This article contains frequently asked questions regarding Curaytor's Google PPC lead generation service.
What kind of performance can I expect?
Typical Cost Per Lead hovers between $7 and $17, depending on market, which yields 55 to 150 leads per month (based on a $1,000 budget).
What kind of keywords are you using?
We build out the entire spectrum of keywords - from very broad to very specific. We then monitor performance and will allocate budget based on what is working best for your business, so the types of keywords that are driving the most high quality leads will get the most budget.
What keywords am I showing up on?
Keywords are the behind-the-scenes tool that we use to point Google in the right direction. Keywords tell Google - “we want our ad to show up when someone types in something like this phrase”. What really matters is what kind of search terms are we showing up on? What are people typing into Google that are triggering our ad to show up?
We do not share our keywords with clients because our strategy is proprietary. However, we are more than happy to show you a search term report to give you a sense of the types of searches that you're matching to.
Do you run seller ads through PPC? / Most of the leads are buyer leads - why aren’t we getting seller leads?
Our expectation is that the majority of the leads that you’ll receive out of PPC will be buyer leads. Seller-centric keywords are incredibly expensive in Google ($8-10 per CLICK - not per lead) and have very poor conversion rates. That will eat up our advertising budget very quickly and will actually net out with far fewer leads from the program. It’s simply not a cost-effective way to get seller leads.
We use a more cost-effective approach of qualifying seller intent through questions on the lead form. We ask additional questions (beyond contact information) to add friction to the process, eliminate low quality leads, and identify buyer leads who also need to sell.
On average, we see ~20% of PPC leads that identify themselves as “needing to sell first”.
When someone clicks on my ad, where do they go?
We utilize Chime landing pages for all buyer leads. We create dozens of landing pages to make the on-page experience as tailored as possible to each individual user. This boosts quality score and conversion rate. We regularly test and iterate on the landing page functionality to increase conversion rate.
Will my ad display at the top of the Google search results?
Maybe. Every time someone does a search in Google, it kicks off an instantaneous, dynamic auction behind the scenes. Where you rank on the search results page is determined by your relevance to that specific user and how much you’re willing to pay (your bid). Because we use limited budgets, we intentionally do not bid to the top of page 1. Sometimes we will show up in the #1 spot, but sometimes it will be too expensive. Our goal is to maximize the number of conversions coming out of the advertising budget. So we need to closely monitor our cost per click (CPC) in order to squeeze as much out of the budget as possible.
How do I know a lead came from Google?
Any lead that has interacted with a PPC ad will have a “google_ppc” tag on the lead profile, regardless of their original source.
What is the lead source for the PPC generated leads ?
Any lead that originally registers through a PPC ad will have the source "curaytor".
Where does my ad show up?
Your ad is eligible to show up when someone searches for a relevant search term on google.com. Most often, it will show up in the search results at the top/bottom of the page on page 1 or 2.
If you have a Google My Business account (GMB), we set up a Location Extension for you, which makes you eligible to serve in the ad spot in the “local pack”/”map pack” as well. We cannot specifically target this ad location.
Do you run ads on Bing, Yahoo, etc?
No, not currently. Google covers 85% of the search market and dominates in performance. We may test Bing in the future, but with the limited budgets that our clients work with, we believe Google will give you the best return on your investment.
We will not pursue third-tier advertisers like Yahoo because performance, features, and capability are not up to our standards.
Why would someone search for a home in google instead of just going to a Zillow or realtor.com?
Zillow is by far the biggest brand name in real estate, however, Google drives a MASSIVE amount of search traffic for real estate related searches. In fact, Zillow gets ~40% of their traffic from Google (source is SimilarWeb).
So, as a local agent, you can concede and allow Zillow to hold you captive and charge you whatever they want to buy their leads. Or, you can take your destiny into your own hands and capture the traffic yourself and cut out Zillow.
You can do that through SEO or PPC. But SEO is uncertain and can take a really long time. PPC is the “hack” that allows you to compete head-to-head with Zillow as soon as we turn on the ads.
In addition, you own the relationship with the customer. CEO of Curaytor, Jimmy Mackin, always says “the one who is closest to the customer wins”. That’s why you see Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) brands taking off in the last few years.
So if you can circumvent Zillow and capture the traffic yourself, you put yourself in the driver seat to control your own destiny.
What does client reporting look like?
Here is an example report. As a PPC client, you will receive this monthly on the first of every month, showcasing the previous month's data.
