Google Ads & Competitor Tactics

In the ever-fierce battle to attract new customers on Google, how can businesses make their mark against the competition? One way is through running a competitor campaign and bidding on their brand name – for example, if a user searches for “Nike” they may be shown an advert for “Adidas” in an aid to encourage spending their money with Adidas instead. In 2008 Google introduced targeting of competitor brand names, although there are restrictions in place to prevent businesses from misleading the user by trying to appear as the competition, therefore you cannot use another businesses name in the headline of your advert. This doesn’t mean there aren’t some highly effective ways to poach potential new clients from rivals! Once the user has searched for your competitor by name and your ad is shown alongside theirs, you have a few seconds to impress. At this time, sharp, witty ad copy is needed to capture the users attention and then following this, clear articulation of the benefits of your business versus the competition. Here are a few examples of how we are doing this for our clients helping them get ahead and piggy back off awareness of the competition.   In the above example for MiSmile we have used our ad copy to appeal to what we know are highly possible user doubts around the competitor’s business model in our headlines ‘Straighter Smile, No Dentist? | Something Doesn’t Sound Right’ this is a smart tactic to interrupt and influence the user during their purchase process. In this above example, you can see competitors of Zoho CRM are bidding on their brand terms, and using the opportunity once in front of new potential customers to push their message through their ad copy in a savvy manner. In the case of Freshworks, they are calling for the user to compare their offer, and piggy backing off Zoho CRM’s brand awareness in the market, in the hope they can steal some valuable air time and gain more visitors to their website. Greenrope are making a direct reference to Zoho, but in a bid to avoid Google rules against using another business brand name in your headline have used ‘Zo no CRM? Look Here First | More Features, No Hidden Costs' – this tactic is appealing to both dissatisfied current users of Zoho CRM, through their witty pun, and potential new users, all while shouting about the unique selling points of their CRM. Why not let KMG audit your online strategy today?