How to Optimize Your Google Grants

1. Use IF statements

When a condition is met, IF functions allow you to insert a specified message in your text ad and a default text when it is not; this makes your ads more relevant to potential donors and more personalized to each search. IF functions, unlike ad customizers, do not use a feed.

IF functionalities are only applicable to ads that appear on the Search Network. IF functions are parameters that are enclosed in braces {like this}. When a person’s search triggers your ad, the parameter is substituted by the text you select. Except for the final URL box, you can use IF functions everywhere in your text ad.

Now, what does this have to do with Google Ad Grants?

To optimize Google Ad grants for your organization, you can use IF statements to promote the different payment gateways your organization accepts based on the browser or device they are on. For example, your organization can easily encourage more donations by promoting the fact that Apple Pay or Google Wallet is available for donations!

In addition, it can also be helpful to use audience lists to ask for a specific donation amount based on the posts they’ve read.

2. Use dayparting

Dayparting is a pay-per-click (PPC) advertising strategy that involves scheduling ads for specific times of day or days of the week to better target potential donors.

As a nonprofit organization, you should have general knowledge of who your ideal donors are. Your existing donor demographics can assist you in determining the demographics of your potential donors so you can target them at the best time of day. If you find that the majority of your donors are retired, running your advertising during the day when they are most likely at home could be a good idea. Your audience will determine the timing and location of your advertisement.

The timing can also be based on past data. For example, about 10% of all annual donations come in the last three days of the year. So when the time comes, you can set up your strategy to target all those last-minute donors!

3. Run multilingual campaigns

When dealing with a diverse range of potential donors in different countries and regions, it can be challenging to make sure your Google Ads consistently reach the right audience and that your organization is visible and established in your target audience.

When people see an advertisement that isn’t in the language they speak, they interpret it as a “generic” ad and disregard it. They don’t click not because they don’t want to, but because their brain perceives them as less relevant than ads in their own language.

For example, about 60% of the Swiss population speak German, 6% Italian, 20% French, and 14% speak Romansh and other languages.

You would miss out on about 40% of potential clients if you only created your ad in German. That’s nearly half of the population—yikes!

Multilingual Google Ads campaigns provide the perfect solution, presenting information about your organization and mission in the native language of your target donors and exposing potential donors who are searching for targeted keywords to your organization almost instantly.

Optimizing your Google Ad Grant doesn’t have to be as tricky and confusing as you are probably making it. Following the three steps above will put you on track to getting the absolute most out of Google Ad Grants. But keep reading! Check out a couple of our bonus tips to take your Google Ad Grant even further.

Bonus #1: Use lead-gen forms and other ad extensions

The average conversion rate in Google Ads on mobile for nonprofits is 2.63% for the search network but then .37% on the display network. So Google wanted to create a solution to allow people to easily convert without having to actually go to the mobile website, thus, lead form extensions were born.

Google lead form extensions appear beneath your search ad on mobile and tablet devices and allow users to give their contact information directly through your ad on the SERP rather than visiting a landing page. This eliminates the extra step users have to take of going to your mobile website to convert. Instead, suppose the searcher is logged into their Google account. In that case, they will be directed to a Google-hosted form that is already pre-populated with their contact information and can convert with one simple click!

Using lead form extensions can help your nonprofit by generating leads to drive donations. They also can drive leads into your marketing funnel to get more and more conversions and even long-time donors. Lastly, they are great for finding and engaging more people that could potentially be interested in your organization.

Bonus #2: Contact New Target to help get past the $2 CPC limit with a custom bidding strategy

The typical bidding approach uses Maximize conversion values if you’re tracking a donation, membership, or purchase fee on your website. However, if you contact New Target, we adjust your bid strategy to Target CPA and Target ROA. These are much more advanced strategies, and combined with our unique formula, we set bids focused on your conversion goals and help you get past the $2 CPC limit.

Still skeptical?

Yes, this might sound too good to be true, but numbers don’t lie! For example, for one of our nonprofit clients, TechnoServe, we introduced lead-gen forms and used IF statements while working with their Google Ads. The addition of both strategies greatly improved the click-through rate. In fact, this resulted in an increase of more than 100% in paid search traffic who spent nearly 25% more time on the site.

Optimizing your Google Ad Grant can seem like a bit of a nuisance, and we understand that and are here to help. So if you want to see the success we created for TechnoServe and many of our other clients, get in touch with us today!