experiences, goals for this year’s Christmas business can be determined.
Which products should be advertised more intensively on Google Ads at Christmas time?
Which products / offers do you have that are most relevant for the Christmas season? Here, it is also worthwhile to look at which products were in greater demand at Christmas last year and to keep an eye on current trends. The aim is to identify products that are particularly in demand at Christmas time and should therefore be advertised more intensively.
Gift cards are particularly popular at Christmas time – especially last minute. Here it can be profitable to advertise them more aggressively, especially in the last days before Christmas.
Create extra ad groups for Christmas
During the Christmas period, different products are often in greater demand than during the rest of the year. Especially search terms around “gifts”, “Christmas” or even ” gift cards” increase during the Christmas season. In order to perfectly meet the customers’ needs, it is therefore worthwhile to create extra ad groups for the Christmas season.
When it comes to the scheduling of the ads: people usually shop for Christmas presents in the evening and at the weekend. It is therefore important to ensure that the ads are still played out in the evening – and that the budget has not already been spent.
It often makes sense to create a separate landing page for Christmas, on which all products are listed that are most relevant for the Christmas season.
Adapt keywords to Christmas
Around Christmas, keywords suddenly become relevant that are probably rarely searched for during the year. You should therefore expand the keywords you have entered with search terms related to “Christmas”.
Adjusting keywords before and during Cyber Week is also a recommended procedure. Here, it is recommended to book combinations of “Black Friday + brand”, “Black Friday + category” and “Black Friday + product”.
Change Google Ads ad texts for the Christmas season
It can also make sense to change the ad texts for the Christmas period. For example, it is advisable to indicate in the ad texts that the product will be delivered before Christmas (especially if there are only a few days left until Christmas Eve). In addition, special promotions, discounts or specials should be mentioned in the ad texts. Special services such as free shipping or an extended return policy (in case you don’t like the gift after all) should also be mentioned in the ad text or in the ad extension.
Merchant promotions on Google Shopping
For those who use Google Shopping campaigns, it is often advisable to work with Merchant Promotions. This allows discount codes to appear directly in the ad. This often ensures higher click-through rates and conversion rates.
Budget planning and bid adjustment for the Christmas season
Especially around Black Friday and Cyber Week, people shop online more frequently. You should keep this in mind when planning your budget. Are there keywords that achieve an excellent conversion rate? Then it may be worthwhile to increase the bids for these keywords.
In general, it is advisable to open the budget completely at Christmas time and choose cost-per-conversion as the bid strategy. As there is extra competitive pressure at Christmas, the click prices also rise. With an open budget and cost-per-conversion target, you ensure that your ads do not perform weakly due to a too low budget.
No time or missing know-how?
You don’t have the time or the know-how to successfully manage your Google Ads account during the Christmas season? Don’t worry, that’s why we developed BiddingLab. We automate your search, shopping or display campaigns and manage your bids in real time using AI. For maximum performance that would not be possible with human hands. This way, you can increase the performance of your Google Ads campaigns (not only at Christmas time), bid more efficiently and save a lot of time!
