Also, don\u2019t forget to migrate your Twitter ad budget to something actually stable.<\/p>\n
So, let\u2019s discuss what you should be doing now, what you went through in 2022, and what you need to do in 2023.<\/p>\n
Think of this as a really nerdy and \u201csnarkastic\u201d visitation of three ghosts.<\/p>\n
What Should You Be Doing Right Now?<\/h2>\n
It\u2019s the beginning of 2023, so you\u2019re running a bit late \u2013 but you can still make up for lost time.<\/p>\n
Forecasting A 2023 Budget<\/h3>\n
You\u2019ve seen how to forecast search budgets year after year: the old \u201cdetermine impression share (IS) lost due to budget and had 3%-5% increase in CPC assuming strategy stays the same\u201d method.<\/p>\n
Then the pandemic came along, and forecasting got a little iffier. Now, that method lacks some weight.<\/p>\n
The reality is, if you keep with that approach, fine, not the end of the world, but understand that cost per click (CPC) growth, especially on brand terms, saw some obscene growth in 2022 (starting around April).<\/p>\n
Why? There are a variety of theories, but for now, let\u2019s just call it \u201cinflation.\u201d<\/p>\n
If you keep the typical approach, expect to add anywhere from 10%-15% on brand CPC growth YoY in Q1 and, likely, more along the lines of 4%-7% growth on non-brand. This comes from our own in-house estimate \u2013 yours should vary.<\/p>\n
Next, the ugly elephant in the room \u2013 Performance Max \u2013 appears. But it gets more complicated if you migrate smart shopping over to Performance Max as well.<\/p>\n
There are two ways to forecast this, and honestly, neither will be all that accurate or insightful \u2013 I apologize in advance.<\/p>\n
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- Look at Google\u2019s recommendation tool, see what it says for growth on a budget (because we all know it never says less), take 15%-25% off that growth level (kill off the buffer), and try that.<\/li>\n
- Or, gradually scale upward of 5%-10% from your current budget, assuming you hit budget caps consistently while flexing up and down for seasonality.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
As I said, neither option is great.<\/p>\n
If you want to adjust your search strategy (not applicable for Performance Max), look at your IS lost to rank and work the fancy formula that PPC Hero<\/a> posted a little ways back.<\/p>\n
It\u2019ll help you understand where your current strategy\/bids are, causing you to miss opportunities.<\/p>\n
This is a good time to pace out your budget (if you\u2019re like me, you have a planned budget to spend for literally every day of the year, which will vary based on anticipated demand).<\/p>\n
Content Calendar\/Seasonal Flighting Planning<\/h2>\n
Often this is not as applicable if you\u2019re new to a piece of business, but it should 100% be part of your plan.<\/p>\n
If you aren\u2019t new to the business and you haven\u2019t done this, then you are Mr. Wilson of the Jets and deserve to be benched.<\/p>\n
Make sure you know your deals, seasonality for peaks and lows, and everything you want to do creatively and budget-wise.<\/p>\n
It allows you to get all of your assets built way in advance<\/a>, approved, and scheduled for deployment.<\/p>\n
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![\"QSR](\"https:\/\/marketingnewsbox.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/sem-strategy-in-2023-more-ahead-with-your-year-in-review-via-sejournal-jonkagan.png\")
Screenshot from author, December 2022<\/span><\/div>\n<\/dt>\n<\/dl>\n<\/div>\nAssessing What You Didn\u2019t Do<\/h2>\n
Life and work get busy. This happens to all of us. Odds are, you had laid out some plans for 2022 that you could not execute.<\/p>\n
Now is the time to determine what builds, testing, flighting plans, etc., you never got around to doing last year and reprioritize them to determine if you should try them out in 2023.<\/p>\n
I like to use this thought process when doing that evaluation:<\/p>\n
Was this for \u201cfun\u201d or a necessity<\/strong> (i.e., Is this effort something that would\u2019ve definitely made a business impact, or something just to try out and see if it could help or hurt)?<\/strong><\/p>\n
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- If it was a necessity, then I hope you have a good excuse for why it wasn\u2019t done and put it on the books for 2023.<\/li>\n
- If it was for \u201cfun,\u201d file it away for a rainy day.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Was there a business implication<\/strong> (positive or negative) by not doing this?<\/strong><\/p>\n
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- If no, then no harm\/no foul, and you can try it eventually.<\/li>\n
- If yes, then get it ready for 2023, and have a good explanation as to why it wasn\u2019t done.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Consider what you\u2019ve been through.<\/strong><\/p>\n
Much like dealing with your strange aunt\/uncle who said something grossly inappropriate during the holidays, you need to sit down and process what did<\/strong> happen to your SEM campaigns in 2022.<\/p>\n
This helps you decide if it was all good, all bad, or somewhere in between and what you need to consider carefully in 2023.<\/p>\n
Look at both the big things and the small things.<\/p>\n
Performance Max<\/h3>\n
If you migrated into Performance Max by choice or by force (anyone using Smart Shopping or local search), it likely made both a negative and a positive impact on your year.<\/p>\n
Negative<\/strong>: You literally have no idea when\/where your ad is showing, and all you can think (and you\u2019re probably right) is that Google has thrown some of your direct-to-consumer (DTC) funds away on a really bad Google Display Network placement.<\/p>\n
At the same time, you have very little information or ability to explain to your boss why Google has basically relaunched the SMB-targeted Adwords Express as a 2.0 version and just ruined your transparency.<\/p>\n
Negative<\/strong>: You did the auto upgrade of a local campaign to Performance Max and discovered how many bugs there are, or you let Google create your YouTube video, and the music makes it far more cringe than you had hoped.<\/p>\n
Positive<\/strong>: Especially for those running foot traffic campaigns, you\u2019ve (hopefully) seen cost per store visits become somewhat more cost-efficient, and your ecommerce (for those running Smart Shopping) has seen an improvement in the cost per action (CPA).<\/p>\n
Positive<\/strong>: Performance Max is slowly becoming more reliable, and the ability to move to other verticals that are leads driven has become an opportunity.<\/p>\n
Google Analytics 4 (GA4)<\/h3>\n
I\u2019ll go ahead and say what we\u2019re all thinking (and it has been published multiple times already):<\/p>\n
My god, this analytics platform was clearly made by someone who clearly only interacts with barnyard animals and has a vision and not by someone who did a user focus group.<\/p>\n
If you somehow managed to survive the implementation of GA4<\/a>, you\u2019re now, more than likely, cursing it out due to lack of intuitiveness or more frustrated they rolled it out without a bounce rate or even conversion rate until months later.<\/p>\n
All is not lost, though; I highly recommend deploying it immediately (if you haven\u2019t already) and running it concurrently with GA UA, so you can work out the kinks and learn the platform while accruing historical data.<\/p>\n
You may feel like Google decided to wake up and choose chaos with this platform and probably lost a few weeks of your life trying to understand it \u2013 so keep it in mind when you evaluate what you didn\u2019t get around to doing in 2022.<\/p>\n
Bing Multimedia Ads<\/h3>\n
You saw the hype for them in September, especially on the video side, and thought: Finally, Bing is getting into the video ad game<\/a>.<\/p>\n
But then you realized you needed a raw video file to upload it and how little it would rotate.<\/p>\n
Big hopes, big opportunity, but just no volume.<\/p>\n
Twitter<\/h3>\n
I know this article is SEM focused, but I would be remiss if I didn\u2019t address this, as it is still biddable media.<\/p>\n
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