When building a campaign, the starting point can be challenging. Beyond the organization name, what should the keywords be? Should you use specific or long queries, short or broad words? What will users search on, and where can we find a crystal ball to predict these queries?

AdWords in the Curriculum students at Michigan State University worked with the National Leiomyosarcoma Foundation, and faced precisely this quandary. Leiomyosarcoma, a type of cancer, is a rare disease that affects 4 out of 1 million people.

Although AdWords campaign tools are helpful for estimating and brainstorming keywords, a preceding valuable starting point is to come up with a raw list of ideas using information about the target audience and non-profit mission.

“We tried to understand what the user went through in trying to find more information on the ailment,” explained MSU student Nupur Bihani. “It was complicated when we learned that the rarity of the disease meant that some doctors weren’t even aware of it.”

“We tried to put ourselves in the shoes of the patient, and walk ourselves through the learning process, and all of the scenarios one would find themselves in. It was really something of a humbling experience.”

Doing so led to a robust set of ideas for search keywords.

“We found that what drove the most traffic were people wanting to learn more about the disease, its symptoms and its cures. In short, people wanted to learn what they were dealing with,” said Kristyn Jones, also on the MSU team for the National Leiomyosarcoma Foundation.

“The website offers so many ways to help people who are suffering, not only through support, but also education, treatment and advancing the fight against the disease,” added Ray Lee, the third member of the team.

In addition to general awareness, the foundation hoped to drive more donations through the AdWords platform. To do so, they set up a separate campaign for ribbon sales. Alongside traditional e-commerce, the MSU team found creative ways to create a quantifiable success metric beyond clicks: Facebook. Membership on Facebook for the foundation doubled from 600 to over 1,200 since the AdWords campaigns started.

As a result of the AdWords campaigns and partnership with AdWords in the Curriculum, the NLMSF has seen a surge in awareness, site visits, and donations. Stepping into the shoes of their target audience became a key part of their strategy to think outside the box and get creative with queries. Thanks to the AdWords in the Curriculum student team, NLMSF’s campaigns have become a well-oiled machine to continue to drive exposure and ribbon sales.

Posted by Anita Varma, Google Ann Arbor

Just three weeks ago, schools resumed session and AdWords in the Curriculum embarked on a new semester. With a portfolio including a Google Grantee's site, mission statement and contact information, students are faced with the familiar question invoked by any assignment: where to begin?

The holiday season at the end of the calendar year is well known as the busiest time for both charitable donations to non-profits and sales for profit companies. Identifying strategic goals in September will lead to better outcomes in an end-of-year assessment of marketing success.

The most important place to start for any Google Grants recipient is deciding on campaign goals -- not keywords. What should the advertising accomplish? How will it improve your organization's exposure, and what audience are you trying to reach?

Starting a campaign without answering these important initial questions can lead to a hodgepodge of keywords, ad groups and ad texts that attempt to cram an entire mission into unstructured campaigns, potentially ineffective ads, and longer term struggles with determining whether the campaign is working.

After a set of goals are established, the next step is to determine a success metric to track. Is there a particular page that would be valuable for users to reach? Or is there an online conversion such as a donation, purchase or information request that you'd like to achieve? Determining success metrics will help non-profits determine whether the campaign is bearing fruit, or if it needs further refinement. This is especially relevant for campaigns that will run during the busy holiday season when you want to ensure your advertising is as effective as possible.

When creating your first AdWords campaign, also consider using the recommended steps available on the the 'Solutions for your advertising campaign' page to help generate ideas.

The work of both becoming experts in the AdWords program and helping with Google Grants recipients manage accounts and meet their goals is now underway for AdWords in the Curriculum students. Stay tuned for an end-of-semester update that will spotlight high performing AdWords in the Curriculum accounts for local non-profits in Michigan.

Posted by Anita Varma, Google Ann Arbor

School is almost back in session, and Wayne State University is joining the roster of top notch universities that are participating in AdWords in the Curriculum. Past and current participants include Eastern Michigan University, Michigan State University, and Emerson College.

How do AdWords in the Curriculum participants (students and non-profits) coordinate to attain success? For many non-profits, time is tight, and the task of developing advertising strategy may fall to the wayside of other concerns such as program development, event planning, or fundraising efforts. These priorities are understandable, and AdWords in the Curriculum is designed to ease the weight of honing online advertising while providing a valuable learning experience for students. That said, the effectiveness of a campaign will depend largely on mutual engagement from both students and non-profits. The time commitment may differ, but close engagement and adherence to deadlines are essential for an online advertising campaign to take flight.

For non-profits who are considering working with a student team or set of interns, the following steps that will be used in the Wayne State course are helpful for ensuring that a partnership develops between a student team and a non-profit team. This partnership will help lead to a fruitful campaign tailored to a non-profit's needs.

Successful communication between Google Grants recipients and students depends on measuring progress and accountability. Deadlines, meetings, and progress reports are three cornerstones of a framework for AdWords in the Curriculum effectiveness.

Wayne State Professor of Marketing Kevin Ketels explains, "The non-profits will receive a copy of my syllabus up front so they understand expectations for the students as well as for their own participation. For example, the non-profits will need to understand hard deadlines for reviewing student work in order to launch on deadline. In my syllabus, I have outlined a specific agenda for the introductory meeting between students and the non-profit. This meeting includes a review of the non-profit mission, overview of Google AdWords, goals for the advertising campaign, deadlines, and exchange of contact information."

Regular progress reports are a final facet of making sure that a partnership is blossoming between a student team and non-profit.

"I have also outlined specific milestones throughout the semester that include definition of organizational objectives, advertising design, campaign launch, evaluation, and optimization of the program," added Ketels. "For each of these items, the non-profit and I will receive a progress report from the student teams."

This is Wayne State University's first semester of AdWords in the Curriculum. Throughout the process, the mission and interests of the Google Grants recipient will be prioritized, keeping in mind time constraints and importance of a strong relationship between the student and non-profit partners.

"This course is unlike any I’ve taught in the past in that the students will be working on a project that directly impacts an outside organization," said Ketels. "It will require a high level of planning and communication between the non-profit organizations and their assigned student teams."

AdWords in the Curriculum at Wayne State will serve to educate students about the online advertising space, and will help non-profits local to Michigan get their first AdWords campaigns off to a running start.

Posted by Anita Varma, Google Ann Arbor

School's out! The sun is shining and students are taking a break from coursework, while their teachers and professors prepare for the coming semester. AdWords in the Curriculum pupils in Boston and Ann Arbor have also wrapped up for the summer months.

Even during these carefree summer months, Google Grantees that have been part of AdWords in the Curriculum haven't let their campaigns fall by the wayside. Several non-profits have brought in Eastern Michigan University students as summer interns (following their in-class success with AdWords campaigns), and others are using their AdWords accounts to promote summer-specific events, camps, and workshops. That being the case, we thought it would be useful to provide some tips for success with summer campaigns. Our AdWords in the Curriculum teachers and students recommend the following practices as you ramp up your seasonal advertising:

1. Set up a campaign for your summer events.

Tailor these keywords to the event - whether it's summer classes, an annual summer picnic, or a walk to raise funds for a cause. Worried about the ads continuing to run after the event is over? Not a problem - you can set an end date for the campaign so that it automatically ends based on your timeline.

2. Write ad text with a spin on seasonality.

Rather than running your standard ad text, spice it up with a nod toward "Fun in the Sun!" for an outdoor event. To target students, consider phrases like 'Summer Opportunities with Non-profits' which will help you capture the attention of students who are searching on Google for summer volunteering or employment positions to keep busy.

3. Use multiple match types to ensure that seasonal terms are tethered to the rest of the keyword.

For instance, using a phrase match keyword, "summer volunteer opportunities", will help you narrow your audience to the season-specific traffic that you're seeking with your summer campaign. It'll also help you avoid any duplication with other campaigns' keyword lists.

We'll have more gems of advice to share as our next batch of students become the teachers of the ins and outs of AdWords campaigns for Grantees. AdWords in the Curriculum spans graduate, undergraduate, and high school classes, so we'll have another update with tips from the newest round of Google Grant recipients when students return to school in August.

Posted by Anita Varma, Google Ann Arbor AdWords Team

AdWords in the Curriculum has arrived in Boston! After Ann Arbor, Boston was the next logical location for an AdWords in the Curriculum program based on its large student population. These two college towns with Google offices both have the unique advantage of accessibility to a wide range of universities with students and professors who are interested in online advertising for non-profits.

"Because Boston has so many colleges and so many non-profits, we thought it would make sense to expand the program here as well," said AdWords in the Curriculum organizer Laura Odorczyk. "At the end of last year, we officially launched the AdWords in the Curriculum team in Boston and started reaching out to schools."

Emerson University was the first school to participate in Boston's AdWords in the Curriculum program. During the spring semester, Emerson students worked with six local non-profits on their Google Grants accounts. These non-profits included The Level Field Foundation, Samaritans, Farm Aid, VHL Family Alliance, Partners for Youth with Disabilities, and Piers Park Sailing Center.

Undergraduates in the Emerson class titled 'Social Media and Marketing' learned about both online advertising and social media in the context of integrated marketing and communication outreach. During the spring semester, the innovative course was featured on Social Times and XConomy. More details to come on the students' work with grantees in future blog posts. Stay tuned!

Posted by Anita Varma, Google Ann Arbor

A major benefit of Google AdWords is that it allows you to self-manage your online advertising. Unlike other advertising platforms that require long contracts, tearsheets, or the laborious creation of ad material, AdWords gives non-profits and businesses alike the ability to build successful advertising campaigns from the comfort of your office, home, or both.

That said, Google Grant recipients are always eager to hear advice from people who are well-versed in the best practices of AdWords campaigns. This advice can come from the new Google Grants Help Center, the Google Grants Help Forum, or the Google Grants blog.

Recently, we asked two members of the Eastern Michigan University AdWords in the Curriculum course to offer their expert advice to nonprofits using AdWords.

Avoid Placing All Your Eggs in One Basket: Tailor Ad Variations and Ad Groups to Specific Goals

"My biggest pointer would be: don't try to do too much with just one ad," said Eastern Michigan University student John Hanna. "Keep the ads very focused on one objective and tailor the ad, keywords, and landing page to that objective. You can always make other ad groups if you are trying to accomplish more than one thing with AdWords."

Taking advantage of using multiple ad variations and ad groups in AdWords can lead to improved clickthrough rates and ad performance. Let's say your organization is seeking volunteers for a community event and would also like to encourage online donations. Having one ad group for each goal--with carefully tailored ad texts--will lead to more success than writing a single, generic ad text that applies broadly to both aims. By separating ad groups and ad texts based on goal, you could have one ad text with the call-to-action phrase 'Sign Up to Volunteer!' and another with the call-to-action phrase 'Donate Online!'

Set It, But Don't Forget It: The Value of Flexibility and Frequent Revisions

"I think the most important thing to do with Google AdWords is to be very creative and willing to make changes," noted Eastern Michigan University classmate Steven Pottenger. "If you target your audience to what you want, you will see a increase in accomplishing your goals."

After creating a successful campaign, it may seem risky to make any changes for fear of ruining the strong performance. But search trends change on an hourly basis, and search volume can vary a great deal from one week, month, or season to the next. What worked beautifully before may no longer be working, which is why we encourage Grantees to monitor campaigns and make regular revisions. Google Insights for Search and the Keyword Tool offer insight into what people are searching for and will help you keep your keyword lists timely.

During their time with AdWords in the Curriculum, John and Steven worked with Heritage Works, Habitat for Humanity for Huron Valley, and the Organization for Bat Conservation.

Posted by Anita Varma, Ann Arbor AdWords Team

What are the ingredients for a successful AdWords campaign? What specific, foundational learnings have proven useful for non-profits who are either starting from scratch or trying to improve current performance?

Students at Eastern Michigan University and Michigan State University recently paired with Google Grantees all asking these kinds of questions at the start of the semester.

In July 2008, we announced a recently launched program called AdWords in the Curriculum, driven from Google Ann Arbor. Most recently, AdWords in the Curriculum assigned undergraduate and MBA students at Eastern Michigan University (EMU) and Michigan State University (MSU) to local Google Grant recipients in Michigan.

 

AdWords in the Curriculum poises students to gain hands-on experience with building AdWords campaigns for Google Grants recipients. MSU student presentations revealed that each group's non-profit's AdWords campaigns had clickthrough rates of at least 5%, along with positive feedback from students on the value of the skills acquired through the AdWords-focused class.

 

At EMU, roughly 60% of non-profits have invited AdWords in the Curriculum students to join as interns since the end of the semester.

We'll describe two key learnings (relevant to all past, present, and future Grantees) that emerged from the students' fruitful semester of AdWords for Google Grants related to two areas of campaign management: refining keyword lists and selecting landing pages for ads.

 

Finding the Words Key to AdWords Campaign Success

 

Looking For My Sister, an anti-domestic violence non-profit in Wayne County, Michigan, had astronomical success with a solid 5% clickthrough rate, and a dramatic increase in online donations after the campaigns launched.

 

How did the students achieve such stellar statistics? A major part of their strategy was to continually revise and recenter keyword lists in order to avoid irrelevant traffic, which went hand-in-hand with overhauling campaign structure after assessing initial performance of ad groups.

For instance, the MSU students who worked with Looking For My Sister observed that the name of the organization (though memorable) is not immediately associated with the anti-domestic violence mission of the non-profit. The broader lesson? Keyword lists that rely on the assumption that people are Googling a non-profit's name may result in campaigns not performing to their full potential. Applying the lens and logic of marketing to non-profit exposure led to the students to compiling a more successful keyword list than originally drafted. To come up with revised keyword lists, the students ran reports like the Search Query Performance Report and Keyword Performance Report. These reports also made it easier to identify low-performing keywords to remove. 

 

Land on the Right Page: Fun and Games

 

EMU students who worked on Heritage Works’ AdWords campaign saw particular success with an ad group that promoted Heritage Works’ ‘Youth Zone’ page, with links to games for cultural education. The broader mission of Heritage Works is to promote cross-generational cultural understanding between youths of African descent and their families. While it may initially seem intuitive to have AdWords ads lead straight to a homepage, having the ads land on the unique games page effectively illustrated the mission of the organization: to serve as an appealing venue for children to learn about their backgrounds. Ultimately, the ad group with the 'Youth Zone' landing page had impressive performance. 

Here's the key takeaway: as you refine your AdWords ads, try linking to a page that shines a spotlight on a unique aspect of your organization--your homepage will still only be a click away after the user gets to your site. The more enticing the landing page content, the more likely the user will be to explore.

These two highlights are just a snippet of the tips of the trade that students of AdWords in the Curriculum develop through the course of a semester. We’re happy to share these best practices, brought to life by real non-profits like yours who can reap tangible benefits from using students’ hands-on strategies. Stay tuned to the Google Grants blog for future features on AdWords in the Curriculum!

Posted by Anita, Ann Arbor AdWords Team

Nationwide, belts are tightening. And in Michigan — home of the auto industry — belts are on just about the tightest holes.

As a way to support the local community, we’ve developed a program in our Ann Arbor office called AdWords in the Curriculum. In the course, Michigan high school and college students learn the ins and outs of Google AdWords. We hope graduates of the course, armed with a new set of skills, will go forth and help Michigan’s companies succeed in a global, technology-based economy.

“What does this all have to do with me?” you may be asking.

In AdWords in the Curriculum, students are assigned local Google Grantees. They work together to apply the students’ new knowledge and implement strategies.

But because most of you don’t necessarily have time to take a class and spend a lot of time experimenting with AdWords accounts, we thought we’d set you up with regular check-ins from the AdWords in the Curriculum students. We want to share their learnings, so that we can all make the most of their newfound experience, and spend advertising dollars wisely.

We'll be rounding up their learnings on a monthly basis here on the blog, so we hope you'll check back in to see what's new in the world of AdWords for non-profits.

To tide you over until the first official check-in, we'll leave you with a quick tip from one AdWords in the Curriculum alumni: Know your audience.

Eastern Michigan University students working with Dawn Farm, a rehab facility, initially targeted drug users looking for help. But when their ads weren't appearing often at all, they soon realized that it's not the addicts themselves looking -- they, of course, don't always realize they need help. Rather, it was loved ones searching, and researching drug effects. So, the students added keywords like 'LSD symptoms' and 'crack effects.' They also wrote ads targeted more toward loved ones, highlighting the informational portions of the site.

Traffic to the site rose by 60 percent.

In this video from Eastern Michigan University's College of Business, an AdWords in the Curriculum professor interviews one of the students about her experience with the Dawn Farms account.

Posted by Eileen, Ann Arbor AdWords Team

Our Ann Arbor office recently launched a pilot program designed to teach high school and university students how to use AdWords, helping them gain valuable skills in online marketing. As part of this effort, our team paired student groups with new Google Grants participants in the area to build their Google Grants accounts together. The students managed the accounts for several months and built their knowledge of AdWords. As the term came to a close, the students then taught the grant recipients how AdWords works and handed the accounts over to them to manage on their own. Some students were offered internships at the organizations to keep working with them and developing expertise.

The pilot classes were great successes for both the students and the non-profits organizations, and gave us the unique chance to help all of them better understand AdWords. One of the courses, held at Eastern Michigan University (EMU), has shared the results of their work on a website looking at innovative initiatives in Michigan. Overall, the EMU students' accounts accrued over 85,000 clicks at a click-through rate of 2.2%, with the participating organizations seeing increases in sales, event attendance, and so on. You can read all about EMU's experience here and watch short videos with students discussing their experiences in the course.

With such positive results from our initial pilot program, we may expand it to other schools and regions. We'll keep you posted on any future plans.

Posted by Kristie, Google Grants Team