How would you like to increase your web traffic by 400 percent? That's what Google Adwords did for restaurateur Shahram Bijan. As a new restaurant owner, Shahram didn't have a large budget for advertising, which is where Google Adwords can become an invaluable part of your interior design business's marketing plan. When every customer counts and margins are razor-thin, interior designers can't afford to spend money on advertising unwisely.

Google Adwords works on the premise that targeting your particular customer base will provide the best return for your advertising dollar. Not everybody is looking for your service, so advertising directed towards internet traffic that will not use your service is a waste of resources. Think of it like this: you wouldn't spend time (and money) researching pickup trucks if you were looking to purchase a new Range Rover, would you? It's the wrong target audience, and your money would be better-spent advertising to "eligible" customers who are most likely to use your service.

How Does Google Adwords Work for Interior Designers?

Let's say you conduct a Google search for "Interior Designer Dallas" on Google. Besides the regular search results, a list of sponsored ads will appear on the right and in a shaded box at the top. But why do these ads in particular appear? If you use Google Adwords, you aren't paying to have your ad put there; your ad only appears during relevant keyword based searches. When you set up an Adwords account, you set up a budget, and then you set up a list of keywords you want to be found for. For interior decorating you might research and choose a list that contains "Residential Interior Decorating" and "Commercial Hotel Interior Design." When someone searches for those words on Google, ads targeted to those keywords will appear. This is where it gets tricky.

If a hundred companies use the same keywords, which ones appear at the top? The main two components that affect your ad's placement is a combination of your budget and how much you are willing to pay per click (you only pay when customers click your ad) and the quality score Google assigns to your web page based on your keyword. This is why some people have referred to Google Adwords as an "auction" type of advertising. High-demand keywords such as "interior decorating" are likely to receive more bids, and thus cost more.

How To Get The Best Results From Google Adwords

Now we see there are two ways you can improve your marketing on Google Adwords. The first, and cheaper way is to ensure your website will get a good quality score for any keywords you want clients to search for. This means meeting the three main components of a google search result: crawling, indexing, and serving results. 

Crawling and indexing only require following the webmaster guidelines to make sure Google can find your site. Serving results is where you can improve your search results by including quality information relevant to the keywords, and having lots of deep links and back links to your web page. Think of your web page as having a conversation with your customer- if the "date" were interested in interior decorating, what would you talk about? Avoid fluff, filler, and small talk- have a meaningful conversation.

The other way you can get the most from your advertising budget is to target your ideal customer base. If your interior design company is located in Dallas, then you will have less competition if you target customers who search for "interior designer Dallas" or even "interior designer Dallas feng shui."  Instead of competing with a thousand other companies, you're putting yourself in a position where customers who are likely to use your service will find you.

Google AdWords can be part of a complete marketing strategy. It's important to look at your online presence as an eco-system designed to attract visits, convert them into leads and close sales. Developing a marketing plan that stretches your budget is the first step towards getting better customers. We have seen Google AdWords work tremendously well for our clients but (And this is critical) It's only cost effective if your website is keyword rich, search engine optimized and you are already blogging regularly. Without these items in place first, you will be wasting a considerable percentage of your budget.

About Michael Conway

I'm the owner and strategist at Means-of-Production. My firm builds Squarespace websites, Houzz profiles, and content marketing and advertising solutions for architects, interior designers, design-build contractors and landscape design firms. Our all-in-one marketing tactics attract the right clients with exceptional architectural photography and brand messaging that sets you apart from the competition.