Saving The Ol' Pennies

This piece came from some research I conducted into consumer buying behaviour when working for a successful Appliance Retailer. Take a looksy…

A consumer looking to buy a particular appliance will not go to the web site offering the cheapest price and buy it then and there.

This would be regarded as brash and insensible, especially within the current economic climate. There is also a huge commercial trend to “Compare the Market”, especially when a customer will be spending over a few hundred pounds.

Therefore, a customer will often search for what other competitors have to offer.

SEO is obviously a vital factor here as well as PPC ads to ensure that your company has substantial, ‘Share of Voice” in Google.

The top three or four companies listed in a Google organic search and its accompanying PPC ads will normally be viewed.

So, What Does This Mean?

One can argue that customers will therefore ‘Scout’ out a variety of competitors to see if they offer any alternative values.

For example, some companies will offer free delivery, some will offer a quick delivery, some will offer gift vouchers and some will offer a mixture of all three. A customer therefore has a lot to consider when deciding, “What is best for me?”

This ‘scouting’ element in the way customers purchase items can cost an e-commerce firm a small fortune in PPC marketing.

For example, if a Google PPC ad does not contain the price of a product, the estimated delivery time of a product and whether or not that product is in stock, a customer will ‘scout’ into a website to acquire that information and leave almost instantly once that information has been acquired. Anyone thinking of why they are receiving such a high bounce back rate?

It is therefore vital to supply the customer with the information he/she wants instantly.

To expand, I made a few phone calls to numerous appliance retailers and asked about certain products and the first piece of information every sales person attempted to locate was if the product was in stock. More often than not, the products were also not in stock. Within the kitchen appliance industry, a one off buyer or repeat purchaser will therefore quickly realise that most companies will advertise a product on their site, yet it may not be in stock. Customers may well have to wait for a prolonged period unless they decide to go scouting again, which they normally will do as customers want their appliance/s immediately. But when does the price of a product become detrimental to the time it is delivered? Your thoughts?

By supplying customers with a product’s availability within a PPC ad, there is the potential to save money as the customer will not have to click on the PPC ad and be directed to the landing page to find such information out. You will also be saving them time.

To conclude, you cannot over estimate the importance of sound copy writing in PPC ads! Ask yourself, 'What do our customers want to know?' and supply that information concisely. There isn't much space for spin in PPC ads!

In this case, by including within product ppc ads the price of a product, the estimated delivery time and if that product is in stock, the need for a customer to to scout your web site is reduced, thus, reducing you PPC expenditure.

By supplying such information within the first, ‘Customer Gateway’ (your PPC ad), you will then witness, ‘Scout Snipers’ coming to your website who are fully informed and in a position to make a pinpoint purchase.

A limitation to this thesis however is that even when you do advertise all the relevant information, a customer may click on your site to view the design and brand as these features will indicate to the customer values of integrity and authenticity.