Services: Content, Google Ads, Web design
The brief
The Orchard is a beautiful wedding venue near Maidstone, Kent.
The owners came to us for a review of their existing Google Ads campaign, which was running on Google’s “auto-pilot” (called Google Ads Express).
We investigated the current campaign and discovered that most of their click budget was being spent on searches for “The Orchard”, “The Orchard Maidstone”, etc. This concerned us because anyone searching for the venue by name would find their organic search listing anyway.
In addition, Google wasn’t displaying the advert often enough when people searched for more important terms, such as “wedding venue Maidstone” or “wedding venues near me”, letting their competition dominate these search results. This isn’t an uncommon problem with Google Ads Express campaigns, often because the click budget is set too low and Google therefore concentrates on low cost clicks.
The solution
We immediately took the campaign off the auto-pilot setting and started to manage it manually.
Our first step was to fundamentally change the keywords which the adverts were appearing for, to remove searches for “The Orchard” and instead start competing for search terms such as “wedding venues” and “wedding venues Kent”.
We also reviewed the geographic areas in which advert was appearing, to ensure that The Orchard’s budget was being dedicated to their target locations.
The result
In one month alone The Orchard received 460 Google Ads clicks from potential customers, who probably wouldn’t have found them otherwise. The click through rate (CTR) was 11.38% (ie the number of people who saw the ad and then clicked on it) – this compares to an average CTR for the sector of 6.12%*.
The average cost for each click was £2.64 (the industry average being £2.87*). This equated to a spend of £1,214.40 in a month.
In addition, using Google Ads enabled them to appear at the top of Google searches outside their local area. As a result, couples in London and other urban areas will discover The Orchard when seeking a countryside wedding venue.
With their fabulous wedding packages costing between £7,000 and £27,000, they only need to convert a few of the 460 clicks to achieve a very strong monthly return on their investment.
* Source – Search Engine Journal
We are also proud to have designed the Orchard’s website.
Terri White
Owner
When Open Door Digital took over managing our Google Ads we were amazed at the difference it made. The ads give us a great return on our investment and were an important part of keeping us going during lockdown. We can get on with creating memorable weddings, knowing that Open Door Digital is looking after the ads for us.