5 Commonalities Between Baseball and PPC Advertising
One of the main reasons I was intrigued when I started studying and working with pay-per-click advertising was the similarity to my favorite game of baseball. There are so many moving parts of both. Variables galore…weather, market size, market prices, day or night, economy, structure and the list goes on and on. There are obstacles you can’t control – like Google. You can practice hard and be ready, but sometimes it just doesn’t work out.
I learned something very simple from a retired major league baseball player. “You need to practice so you can get results. Those results build your confidence”. In both worlds this is true. If you do the little things right, your odds of success greatly increases. Below are some of my favorite similarities between baseball and pay-per-click advertising.
Starts with the Front Office and the Manager
Structure and talent. A well-organized and talented baseball team has higher odds of winning. Same holds true for pay-per-click advertising. You must have a well-organized campaign structure. For, at least one reason, it’s good for quality score. Your PPC talent comes through practice. Writing ads, changing bid types, geographic targeting, etc…that practice will give you results. Those results will allow you to build confidence to beat your PPC advertising competition.
Numbers Game
Baseball and PPC are all about numbers. In baseball, you offensively bunt, steal and hit and run to increase the odds of scoring a run. From 1977 through 1992, the probability of scoring at least one run with no outs and a runner on second was .662. So, 66% of the time a runner was on second base with no outs, they scored. Same goes for pay-per-click. A keyword that has a 25% click-through rate can be considered pretty good. That means, the keyword can fail to get noticed 75% of the time and still be a success.
Bench the Non-Performers
In baseball, if a player isn’t performing well a manager might bench them. In pay-per-click you do the same thing with keywords and ad text. If either of these are falling behind and not helping your return on investment, pause or remove them from your lineup.
Paying the Stars
If you’re an all-star in the big leagues you could expect to see a nice raise come contract time. When there’s high performing keywords, it’s common to increase the maximum bid amount to possibly attract more clicks and keep a higher ad position.
“Build It and They Will Come” Field of Dreams
In the movie Field of Dreams, a corn farmer builds a field so the ghosts of the 1919 Chicago White Sox can play. This attracted visitors to the field and in the closing scene, there are cars lined up for as far as the eye can see. It is imperative to have targeted ad text, keywords and a good quality score to attract motivated visitors. Build a well-organized and targeted campaign, and they will come.
Play Ball!
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