5 Tips To Kick-Start Your Career In PPC

Having started my career in PPC at the beginning of the year, I wanted to share some tips to help you ace that interview and get your foot in the door. Perhaps you have just graduated university or are looking for a career change, whatever the case, if you’re interested in a career in PPC follow these 5 tips to help you get started.

If you’re reading this article, I’m sure you’ll already be aware of what PPC is but it is important to make sure you understand the basic terminology and all the acronyms that entail.

• SERP: SERP means the search engine results page.
• Impressions: An impression is counted each time your ad is served on the SERP.
• Clicks: When someone clicks your ad that will count as a click.
• Clickthrough Rate (CTR): CTR measures how often people click your ad after it’s shown to them. CTR is calculated by dividing the number of clicks your ad receives by the number of times your ad is shown.
• Cost: Cost is the sum of your spend during a selected time period.
• Cost-per-click (CPC): CPC is the average amount you’ve paid for each click. CPC is calculated by dividing the amount you’ve spent on the ad by the amount of clicks your ad receives.
• Conversions: Conversions show the number of conversions you received after ad interactions. For example, this could be as simple as a purchase or it could be a different action such as filling out a contact form after your ad has been clicked.
• Conversion rate (CVR): CVR shows how often, on average, an ad interaction leads to a conversion. It’s calculated by dividing “Conversions” by the interactions with your ad.
• Cost per conversion: Cost per conversion shows the average cost of a conversion. It’s your cost divided by your conversions.
• Conversion value: Conversion value, also known as Revenue, is the sum of conversion values for your conversions.
• Return on ad spend (ROAS): ROAS measures your return on investment. It’s the conversion value divided by the total cost of all ad interactions.

Along with these terms, you should also be aware of the campaign structure within accounts. Key themes to be aware of here are campaigns, ad groups, ad types, and keywords.

There’s lots of free certifications online that can help you to build a foundation of PPC knowledge across multiple topics, allowing you to test yourself and gain a certification to demonstrate your ability.

Both Google and Microsoft offer free training and certifications. Google Skillshop offers certifications across multiple topics including Search, Shopping, Display, Video, Measurement and Apps. Here at Katté & Co, our trainees are required to take these as part of the onboarding process, but it wouldn’t hurt to take a look at the modules. I would even recommend taking the Google Ads Search Certification as this will give you an understanding of Search and show to your interviewer that you’re acting on your interest to pursue PPC as a career.

There are also a lot of videos on YouTube explaining all things PPC – take a look there if you want to explore a topic in more detail.

Analysing data and tracking results is a crucial aspect of PPC and familiarizing yourself with shortcut keys, formulas, functions, and tables would put you in good stead to hit the ground running.

Some important formulas you should understand include: VLOOKUP, SUMIF, and LEN, as well as Pivot Tables.

At the interview stage, you could be asked to complete a short assessment involving Excel / Google Sheets and understanding the above formulas will ensure you’re prepared.

Networking… it may sound scary to reach out to people that you don’t know but it will help you to learn more about the role you’re applying for and could increase your chances of securing an interview. LinkedIn is your best friend here – if you’ve found a role and company you want to apply to, find the company page on LinkedIn and look at current employees. Find someone in a role you’re interested in, connect with them and drop them a brief message. Most people would be happy to have a quick chat and answer any questions you might have.

Additional tip: make sure your LinkedIn profile is up-to-date with all of your recent skills and experiences.

The world of PPC is always changing and reading up on current trends in the industry will help keep you up-to-date on news and develop your expertise on the foundations you already have. Reading up on articles and blogs will solidify your knowledge and boost your understanding of the basics.

To start with, you could take a look at our other blogs for insights into various topics across Paid Search and Social. Also, check out our LinkedIn page and keep an eye out for our monthly ‘Breakfast Bytes’ webinars.