Will Automation Destroy Your PPC Career?

I’m a huge fan of digital marketing automation. I have written extensively about SEM automation here and all of my favorite platforms. One of loyal readers, ppcKnight, wrote in with a super interesting question. (Thank you ppcKnight for reading and for the question, you rule!) I have pasted ppcKnight’s full question below, and here’s the main punchline: Will automation eliminate careers in digital marketing? Today, I will respond to ppcKnight’s question. Preview: I’ll share why automation is absolutely critical. It enhances and grows careers in digital marketing.

Will SEM Automation Eliminate My Career?

Production Automation

Hi Ian, remember me? Long time ago I asked some questions about work-life balance in PPC and you gave some brilliant answers! I now have a new, very important question, and would appreciate to hear your thoughts on that.

I am still at the same company (client side) and am the global PPC Manager. My role is less technical and more… marketing. Recently, our tech guys helped the Director of Online Marketing automate everything (you surely have heard about AdWords API etc) thereby making 80% of the PPC team redundant. That was a lot!

I have heard of slightly similar stories in other client-side PPC departments/teams – If this trend continues, will in-house/client-side PPC become extinct as a career? If not, how can a PPC professional be more valuable than automation, especially in-house/client-side?

Would really really appreciate to hear your thoughts on this, especially because I love my job, I love PPC, but I don’t want to be replaced by a machine…

My 2 Cents On Digital Marketing Automation and Digital Marketing Careers

I’m here to say that SEM automation absolutely does not eliminate careers in digital marketing. In fact, it enhances them! Here’s why:

Digital marketing is getting more and more complex by the day! Digital marketing professionals are doing even more than before, with no end in sight. Many digital marketing professionals are expanding from Google AdWords and Bing Ads to manage new programs such as Facebook, LinkedIn, display advertising, retargeting, and so more. Many digital marketers are taking control of new programs, including the customer experience. I, for one, love utilizing ion interactive for building incredibly sophisticated landing page experiences. Many digital marketing professionals are venturing into other closely related marketing channels such as email marketing and even direct mail. Many digital marketers are testing new beta opportunities on Google AdWords and Bing Ads, expanding the sophistication of their core programs. The only way to scale, in my opinion, is via automation. Automate as much as possible so you can focus on new initiatives and new complexities. Automation is your key to career growth.
Advertising dollars are shifting online at a rapid pace. Competition in many/most categories is increasing with little relief in site. The only way to keep your edge? Innovation! Marketers are being challenged to push the limits of digital advertising. I’m a huge proponent of automation because it offers precision and scale. Let computers do the manual stuff so you can focus on clever new strategies to outsmart your competition. As marketers we are judged on performance. Automation is your friend in hitting your numbers and goals.
Humans are incredibly smart and creative. As marketers we deserve to be thinking about marketing strategy. I’m talking about truly knowing the customer and crafting amazing campaigns. This vision becomes so much more possible with great automation. Automate the routine, manual tasks so you can focus on the higher level strategy. While automation may change the day-to-day of many online marketers (less manual, repetitive work), those same marketers will now be focused on new, more exciting challenges. Automation grows careers and allows marketers to push our industry forward with new strategies.
Automation requires incredibly intelligent marketers to set up and manage the system. Many savvy marketers are integrating automation deeply into their organizations. They’re starting to import CRM data into their bid management platform so the automation can bid even more efficiently. Such integration requires a truly seasoned marketer, one who can work cross-functionally throughout their organization. There are always more opportunities to integrate. There are always increased opportunities to leverage automation in new ways. Platforms are always releasing new features that will help you and your company scale. Exciting work for digital marketing professionals, especially those that can manage the technology platforms, has no end in sight!
Automation helps grow teams. I have managed digital marketing programs at four large companies during my career in online advertising. In all four cases, we implemented and grew our automation. In all four cases, we actually ended up expanding our teams as automation grew. Why? Complex programs need amazing teams. As programs grow, companies make more money. With more money, comes more responsibility and more future opportunity. There’s no better way to tap into that opportunity than to hire world class marketers. As someone who has embraced automation for ten years, I have never seen automation actually shrink a digital marketing team. It’s always the other way around!

This is not meant to be a comprehensive list, but just a few of the top reasons why careers in SEM and digital advertising are here to stay. In my opinion, technology and automation increase the need for talented individuals. What do you think? How has automation impacted your team and digital marketing program? Do you leverage a digital marketing technology platform? If not, make sure to start auditioning right away, you will be super impressed!

Image of Production Automation © iStockPhoto – ralex3D

PPC Bidding Automation Tips

By PPC Ian Leave a Comment Sep 21 0

If you’ve been reading PPC Ian for a while, I bet you know that I’m a huge proponent of SEM automation. I even wrote a whitepaper a while back, PPC Ian’s SEM Automation Buyer’s Guide. One of my favorite aspects of PPC platforms such as Kenshoo, Acquisio, and Marin Software is automated bidding. In that spirit, I wanted to provide a few invaluable tips to keep in mind when setting up and maintaining your automated bidding platform.

Tip 1: Verify Your Platform’s Data Daily

What You Need To Know

Good data means good decisions. Bad data means bad bidding decisions. I’ve seen it hundreds of times: Something goes wrong and your SEM platform does not sync data properly. Perhaps the search engine API is down. Perhaps your own API (or FTP) is not working and the platform cannot access your internal conversion data. Perhaps your internal system does not update conversions properly. Sometimes it’s just a day’s worth of bad data. Sometimes, the bad data can pour in for multiple days (my worst nightmare, that is if it goes undetected).

Here’s the problem: Automated bidding systems rely on accurate data. If the clicks, cost, conversions, or other important metrics are off, the bidding system is going to make mistakes. These mistakes can be incredibly costly. It’s important to audit your data daily on all levels: Account, campaign, adgroup, and keyword. It’s also important to make sure your internal conversion data is passed into the system correctly (if applicable). When you do catch issues, make sure to work closely with your account management team and, until the problem is fixed, make sure the bidding system ignores the bad data dates.

Tip 2: Leverage Internal Conversion Data

Do you currently bid based on conversion collected via search engine pixels? Or, do you leverage your own, internal conversion data? From my experience, search engine pixels are always off. They will never offer as accurate of a picture as your own internal data. As such, I highly recommend passing your internal conversion data into your automated bidding platform, if at all possible. By doing so, you will see an instant lift in your results (good data equals good results). If not easily possible, search engine pixel data can be a stepping stone until you’re able to integrate internal conversion data.

Tip 3: Invest Heavily In Your Bidding Setup

Long term, automated bidding systems save a ton of time while also driving improved results (more conversions at lower CPA). Short run, however, they require a ton of setup. In my experience, it’s the setup (or lack thereof) that will make or break your bidding system. My advice is to spend a good amount of time upfront thinking through all the details. I’m talking about these types of questions:

Should I pass data across search engines? For example, if Microsoft adCenter does not have statistically significant data on a keyword, should I leverage my Google data?
Should I minimize bid movement on a day-to-day basis? Let’s say my current bid is at $0.50 and I’m headed toward $1.00. Should the system make the entire move in one day or should the system make the move gradually?
What should my bidding system consider statistically significant? Is 100 clicks worth of data statistically significant? How about 1,000 clicks worth of data?

My advice is to compile a list of at least 30-50 such questions and then think through them in great detail. Engage your account management team and expect to dedicate a full time employee (for at least one month’s time) to make your new automated bidding system work.

So, there you have it. Some of my favorite automated bidding tips, especially if you’re newer to the exciting world of PPC bidding automation. I sincerely hope this helps and encourage you to investigate the great SEM platforms out there.

Image of What You Need To Know © marekuliasz

SEM Automation Buyer’s Guide Whitepaper

By PPC Ian Leave a Comment Jul 12 24

Hey Everyone,
Today is an exciting day! I’m officially launching PPC Ian’s Whitepaper Series. Today, you’ll have the opportunity to download my FREE 12 page whitepaper all about buying SEM automation software. I’m launching my SEM Automation Buyer’s Guide, the culmination of years of very hard work in the SEM technology arena. Want to download my free whitepaper? Read on! Instructions follow at the end of this post, it’s easy…

SEM Automation Software

SEM Automation Buyer's Guide

There’s no doubt about it! I’m the biggest fan of SEM automation software. Over the years, I’ve had the huge pleasure of building several in-house automation tools. I functioned in a product management role to build scalable campaign management technologies. The benefit in all of this: I learned exactly what it takes to succeed in the world of search marketing software!

Later in my career, I quickly noticed that the solutions available on the market evolved tremendously. Today, they’re far more cost effective, practical, and advanced compared to the in-house route. These day’s I’m a big proponent of buying instead of building, and was directly responsible for buying a major SEM platform at one of my recent companies. (You may wish to check out my recent video on the build vs. buy decision). The crazy part of all of this: I’m not the only one who has arrived at this conclusion! This year alone, I’ve coached at least 10 different corporate SEM teams in their SEM software audit. It seems like everyone is in the process of evaluating SEM software right now!

My Whitepaper Will Help You Buy The Right Search Marketing Software

So this all brings me to the topic of my whitepaper. When it comes to SEM software, I’ve really seen it all and done it all! I have added huge value to numerous SEM teams this year, coaching them through their buy decision. However, I’d like to scale even more and help even more search marketing teams. As such, I created an incredibly comprehensive resource for those of you evaluating SEM automation software. In 12 pages, I share my proprietary framework for completing an unbiased audit of the major SEM applications out there, arriving at the perfect decision for you and your company. Regardless of your current situation, I highly encourage you to download and read my FREE whitepaper. It will save hours of work while taking your career to the next level. If you really want to stand out as a leader in your organization and make the right software decision, my whitepaper is definitely worth your time!

PPC Ian Whitepaper Series – Sign Up Now!

The really exciting part of this all? My SEM Automation Buyer’s Guide is the first whitepaper of many. My eBook highlighting my Top 5 SEM Career Tips has been a huge success. It even landed one PPC Ian reader several job offers. As a result, I decided to launch my whitepaper series. Download my first whitepaper and you’ll automatically receive all future whitepapers directly to your email inbox. Moreover, you’ll periodically receive PPC Ian updates. It’s easy! Simply enter your first name and email and you’ll receive my whitepaper in just a few minutes. Already on my email newsletter list? My whitepaper list is actually new so you’ll want to sign up again!

Thanks so much for your support! I can’t wait to hear what you think about my new whitepaper!

Sincerely,
PPC Ian (Ian Lopuch)

Video: PPC Automation – Build vs. Buy

By PPC Ian Leave a Comment Feb 27 9

Hey Everyone,
Just a few days ago, I posted my first video entry: Who Is PPC Ian? I’m really thrilled that it took off and already received over 250 views on YouTube in just a few short days! As promised, today marks my second video and I expect to post quite a few more over the coming months! I’m excited today to discuss my deep experience with pay per click automation build versus buy decisions.

Pay Per Click Automation

If you read my Pay Per Click Automation post or Interview With Matt Lawson from Marin Software, you know I’m a huge fan of PPC automation. As someone who’s been through the decision many times and who has a Stanford Computer Science degree, automation is consistently top of mind for me. In my opinion, PPC automation is an absolute no-brainer for horizontal organizations with keyword sets spanning many different verticals (such as product shopping, financial services, education, home services, real estate, and more). However, I’m also a fan of automation for vertical organizations (those that are the 800 pound gorilla in their field) as well, those that have deep expertise within a very focused vertical.

Over the past few months, I’ve been on the phone with many folks in the pay per click industry right in the middle of the build versus buy decision. I know it’s a top priority for many large PPC organizations right now as teams are looking for the next big growth (and efficiency) driver. I truly hope my video helps in your personal decision. I know more than anyone that there’s no perfect decision that fits all organizations – Every time I’ve made this decision the outcome been a little different. Today’s video presents three thought points that will help you and your team work through your personal decision. As always, please don’t hesitate to contact me with questions and feedback, it’s always a pleasure to hear from you guys.

Sincerely,
PPC Ian (Ian Lopuch)
P.S. Huge thank you to my beautiful wife Nicole for shooting, editing, and producing this video!

Video "Pay Per Click Automation Build vs. Buy" © PPCIan.com (An IJL Productions LLC Website)
Image of Automation Factory © iStockPhoto – belknap

Pay Per Click Automation

By PPC Ian Leave a Comment Jan 22 29

As you may know from my about me page, I majored in computer science at Stanford University. I truly feel like my computer science background prepared me perfectly for the corporate pay per click career path. Why? When you’re dealing with extremely large campaigns (especially across a portfolio of verticals), it’s nearly impossible to scale without automation of some sort. As someone who’s product managed several internal automation tools and who has worked with third party solutions, I’m thrilled to start discussing PPC automation today. I’ll start off with an overview of my automation thoughts and will follow up with a series of in-depth PPC automation articles over the coming months.

Why Automate Corporate Pay Per Click Campaigns?

Automation Gears

What’s the key difference between affiliate marketing and corporate pay per click marketing? There are a few, but the big one is scope. In the affiliate world, you can make quite the decent living by focusing on a very specific niche. However, in the corporate world, it’s all about going big. You’re dealing with millions of keywords, unreal budgets, extremely complex accounts, often across multiple categories.

As a computer science guy at heart, I like to equate manual campaign management to The Mythical Man Month. After a certain point (usually after 5-10 campaign managers), throwing more marketing professionals at your corporation’s campaigns will simply not help. Actually, more people at a certain point can actually slow you down! Here’s where automation comes in: Automation will take your program to the next level. Automation will assist your human team in executing certain aspects of PPC faster and more accurately than possible through manual campaign management. Automation will get you over that plateau your team is facing.

Another critical point: Corporate PPC is an extremely competitive field. You need to assume your competitors are investing in automation. If you’re not, your PPC campaigns will fall behind. You simply cannot keep up without automation. For this reason alone, it’s extremely important to automate aspects of your PPC campaigns to maintain your edge against the competition.

What Aspects of PPC Should You Automate?

I want to be clear from the beginning: I’m not one of those guys that recommends automating all aspects of PPC. In my opinion, that’s a recipe for disaster. I’ve seen it play out before: You automate everything, the campaigns start trending down, and then a manual manager needs to jump in and fix everything. What I am arguing however is that automation should play an absolutely critical role supporting your human campaign management team. Below are just a few aspects of PPC that are totally worth automating.

Automate PPC Bidding: Biding is perhaps the primary aspect of PPC that should be automated. Bidding is very tedious, it’s totally based on data, and it’s very time consuming. In my experience, it’s very easy for humans to make major mistakes with manual bidding.

Automate PPC Reporting: There’s no doubt about it, reporting is extremely important. Corporate PPC is all about data analysis and data-driven action. If you automate your reporting, your team can spend more time analyzing and driving action versus pulling numbers together.

Automate Keyword Generation: I have mixed feelings on this one because some of the best gains in PPC have been a direct result of creative keyword generation. At the same time, you simply cannot scale your keyword set effectively without automation. In a product shopping vertical? Leverage your catalog to generate keywords as new products are released. Looking to deploy more exact match queries for increased bidding efficiency, targeting, and position? Deploy exact match versions of all raw user queries that drove conversions. Looking to leverage the competitive intelligence of your industry? Pull keyword lists from tools such as Trellian, Wordtracker, and KeyCompete.

Build Versus Buy and a Few Great SEM Platforms

As discussed in the introduction, I’ve both built and bought PPC automation tools during my career. While building was the only option when I first got started (there were simply no tools available on the market for purchase), buying is a lot easier these days (thank goodness).

As a general rule, I’m much more in favor of buying versus building for smaller organizations. Small organizations need to focus on their core business, they simply don’t have the resources to effectively build and maintain automation tools. There’s actually quite a bit of overhead in simply maintaining SEM tools due to search engine API upgrades that happen regularly. Moreover, the tools available on the market these days are absolutely astounding. Two tools that I highly recommend are Marin and Kenshoo.

Now, if you’re at a larger organization, the decision can become a bit more difficult. Because most SEM platforms out there operate on a percentage fee model, buying at a large organization can become very expensive (unless you’re able to negotiate a great deal). There may come a point where building becomes more cost effective than buying. One thing is for sure: SEM automation is very high leverage and should be an important decision that every corporate SEM team considers regularly.