Steps To Create an Effective Local San Diego PPC Strategy

Small businesses hire a San Diego PPC agency because they know a local agency knows how to build compelling campaigns that multiply marketing ROI. However, not everyone can afford to hire outside help, especially small businesses struggling with growing pains or settling into routines.

This guide shares seven steps you can follow to make your own local San Diego PPC strategy:

1. Pick a location and start there

2. Get to know all about the locals

3. Find the best solution to fill a specific need

4. Map out the customer’s journey

5. Design effective sales copy

6. Test until you have the best ads

7. Set up your retargeting strategy

There’s a lot to discuss, so get ready to take notes.

Let’s go!

If you want to learn how Digital Authority Partners can increase your PPC effectiveness, watch this video!

7 Steps To Build Your Own Local San Diego PPC Strategy

What makes an effective local San Diego PPC strategy? In a word, consistency, because one of the worst mistakes you can make in PPC is intentionally or unintentionally misleading people for clicks. Strategies like that work; they just never last long because people catch on eventually.

What you want to do is be honest with people about solving their problems or making their lives easier through your products or services. Approach this with an underpromise-but-overdeliver mindset. Follow these seven steps to build a local San Diego PPC strategy that converts now.

     1. Pick a Location and Start There

Although targeting San Diego is technically local PPC work, your strategy can go even smaller by tailoring your PPC ad strategy to each of the city’s many distinct neighborhoods. If you have more than one location in mind, go right ahead. Just prepare a separate strategy for each one.

As a rule of thumb, it is best to pick your immediate area (where your business is if you have a brick-and-mortar store) and then two adjacent areas or neighborhoods to target. This gives your strategy flexibility and broadens your potential reach. It also maximizes proximity and convenience for people.

     2. Get To Know All About the Locals

Almost more important than choosing a good physical location is knowing whether or not your business is what people in that area need. Just how well do you know San Diego’s neighborhoods? Do your homework, meet the people, learn about their pain points and determine how you fit in with them.

For example, the Gaslamp Quarter is a hotspot for shop- and restaurant-goers and a center of nightlife in San Diego. On the other hand, La Jolla is a laid-back seaside community with many options for reconnecting with nature while not lacking upscale choices for dining and recreation.

     3. Find the Best Solution To Fill a Specific Need

Now that you know a thing or two (and hopefully much more) about your target market, it is time to piece together your pitch to potential customers. In short, what exactly do you have that the competing businesses in the area do not already have? What makes you the better choice?

A secret tip for your PPC strategy is to actively use what you learn during market research to improve your products or services. Carving a niche is a surefire way to establish a captive local market for yourself. Once you know your solution, hold onto it for the next steps.

     4. Map Out the Customer’s Journey

Every San Diego SEO and PPC agency has a different answer to what comprises the customer’s journey. The main parts are awareness, consideration, decision, or some variation. A stage after decision also exists — loyalty or advocacy — for customer retention. Your PPC strategy should take each of these customer steps into consideration and a plan to appeal to each stage.

Another expert tip when crafting PPC campaigns is to diversify your approach to ads. Meet people where they currently stand in their customer journey. Take a page from the playbook of local San Diego SEO for ethnic restaurants and turn your reviews into ads that can nudge people in the right direction.

     5. Design Effective Sales Copy

This step is where all of your previous efforts in market research start to pay off. Your goal with PPC is to connect with your customers on a personal level. However, you cannot achieve that if your sales copy makes you sound less like a San Diegan and more like an out-of-towner.

Achieve greater success with local PPC planning by showing how well you know San Diego, its unique offerings, and its endearing qualities you cannot find anywhere else in the US. Locals embrace local businesses, so leverage that and make yourself a fixture (hopefully permanent) in the community.

     6. Test Until You Have the Best Ads

Once you think you have good sales copy, test it to see how people respond. Change it here and there and run two variations simultaneously for comparison. This is called A/B testing, which is a necessary part of creating effective local San Diego PPC — do not skip it.

You can also test the waters with any offers or lead magnets you have in conjunction with your ads. For instance, turn content from your San Diego vineyard local SEO strategy into ebooks or guides that encourage prospective clients to click on your ads. You get two birds with one stone.

     7. Set Up Your Retargeting Strategy

Rounding off your PPC strategy should be retargeting. Here is where having ads for every stage of the customer’s journey comes in extra handy. It goes like this: someone saw one of your PPC ads and became aware of your business; the next ad they see should make them consider it.

This way, you match the prospective customer’s current thought process without being too overbearing or just plain annoying with repetitive ads. Give them something to think about, and use their curiosity to bring them to your side. “Slow and steady wins the race,” as the old saying goes, right?

Summing Up

Assembling a local San Diego PPC strategy is similar to building a jigsaw puzzle. You more or less go in blind and have to feel your way through to find all the right pieces that connect, but when you do, everything starts falling into place. Having a solid foundation to work from is key.

Start from the top (market research) and slowly work your way down to a good rhythm. Find a flow you can follow, from creating ads to testing ads to retargeting campaigns. That way, any misalignments become easy to spot and resolve so that you can quickly get back on track.

Need help with your local San Diego PPC strategy? Contact Digital Authority Partners to learn what we can do to help.