Terms you need to know as PPC

Marketer

A
Active view cost-per-thousand impressions (active wiew
CPM):
A bidding type where you bid for 1000 viewable impressions,
meaning you only pay for the impressions where at least 50% of
the ad is on-screen for no less than one second.

Ad campaign:

Set of advertisements that share the same concept, theme, and

goal. The campaign can have one or multiple ad groups, meaning
that the PPC ads in the ad groups and the whole ad campaign will
generally target related keywords.

Ad copy:
Refers to any text that occurs with an ad. For PPC, this generally
indicates the headline, any descriptions, and the URL. The best
ad copy engages the viewer.

Ad delivery:

Setting in Google Ads that paces the delivery of your ad

throughout the periods of times that you set or throughout the day.

Ad extensions:

Google Ads features that allow additional pieces of information,

like price, extra links, ratings, etc., you can add free of charge to
your pay-per-click ad. If a user clicks on the additional
information, you will be charged the same as when they click on
your PPC ad’s main link.

Ad group:

Set of ads that target related keywords generally under one bid.
Ad groups are used to keep your account and campaign
organized.
Ad network:

Any company that specializes in serving as brokers between

advertisers and websites wanting to host ads.

Ad position:

The position that your advertisements show in the search engine

results pages (SERPs). There are, on average, ten paid ad
positions on each page. Usually, the first ad on the search page,
ad position “one,” earns the most clicks.

Ad rank:

The value that is used to determine your ad position in the SERPs

and is calculated by the amount you bid multiplied by your ad
keyword’s quality score.

Ad rotation:

Google Ads setting that allows you to rotate the set of ads within
your ad group automatically every time the SERP is refreshed.
You can either rotate your ads evenly or have Google select the
best performing ads to rotate.
AdSense:

Google program that compensates sites for showing paid ads.

AdSense works by matching relevant text and display ads to the
content and visitor demographics on the hosting sites.

Ad scheduling:

Also called “dayparting.” It allows you to customize the periods

that your ads run so that you can target times of the day in which
your ad would be more successful.

Ad Status:

Description from Google marking whether your ad is eligible to

run, as well as any restrictions on how or where it runs.

Advertising policies:

Guidelines from advertising platforms for your advertising

campaign, which can include requirements for your ads,
keywords, or site. If your ads violate the platform’s policies, they
won’t run.
Amazon advertising:

Amazon’s advertising platform for advertising on product pages

as product display ads, banner ads, or suggested searches.

Assisted conversion:

Measure of the interaction of users leading up to conversion, but

not the last click to convert on your site. The value allows you to
see which channels perform the best in your multi-channel
advertising campaign.

Audience:

Group of users with predefined demographics that you want to

convert with your advertising campaign. It can also refer to the
users who have completed specific actions such as visiting your
website or shown interest in your services.

Automated Extensions:

Set of Google Ads features that automatically generate

information snippets for your paid ad.
Automated Rules:

Google Ads feature that will make automatic adjustments to your

ad campaign based on customizations, such as seasonal factors,
that you set in place beforehand.

Automatic Bidding:

Google Ads places your bid amount for you to gather the highest
amount of clicks possible while staying within your budget. Your
bid will automatically go up by the amount you specify after a
competitor bids for the same keyword.

Auto-tagging:

Google Ads feature that automatically tags your destination URLs

with Google Click Identifiers (GCLID) that help track your ad
performance with Google Analytics.

Average Cost-Per-Click (Avg. CPC):

Average amount of money spent when users click on your ad’s
landing page.

B
B2C PPC

Business-to-client PPC is a method of digital advertising involving

running pay-per-click campaigns to target individual customers or
online consumers.

Bid:

Also called “Keyword Bid.” The maximum price you want to spend
for clicks for keywords that your target with your paid ads.

Bidding types:

Four ways to bid for your target keywords and their ad space
include: Cost-per-click (CPC), cost-per-thousand impressions
(CPM), Active View cost-per-thousand impressions (Active View
CPM), and cost-per-engagement (CPE). Advertisers choose
which method best suits their advertising goals.
Bid management:

Regulating bids to obtain the minimum bid for a keyword by

grouping and optimizing keywords. Google has features that will
allow you to do this automatically. Otherwise, you can do this
manually or outsource to a bid management agency like WebFX.

Bounce:

A single-page session on your site where users click to your

page, then leave before they view any other pages on your site.

Bounce rate:

Ratio of users who bounce after visiting your page.

Broad match:

Default keyword matching options for ads. It allows you to show

your ad when the search query contains your keyword in any
order or contains any misspellings, synonyms, related searches,
or relevant variations.
C
Call extensions:

Also called “Click-to-Call.” Google Ads feature that allows you to

add your business phone number beneath the text of your PPC
ad, which will enable users to click the number to place a call.

Callout extensions:

Google Ads feature that you can use to promote offers such as
free shipping, price matching, or 24-hour service beneath your
ad’s text.

Call-To-Action (CTA):

Any action you encourage your visitors to take, such as calling in,
signing up for email newsletters, or buying a product. For PPC,
this means clicking on your ad’s link and heading to your landing
page (which can have additional CTAs).

Change history:
Google Ads tool that allows you to view all changes from a
specific date range with filter options for particular changes, such
as bid adjustments, status changes, and keyword additions.

Click:

The action of following a link to a website. For PPC, this is

precisely how many people click on the link to your landing page.

Click fraud:

Clicks for PPC ads made with malicious intent.

Click-Through Rate (CTR):

Ratio of the number of clicks against the number of times the ad

was shown (impressions). It’s used to help you measure your
advertising campaign’s performance.

Client ID:

The 10-digit string of numbers assigned to each browser or

device in the Google system.

Conversion:
Any action you want your visitor to take that you deem is valuable,
such as calling, filling in a form, signing up for a newsletter, or
purchasing a product or service. For a PPC campaign, generating
more of a specific type of conversion is often the goal.

Conversion optimizer:

Google Ads feature that helps adjust your bids depending on

which clicks will likely be profitable.

Conversion rate:

atio of the number of conversions divided by the number of clicks.

It helps you determine how successful your ad campaign is by
determining how often a click becomes a conversion.

Cookies:

Small files used to track user preferences and search history. It

helps search engines track conversions and returning visitors.

Cost-Per-Click (CPC):
Cost-per-click (CPC) is a digital advertising bidding model in
which advertisers pay every time a user clicks on their ad. Cost
per click is a crucial metric to consider when running things like
PPC ad campaigns.

Cost-Per-Conversion:

The average cost required for a conversion on your site.

Cost-Per-Engagement:

The average cost for any time a user interacts with your ad in
some manner.

Cost-Per-Impression (CPI):

The average cost per ad shown in the search pages and an

alternate bidding option to cost-per-click.

Cost-Per-Lead (CPL):

The average cost it takes to generate a lead.

Cost-Per-Acquisition (CPA):
The average cost it takes to generate a customer.

Cost-Per-Thousand Impressions (CPM):

Maximum price you are willing to bid for every thousand

impressions you receive.

Cost-Per-View (CPV):

The average cost per view on a video ad.

Customer lifetime value (CLV):

Estimate of how much profit a customer will generate over the

course of an entire relationship with your business.

D
Daily budget:

Amount of money you choose to be spent each day for your ad

campaign.
Destination URL:

The URL of your landing page.

Display network:

Also called “Content Network.” A network of partnered sites and

apps where it’s possible to show your ad if you agree to pay a
part of the ad’s revenue.

Display URL:

The URL shown with your PPC ad. This can be your destination
URL or a separate, shorter URL. Only have one display URL for
each ad group with the same root domain as your destination
URL.

Dynamic keyword insertion (DKI):

Google Ads feature that allows you to dynamically insert the

keywords users search in place of a string of code directly into
your ad copy and bold it so that it’s more noticeable to searchers.

E
Effective Cost-Per-Click (eCPC):

Also called “Estimated Cost-Per-Click.” The ratio of total earnings

against total clicks. It helps you measure the cost-effectiveness of
the clicks you gained in your campaign.

Enhanced Cost-Per-Click (ECPC):

Google Ad feature that provides automatic bid management for

your manual bids. It raises and lowers your custom bids for
keywords predicted to be more or less likely to convert, increasing
the ROI for your ad campaign.

Exact match:

Allows you to specify whether to show ads only if the search

query matches your keyword word-for-word.

Expanded text ad:

Contains two 30-character headings and an optional third

heading, as well as two 90-character description fields, which
increases the amount of text you can include in your ads.
F
Facebook ads:

Facebook’s advertising platform that allows you to use the

demographic data gathered by Facebook to target any group you
specify with personalized ads.

Facebook dynamic ads:

Automatically generated ads from an uploaded product catalog

that directly target users who previously exhibited interest in your
brand anywhere on the web.

Free clicks:

Interaction with your interactive ad that results in clicks, which

require no payment from you.

Frequency capping:

Google Ads feature that allows you to restrict the number of times
a specific user will see your ad over a set period.
G
Geofencing:

Targeting a specific geographic radius (at least one mile) by

drawing a virtual fence and using GPS to track user data and
show your ads to users located within that area. It’s considered
more accurate than geotargeting.

Geotargeting:

Also called “Location Targeting.” Limiting your advertisements to a

broader geographical region than geofencing and to demographic
criteria such as age range.

Google ads:

Originally “Google AdWords.” Google’s online advertising platform

that helps advertisers manage and maximize the performance of
their advertising campaigns.

Google ads application programming interface (API):

Allows developers to create applications that interact directly with
their Google Ads account to simplify the management of complex
ad campaigns.

Google Ad Grants:

Google Ad Grants allow non-profit organizations to advertise on

Google Ads free of charge. Qualifying non-profits are provided
$10,000/month to create text-based ads and create effective
campaigns.

Google Optimize:

Google’s website testing and optimization platform. It allows the

user to conduct tests on their landing pages against variant pages
to make incremental improvements to their site’s performance.

H
Headline:

First line of your PPC ad. It contains a maximum of 25 characters

and is what users notice first.
Head terms:
Also called “head keywords,” or “short tail keywords”. Short,
high-volume, highly competitive keywords, such as “pizza,” that
are generally broad in meaning. For PPC, head terms are more
costly to bid for than lower volume, less competitive keywords.

Hits:

Amount of views a webpage has. The number includes both new

and returning visitors and helps you determine how effective your
click-through-rate is for your PPC ad.

I
Image ads:
Ads with graphics providing information about your product.

Impression:
The total number of times your ad is shown in a SERP or a
Google Network site.
Impression share (IS):
Ratio of the number of impressions you received against the
estimated number of impressions you could have received.

Instagram ads:
Instagram’s advertising platform that allows you to create video or
photo ads for your audience on Instagram.

Interest categories:
Google Ads setting that allows you to target groupings of users
based on their interests.

Invalid clicks:
Also called “Click Fraud,” clicks on ads that are rendered using
automatic and sometimes malicious software.

K
Key performance indicator (KPI):
The performance value of your primary metric. It helps you
determine if you are reaching your advertising campaign’s goal.
Keywords:
Words, sometimes phrases, that digital marketers such as SEOs
and PPC advertisers use to make pages appear higher in search
results after users type in a search query that matches keyword
exactly or else is related to or relevant to the keyword.

Keyword matching options:

Also called “Match Types.” Keyword level-settings that let you
control if your ad triggers for search queries containing your exact
keyword phrase, a close keyword phrase, or related keyword
phrases. Match types include broad, modified broad, phrase,
exact, and negative match types.

Keyword research:
Also called “Keyword Mining.” The process of finding and
optimizing for relevant keywords to your target keyword.
Identifying a keyword’s user intent is also a part of keyword
research.

Keyword planner:
Google’s keyword research tool that helps advertisers to find
related keywords and negative keywords, estimates keyword
traffic volume, and determines competition pages.

L
Landing page:
The page on your site, marked by your destination URL, where
users find themselves after they click on your PPC ad.

Lead:
Potential customers or users who show an interest in your brand,
product, or services, but have not yet taken action to convert.

LinkedIn ads:
LinkedIn’s advertising platform where you can advertise on
prominent pages on LinkedIn.

Location extensions:
Google Ads feature adds your business address and phone
number beneath your PPC ads.
Location targeting:
Google Ads setting that allows you to show your ads to users in
specified geographic locations.

Long-tail keywords:
Keyword phrases containing two or more words, like “deep crust
pepperoni pizza.” These keywords are more specific than head
terms and are often less competitive. Targeting long-tail keywords
will help you generate qualified web traffic.

Low search volume:

Keywords with little to no search history on Google Search that
will be inactive until searches for them increase.

M
Manual bidding:
Where you set and adjust custom bid amounts without Automatic
Bidding activated. Lets you have greater control over maximizing
your cost-per-click.

Manual tagging:
Tagging your destination URLs yourself instead of through
automated software, which allows for flexibility and customization
and can be passed on to third parties.

Marketing metrics:
Measurable values such as conversions, clicks, or leads, that help
determine an advertising campaign’s performance.

Message extensions:
Feature on Google Ads adds text messaging capabilities directly
to your ad so potential customers can quickly contact you for
more information.

Modified broad match:

Also called “Broad Match Modifiers.” Keyword match type that
allows you to match keywords more specifically than broad
match, but more generally than phrase match or exact match.

My client center (MCC):

Central account for managing multiple Google Ad accounts.

N
Negative keywords:
Also called “Negative Match.” Keywords added to your account
indicated that you don’t want your ads to display on the search
pages for search queries containing those keywords. Identifying
negative keywords will help your ad campaign draw in more
qualified clicks.

Negative placement:
Also called “Placement Exclusion.” Similar to how Negative
Keywords work, Google Ads lets you determine which ads you
want to prevent from appearing on particular sites increase the
relevancy of your ads.

New visitor:
An individual who visits your site for the first time.

O
Opportunities tab:
Google Ads tool that suggests options such as budget
recommendations and potential keywords to help you develop
and maximize your current PPC campaign.
Organic search results:
Search results that appear naturally on search pages in response
to users’ search queries. These types of results are not
sponsored.

P
Pay-Per-Action (PPA):
Also called “Pay-Per-Acquisition” or “Cost-Per-Action.” The
amount of money you pay to a site each time one of your ads
hosted on that site leads the user to a purchase.

Pay-Per-Click (PPC):
Pay-per-click (PPC) is an Internet advertising strategy in which
advertisers pay their publisher (Google, Bing, etc.) only when their
ads are clicked on. This strategy allows advertisers to gain quick
visibility with their target users while also maintaining a high return
on investment (ROI).

Pay-Per-Click management:
Process of optimizing and tracking PPC campaigns to reach
specific goals and minimize expenditures while maximizing
returns. Companies often outsource their PPC management to
PPC management agencies.

Phrase match:
Lets you display ads only when users’ search queries includes
your keyword’s close match.

Pinterest ads:
Pinterest’s advertising platform that lets you target locations,
demographics, or devices with promoted pins.

Placement targeting:
Also called “Managed Placement,” lets you target sites in the
Partner Network where you want to place ads.

Placement tool:
Google Ad tool that helps you locate targets for ad placement on
the Display Network.

Price extensions:
Google Ads feature that showcases a list of products or services
and their prices beneath the text of your PPC.
Primary metric:
The measurable value, such as leads, that you determine is most
important for your advertising campaign.

Product listing ads (PLA):

Also called “Google Shopping ad,” a type of paid ad that includes
more information on products such as images, price, and brand
name. Similar to PPC, you only pay when users click on the ad.

Promotion extensions:
Free-to-add Google Ad feature that highlights current sales for
your target audience by adding promotional offers beneath text
ads.

Prospect:
Lead that qualifies for specific criteria that will move them through
the sales funnel. The requirements include that the lead fits your
target market and has purchasing means and power.

Q
Qualified web traffic:
Visitors that are genuinely interested in your content, products, or
services. They are more likely to convert than more general web
traffic.

Quality score:
Ranking system with several disclosed and undisclosed factors
that search engine algorithms use to determine the relevancy of
keywords compared to their accompanying ads and the landing
pages the ads link to. The more relevant the keywords your bid
for are to your ad campaign, the higher your ad ranks, and the
less the bids cost.

R
Reach:
The total number of users who view an ad.

Remarketing:
Also known as “retargeting,” a marketing campaign that involves
showing targeted ads to returning visitors to increase the chances
of them converting.
Remarketing lists for search ads (RLSA):
Google Ad feature that enables the targeting of returning visitors
with paid search ads explicitly optimized for them.

Returning visitor:
An individual who has visited your site more than once.

Return on ad spend (ROAS):

Ratio determining the amount of money gained (or lost) in
comparison to the amount of money invested. Useful when
comparing performances of two ad campaigns.

Return on investment (ROI):

Similar to ROAS, a ratio that determines the amount of money
gained (or lost), including any expenditures made in the process,
in comparison to the amount of money spent. ROI is used to
measure how efficient your PPC is performing and to determine
whether the investment was worth it.

S
Sales funnel:
Step-by-step process companies guide consumers through where
the result is users making a purchase.

Search engine:
Sites like Google or Bing that searchers use to find information.
The program uses algorithms and machine learning to create an
index of sites that it can pull from to give user’s sites with
information relevant to their search queries.

Search engine marketing (SEM):

Online marketing to increase your site’s visibility through paid
search advertisements like PPC.

Search engine optimization (SEO):

Set of strategies and tactics such as keyword optimization that
improve organic traffic to your site, pushing your site’s rank higher
on relevant search pages.

Search engine results page (SERP):

The page that Google returns to users after they enter a search
query into the search bar. The page contains a list of links to
relevant sites to the user’s query (both organic results and paid
ads), as well as any relevant Featured Snippets.

Search network:
A network of sites that partner with Google, as well as
Google-owned search sites like Google Maps and Google
Images, where you can opt to show your paid ads.

Search marketing:
Umbrella term for online marketing strategies that include search
engine optimization, social media marketing, and paid online
advertisements meant to increase your site’s visibility in search
pages.

Search partners:
Partner sites of Google that agree to show PPC ads for a portion
of the profit generated from the ads. When creating a Google Ads
campaign, your ads will appear on these sites as well.

Search query:
Also called “search term,” the term or phrase that users enter into
a search bar to find information. Your ad will appear on their
search page if the query contains the keywords you bid for.
Search query report (SQR):
Also called “search terms report,” reports that are generated by
Google Ads that specify how well your targeted keywords are
performing against users’ search queries. In other words, the
report will identify the search terms users enter before they click
on your PPC.

SMB PPC
SMB PPC is a paid ads digital marketing strategy for small to
mid-sized businesses (SMBs) in which SMBs pay to have their
advertisements shown to users through digital channels.

Search volume:
Estimated number of searches that are expected for a keyword
within a specific time frame.

Seller central:
Amazon’s web interface for third-party brands and merchants,
allowing them to set product prices and stock items they sell on
Amazon. As opposed to Vendor Central, Seller Central enables
merchants to sell the products personally on the Amazon site
(See Vendor Central).
Seller ratings extension:
Google Ads extension that displays the number of ratings
gathered from Google and approved third-party sites on a
five-star scale beneath ad text. The extension helps generate
quality leads from users making informed decisions and enables
you to examine the performance of your ad.

Shared budgets:
Budgeting option for Google Ads to spread your paid ad budget
across multiple ad campaigns.

Sitelinks extensions:
Google Ads extension that promotes additional links (with
separate URLs from the main one) to your site below the text of
the paid ad.

Snapchat ads:
Snapchat’s advertising platform. Ads on Snapchat are
self-serviced, 10-second-long, vertical videos that are full-screen
and play with sound. Users have the option to swipe to perform
an action that will convert them.
Smart bidding:
Subset of automated bidding strategies that enhance conversion
and conversion value across your bidding campaign with machine
learning. The automatic bids can be tailored to the bidder’s
unique context.

Split test:
Also called “A/B testing” or “bucket testing.” Testing two versions
of an ad with one slight difference to see which performs more
effectively.

Sponsored product ads:

Amazon PPC ads that promote your products in SERPs and
product detail pages on Amazon.

Sponsored results:
Also called Sponsored Links and is an alternate term for Google
Ads advertisements. Sponsored Results optimized to appear on
search pages for targeted search queries.

Structured snippet extensions:

Feature that allows you to show more information on specific
products and services beneath your PPC text ad in the form of a
header and a list of features.

T
Topic targeting:
Google Ads feature that allows targeting of selected topics
instead of keywords or placements and leads to more
impressions than conversions.

Tracking code:
Snippet of JavaScript that tracks the activity of a user after they
visit a site.

Traffic estimator:
Free Google Ads tool to predict the performance of keywords
based on search volume and to research average prices and ad
positions.

TrueView video ads:

YouTube video format that gives viewers a choice over which
messages they want to see and when and the ability to skip ads,
which means you don’t have to pay for unwanted views.
U
Unique visitor:
Individuals who visit a site once within a reporting period.

User:
A person who has the ability to purchase a product or service and
to gain information to obtain a benefit or solve a problem.

User ID:
Also called “Username.” A tag that users create to identify
themselves on a computer or network.

V
Vendor central:
Amazon’s web interface for manufacturers and distributors to
manage and sell their products. The major difference between
Vendor Central and Seller Central is that with Vendor Central,
Amazon buys and resells the products. A Vendor Central account
(by invitation only) is needed to use Amazon Marketing Services
(AMS).

View-Through conversion:
Number of online conversions within 30 days. Measures users
who see a paid ad but don’t click on the ad but are converted
through other means.

View-Through-Rate (VTR):
Ratio for skippable ads measuring the number of completed views
against the number of initial impressions.

Visitor:
Any individual that visits a website. Any person that clicks on a
PPC ad is considered a visitor. Visitors are split into groups called
returning visitors and new visitors.

W
Website optimizer:
Tool to test changes made to the content of your site’s pages. It
helps determine what is useful for generating conversions. For
example, you use the tool to test different versions of your PPC’s
landing page to see which performs better.