Paid Search & PPC

I’ve been working in Google Ads since 2015, so I’ve seen many new Google innovations in the space. The shift away from manual bidding to Google’s (IMO – far superior in many situations) automated bidding was landscape changing. In 2019, Google introduced its optiscore that was essentially a ranking system to determine how “compliant” and[…]

When I first heard about “the metaverse” my mind immediately flashed to The Office episode where Dwight is playing the online role-playing game, Second Life. In the episode, Dwight says “my life was so great that I literally wanted a second one.” Insert Jim Halpert smirk here (but really who can afford it?) That The[…]

I think we can all appreciate a good sandwich. A well designed sandwich can make your whole day. Good bread, quality meat and cheese and just the right amount of sauces and special toppings. My favorite this time of year is a thick cut turkey on toasted whole grain bread with a slice of sharp[…]

Here at Granular, we’ve had the privilege of working with over 50 different companies in multiple countries to assist with their hiring needs over the last few years. We have been able to drive nearly 150,000 applicants to these positions in the past year alone. There has been a lot of testing through various ad[…]

In October 2020, Google updated their Personalized advertising policies to include new targeting restrictions that directly impacted advertising for Housing. Advertisers can no longer target users based on age, gender, marital status, parental status or ZIP code.  This makes it difficult to reach the right audience with your ads, (especially for those 55+ communities). Fortunately,[…]

Disclaimer from the authors Jessica Busalacchi & Emily Martin – Since TikTok is growing at a rapid pace and their advertising platform is so new, a lot of features are continuously changing. We will do our best to keep this guide updated!  Over the past year, TikTok has taken the world by storm with its[…]

Chances are by now you’ve either organized or attended an online event you might not have prior to the pandemic. In LinkedIn’s Best Practice Guide for Events, they mention… 65% of B2B marketers are planning to reallocate some or most of their live event budgets to online events due to Covid-19. The types of online[…]

Detailed and accurate attribution is key to driving digital marketing performance. If the data that your decisions are based on is inaccurate or not detailed enough, then you’re at risk of not making the most optimal decisions. Often, we find that clients are aware that what they’re tracking isn’t a complete picture of all their[…]

I have some issues with the approach of creating Responsive Search Ads (RSAs) as soon as you start a new campaign in a Google Ads account. First, RSAs use the headlines and description lines you input. How do you know if those inputs are any good? Until you have data that proves it to be[…]

As a business, one of the most valuable things you have is your customer data. There are several different ways you can utilize your customer data in digital marketing to both re-engage current customers and find new customers. First, let’s talk about the type of customer data you will need and how you can collect[…]

Having your Facebook ad account disabled can be extremely frustrating, especially when Facebook gives little-to-no detail on what policy was violated to trigger the disapproval! We at Granular have found, more often than not in recent days and weeks, the reason that our clients’ ad accounts get randomly shut down is because they have not[…]

To me, it seems like an overlooked feature that’s been a part of Google Analytics Universal since it launched is Content Groupings. Content groupings are clusters of pages defined by common identifiers, like URL, metadata or website purpose.  By using them, a company can better understand the growth of its website over time through more[…]

Do you have a go-to conversation starter? Something that always gets people talking? At Granular, our team has spent hours debating if a hotdog is a sandwich, if cereal is soup, and more recently – if a Pop-Tart is a ravioli. Another way to get a group of PPC experts to start a conversation is[…]

I forget what the psychological effect is called, but something happens to people when they get free money.  They tend to be more careless with it.  “Oh, I just got a bonus in my paycheck?  Yippe ki yay!  I’ll go blow it on a doodad I’ve been wanting for a while,” we think.  “Oh, I[…]

It’s true. There are some really bad placements for your ads on YouTube. For the unsuspecting advertiser that follows a basic campaign set up and uses some broader targeting options (like topics and keywords), they may just find that they’ve been serving ads before and during videos that either don’t deliver any value, or worse,[…]

At Granular we believe it is critical for companies to own their own digital ad accounts but every so often we come across a client whose Facebook Ads Manager account was set up under an employee’s personal ad account instead of under the business. This can become a real pain…especially if the employee no longer[…]

I have a huge flea market not too far from my house.  When I go there and find something I want to buy, I make sure I cover the whole market first because I regularly find multiple vendors that are selling the same thing.  And while the first vendor that carries the product may be[…]

In the past few weeks, I’ve been asked by clients and internal team members a very smart question; “When should we start using GA4 (Google Analytics 4)?,” and I didn’t really have a clear answer. In the past few months since being released in October of 2020, GA4 has been throwing many digital marketers and[…]

Recently, I got a new client and ran into a major obstacle in the onboarding process that left both the client and I frustrated. Not only that, it delayed launching new campaigns and made not only the onboarding process more difficult, but all management for the ad accounts moving forward more complicated. As a standard[…]

Have you ever felt that the audience in your Facebook lead generation campaign has gone dry? You may have started to see your Cost/Conv. and Frequency rise, or maybe people just aren’t converting as they did initially. Well, it might be time to try out a chatbot instead of a lead gen form.  Never used[…]

Ever since Google used the phrase “don’t be evil” as its motto and in its corporate code of conduct, people have been using the phrase to judge every action they take as evil or not.  With the latest change to their advertising platform, people are asking themselves again – is Google being evil?  Some think[…]

YouTube can be kind of a dangerous place to advertise if you don’t know what you’re doing.  Why is that?  Well…consider this… As of this writing, there are about 720,000 hours of new video content uploaded to YouTube every day(!!!), and that content varies widely.  What’s more, the audiences watching that content varies wildly.  Personally,[…]

Last year changed a lot in retail – with limited capacities at stores due to COVID-19, retailers started pushing for more online driven marketing and focused on store pickups. Google introduced the Curbside Pickup tag (see image below) earlier in the year, with Microsoft following shortly after. Retailers began to train their customers to shop[…]

A new client recently started with us and brought with them a sort of unique situation when it comes to Paid Search.  I had heard about examples of this situation before but had never directly worked with it. The unique part of working with this client is people don’t search for what they offer. Huh,[…]

Every day, one of my best friends and I started our conversations with “how are you?” Of course, the next person gives the obligatory “good, but tired/busy/stressed. How about you?” AND IT’S DRAINING. I love talking to this friend, but this opening takes all of the interest out of our conversations. And then I remembered[…]