How to Sell SEM to Local Advertisers

Most Local Businesses Are Already Using Paid Search

Your customers are already investing in SEM. It’s been a recurring priority for local companies and can deliver great returns. It’s often very competitive, especially for certain industries. However, advertisers know it’s critical to stay top of mind.

SEM works throughout the sales funnel, from awareness to consideration to decision. Thus, it’s a full-funnel tactic, which means many companies devote large budgets to it to support sales. So, why aren’t they buying it from you?

They may not know you offer it as a digital product, or they think their current campaign workflows meet their needs. They may believe it’s not broken, so why fix it? If you could peer into their results, you’d likely be able to pinpoint areas for improvement.

To start the conversation, you’ll need to:

• Advise customers that you can execute SEM for them (and better).
• Discuss how SEM can be part of a larger campaign with other digital or linear ads to support it.
• Offer a quick assessment of what they’re doing now.
• Get insights on their challenges (e.g., manual processes in self-service, margins getting smaller due to agency costs).

As you sketch out their needs and the gaps, you’ll be able to make the case for why you are a better SEM partner.

How to Sell SEM: Key Points to Make

How you present your offerings will depend on what you learn from customers. The following are key things that can build your case.

SEM Should Be Part of a Multi-Tactic Campaign

Whether businesses run SEM on their own or through an agency, it’s happening in a vacuum. There aren’t other supporting tactics. Further, if you sell it as a standalone tactic, your margins will be low due to the cost of goods. There is motivation for you and your advertisers to make SEM part of an omnichannel campaign.

Certain synergies can drive impressive results. For example, a recent study determined that AM/FM radio ads can create a 14% lift in website traffic. Someone hears an ad on the radio and goes to search. Maybe they don’t remember the brand exactly, but they know the type of business. They’ll get local results, and a business sitting at the top of these results will be in a better position to get the click.

You can offer advertisers this, including digital and radio spots. In addition to radio, other complementary tactics could be OTT/CTV. With OTT, people are on mobile devices and may click a link directly. CTV is different; most of these ads aren’t shoppable. However, most consumers have their phones in hand while watching and could move to search to learn more. An ad from the results would be prominent with the same language or offer from the video spot.

You Can Manage Their SEM Campaigns Better

SEM can be impactful, but it often becomes a budget pit. Advertisers keep throwing money to bid but aren’t generating sales. From your assessment of their current campaigns, you can draw some conclusions. From there, you may bring up these areas for improvement:

• The keywords aren’t appropriate based on the products, industry, audience or search intent: Some keywords may be junk, too competitive or not a good match.
• The user’s experience once they click to the website is poor: If people just come to the website’s homepage, they may immediately bounce. Instead, businesses need dedicated landing pages to support the offer in the ad. Additionally, their website should be mobile-friendly and load quickly.
• There haven’t been any adjustments since the campaign started: Setting and forgetting it is how ad dollars get wasted. Performance insights should inform optimization. Using a digital platform with conversion-based optimization allows you to maximize their ad spend for the best return. It automatically allocates budget to the keywords and text ads that deliver the most conversions.

They Don’t Have to Worry About Keywords and Copy

There is an art to selecting the keywords to target and the ad copy. Most companies lack the resources to do this strategically. If they’re working with an agency, they’ll get more relevant ones, which may come with a big price tag.

Instead, you can rely on your third-party digital partner to provide this. Campaigns would include:

• Vertical-tailored keyword lists
• Copy relevant to the products or services with localization
• Multiple headlines and descriptions that dynamically combine for the best performance

Performance of Ads Correlates to Intent

As noted, SEM is a tactic that businesses can use throughout the funnel. The keywords and ad copy should be different depending on search intent. When someone is doing research, they use different terms than when they are ready to buy. Many businesses can play in all these spaces.

The searcher’s intent impacts clicks and conversions. When talking to advertisers about SEM, discuss intent. You can offer two strategies. The first would be to have different campaigns based on intent with ad copy that supports researchers and buyers.

The second option would be bidding only on purchase-intent keywords and dismissing researchers. This has its pros and cons. The pros would be that you can optimize the advertiser’s budget better and attribute revenue to the ads. The cons would be that the person gets great ideas while researching and then buys from the company that offered them.

Having this conversation demonstrates your knowledge and value to advertisers. You’re not an agency offering the same SEM proposals to any local business.