Last Updated on 2021-01-01 by ppcguybklyn
As a paid search advertiser in a marketing agency, it is almost routine to report performance and discuss optimization strategies with clients or supervisors on a regular basis. Usually the directors of the office will have some background knowledge of digital marketing, and some may even be doing advertising before becoming the director ,so communication will not be a big problem. But if today we are dealing with customers and supervisors who have no concept of advertising, how should we report account performance and optimize proposals so that customers and supervisors can also know our painstaking efforts on the account? In this article, based on my personal experience, I will list the most appropriate preparation and interaction process when submitting performance and optimization proposals to customers and supervisors who have no basic advertising knowledge.
Step 1 : Choose Easy-To-Understand Metrics
PPC advertising requires a certain degree of mathematical ability, which may not be a big problem for Taiwanese people, but some Americans really only know how to add and subtract, even the basic concept of multiplication and division is not very good. Even if you are a Taiwanese, if you are a complete novice, it will take some time to digest some basic concepts. We have to avoid explaining some more complicated KPIs, such as conversion rate. We are familiar with this KPI, so we don’t think it’s special, but because it represents "what percentage of people will convert on the website”, which is a concept that is not so easy to understand. Some people even confuse it with click-through rate. On the other hand, the better KPI to understand is ROAS, because it directly tells the other party how much money they have spent on advertising.For the detailed introduction of KPI, please refer to my previous article.
Step 2: Simplify the report, choose your visual presentation carefully
After choosing our KPIs, the next step is to make our report as simple as possible. The general paid search report is a table on the campaign level, but if there are more than 20 campaigns in our account, then we really do not need to put all the performance of the campaigns in the table. Simply list the account performance overview and the performance of each type of advertising activity (search, shopping, display...). There is no need to put too many details in the report.
In addition to tables, sometimes we also need to use other charts to provide more information. It is also a science to choose which type of chart to use. In general, the principle I hold is to not use pie charts or pie charts, because apart from taking up a lot of space, it is difficult to make meaningful comparisons with other periods. The most appropriate visualization choice for keyword advertising is line graph and bar graph. The former can be used to compare the changes of specific KPIs over a period of time, while the latter can be used for special analysis, such as the conversion performance during the advertising period, differences in delivery devices, etc.
Step 3: Streamline the optimization proposal
After the report is completed, we need to provide account optimization suggestions for customers or supervisors based on the performance of the account. Here our principle is that the optimization proposal should not be written too complicated, and it is best that everyone can understand it and mention it as little as possible. Some words that only advertising pitchers know. For example, the phrase "adjust keyword bidding to get more conversions" can be replaced with "allocate more budget to better-performing keywords to increase revenue." In addition to using words, the content of the optimization proposal should also be kept within the scope that beginners can understand. For example, strive for more revenue, reduce conversion costs, reduce click costs and other simple and clear goals, and list how to achieve this goal.
Step 4: Plan the way you present the report
After deciding on the content of our report and the presentation method, we have to think about how to report to the supervisor or client. In order to make sure that they understand what we are talking about while listening, even though our content has been condensed to the point where it’s not enough, at the beginning of the report, you can explain the summary of each KPI and table first, and then go into the detailed figures and analysis content. Some customers, even if we report to them every month, may still completely forget the meaning behind these numbers in the next report. Therefore, patient explanation is absolutely necessary. At the same time, when reporting, remember to stop and check if there are any problems with the clients or supervisors, so that we can make sure they won't suddenly ask a very basic question that has nothing to do with the report.
What if they still do not understand?
After we have spent so much effort on getting the clients or the supervisors to understand the content of our report, what should we do if they are still unfortunately unable to know what we are talking about? Don’t worry, we can do the following:
Patiently explain several times
The easiest way is to explain your meaning to the other person a few more times. Sometimes it can be a good way to repeatedly explain the same concept in the report. This way they will be more familiar with the same concept for the second and third time, and will have a sense of accomplishment by understanding the concept they think is very complicated, and will have a higher acceptance of our report.
Tell them that a detailed follow up email will be sent after the meeting
If our simplified amount of information is still beyond the reach of the clients or supervisors, we can say during the presentation: "Please don’t worry, I will summarize these things in my follow up email after the meeting, you only need to look out for that email." The point to note is that our follow up emails must specify in detail what proposals we need approval for or what additional information we need, so as to save the trouble of multiple email round trips.
Conclusion
Reporting to supervisors and clients is definitely not an easy task, especially when their knowledge and information are asymmetrical with ours. As advertisers, what we should do is to make the report content easy to understand. A professional report is to let people without basic knowledge know the meaning behind these numbers, and choose the most easy-to-understand presentation method to achieve our purpose.
