Setting up a Google Ads campaign for a cruise company is crucial if you want to attract travelers. Many of your potential travelers will be using Google and other partner search engines to look for a suitable cruise or deals for their next vacation.
Google Ads offers you powerful tools to reach people searching for cruises, vacations and related experiences. And you can set up multiple campaign types to reach your audiences at different stages.
This guide will walk you through the essential steps to set up a successful Google Ads campaign for your cruise company.
1. Define Campaign Goals
Before you dive into the setup of a Google Ads campaign for a cruise company, it’s important to establish clear objectives that might include:
– increasing bookings for cruise packages
– promoting deals and discounts
– growing brand awareness
– capturing leads for your email campaigns
Setting your campaign goals and objectives will help to guide you in updating settings such as budget allocation, bid strategy and more.
2. Conduct Keyword Research
Keywords are at the core of a pay per click (PPC) campaign. So, you need to identify the right ones so you can target search queries that are relevant for your cruise company.
You will start by identifying terms potential customers might use when searching for a cruise. And a tool like Keyword Planner in Google Ads is available for you to conduct that research.
As you do the research, consider the following points:
– Destination keywords – like “Mediterranean cruises” and “Caribbean cruises”
– Experience keywords – such as “luxury cruises” and “family-friendly cruises”
– Interest keywords – such as “cruises for foodies” and “adventure cruises”
And you can select keywords for different stages of the customer journey, from discovery to booking.
3. Set Up Your Google Ads Account
To get started with Google Ads, visit www.ads.google.com to create your account. If you have an account, you can login there. When you are in, click on ‘Campaigns’ to set up your campaign and there are various campaign types you can create for a cruise company, like:
– Search – this is one of the best Google Ads campaign types for a cruise company. You will target people who are searching for a cruise company on Google.
Performance Max – this campaign places your ads across Google’s network of websites automatically. So, you can reach people looking for a cruise at different stages.
Display – use visually engaging image and banner ads across the Google Display network to enhance your brand and drive bookings.
4. Target Your Audience
Define who your ideal customers are, who are looking for a cruise company, and use Google ads to reach them:
– Location targeting – focus on states, cities and countries where cruises are popular and where your audiences reside. Add these locations in the campaigns.
– Demographic targeting – use demographics to reach people based on their age, gender, household income or parental status. And add these to your ad groups.
– Interest targeting – target in-market and affinity audiences to reach users who are interested in luxury goods, family vacations, travel or similar audience types.
5. Create Compelling Ads
Next, you will need to create ad groups where you will add your keywords and related ads. The ads should be of a high quality and ensure that they are:
– Relevant – this means they should highlight key benefits and features of your cruises. And you should add your keywords and action-oriented language to encourage clicks.
– Engaging – include cruise offers and discounts and exclusive packages to entice users to click through to your website.
– Clear – include details on the actions you want visitors to take. So, this should be a clear call to action such as “Book Now” or “Learn More”.
And if you launch video and display campaigns, use high quality visuals that are captivating and showcase the experience of being on your cruises.
6. Set Bids and Budget
In campaign settings, you will update bid strategy and budget. These two can be a challenge for many businesses, but doing some testing will help you reach the right performance.
For budget, start with one that aligns with your goals and scale up as you see results.
For bidding strategies use:
– Maximize Clicks – a good one to start with and it tries to get you the most clicks possible within your budget.
– Target CPA (Cost Per Acquisition) – this is a smart bidding strategy which sets bids to achieve a target cost per conversion.
– Target ROAS (Return On Ad Spend) – another smart bid strategy, it sets bids to achieve a specific return on ad spend.
7. Track and Optimize
After launching your campaign, you will need to set up conversion tracking to track cruise bookings. And based on performance, you’ll optimize the campaign to improve its performance.
The key metrics to track include:
– Click-Through Rate (CTR) – this metric tells you how often people who see your ad click on it. It’s expressed as a percentage.
– Conversion Rate – this is one of the most important metrics in Google Ads, and it shows you the percentage of clicks that result in cruise bookings.
– Cost Per Click (CPC) – this shows the average cost of each click on your ad.
8. Leverage Remarketing
With a remarketing campaign, you can retarget people who’ve been on your website looking for a cruise. This is important in the travel industry, because customers take time to make a booking decision, as they shop around.
So, you can use remarketing to offer special promotions or remind visitors of what they were interested in.
9. Analyze and Report
After running your campaign for about a week or two, analyze the data to assess its overall performance. So, look for insights and trends that will inform future ads and campaigns. And then create relevant reports highlighting key achievements and areas for improvement.
Conclusion
Setting up a Google Ads campaign for a cruise company requires careful planning and ongoing optimization. So, with the tips in this article, you’ll be able to create one that helps you achieve your goals.
I’m a search marketing specialist with extensive experience in Google Ads. Get in touch today to discuss your requirements.
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