PPC Google AdWords Campaign Setup Checklist

1. Define PPC targeting audience for each of your campaigns
2. Define PPC budget for each and every campaign
3. Default Bid/Max CPC should be clearly defined at either PPC Adgroup or Keyword level
4. AdWords Campaign budget should be more than the keyword CPC defined
5. PPC Traffic estimation – use this tool before going live.
6. Always keep your AdWords Search and Display campaigns separately
7. Define PPC Campaign settings;
   1. Ad delivery – Accelerated delivery for the higher frequency of ad occurrence
   2. Delivery Method – your ad should be in “rotate evenly” mode initially
8. Google AdWords Auto Tagging = My Account – Preferences – Auto Tagging Tab in Adwords Interface to be selected “Yes”. The destination URL will be tracked by analytics.
   1. If auto-tagging is not selected, you generate the tracking code from Google Analytics URL Builder tool.
9. Creating of PPC conversion tracking code for Direct Response clients, only then you can view conversion metrics in the interface. Make sure not to have the conversion assigned to “Last Click”, but either linear or Position.
10. Adding the conversion tracking code to the confirmation/thank you page.
11. Decide on the right AdWords match type for all adgroup keywords.
12. PPC keyword research always helps you come across both positive & negative keywords list.
13. Negative KW’s : identify negative keywords initially and also from Search Query report on a regular basis
14. Search Query Report (Under Keyword Tab -> Keyword Details -> All) also helps you generate new keywords idea along with negative keyword list too
15. PPC Ads should be created for every ad group
    1. Limit the number of ad copies to 3 in an adgroup.
    2. Adcopy character control (Headline (1,2,3)=30, Description Line (1,2)=90, Path (1,2)=15, Destination URL=1024). Note: Always prescribe destination URL at the Adcopy level.
16. Deep linking Destination URL – Landing User to the right landing page for the keyword search
17. Use AdWords Ad Extensions with Sitelinks , CallOut, & call Extensions without fail for Brand & Competitors campaigns
18. Dynamic Keyword Insertion shouldn’t be used for competitor and brand campaigns.
19. Use Ad preview and diagnostics tool to check ad copy status – whether or not it has gone live.
    1. The advantage is, it won’t add impression to the account performance
20. Adwords Editor helps you to work on account campaigns offline, bulk uploading of either Campaigns, Adgroups or Keywords along with huge optimization changes in sec/min.
21. Use Adwords editor to upload ad copies and keywords.
22. While uploading the keywords through Adwords Editor, it shouldn’t be more than 10 words length limit of each keyword
23. Always link Google Adwords to Google Analytics from the Adwords Interface
24. Using labels in Adwords
25. Additional reference; 75 SEO Checklist for Beginners / 70 SEO Optimization Checklist