Best PPC data tool?

[Brian-H]

Would love to hear your suggestions for the better PPC management and reporting tool. I am suggesting more and more to clients to run PPC campaigns alongside SEO campaigns with the data feeding back in to the SEO.

What I am really lacking is a good tool to help organise the campaigns and help report on conversions, profitability and including things like profit margins per product so they it gives the client an exact figure of how much the PPC campaign generated in cash to them. I'm not a spreadsheet type of person although I force myself when I have to.

So far I am looking at Raven and SEMRush. WOuld love to hear about those and any others I may have missed out on.

[chris.kent]

I would also look into spyfu.com and wordstream.com for software regarding ppc management.

[Brian-H]

Thanks. Under seomoz properks wordstream says "The Keyword Research Suite is fast, powerful, and easy to use – all for a low annual cost, with plans starting at $329 per year. That’s less than $1 a day for unlimited access to WordStream’s full suite of best-in-class keyword tools.  " but I can only find it at $349/month which is a lot different and a lot more expensive.

Am I missing something?

[chris.kent]

click redeem the perk, and it will give you the coupon code to put in at checkout

[Brian-H]

Hi Chris, The perk says 25% off but 25% off $349/month is still a way off from $329 a year. I'm wondering if the prices on the seomoz offer are old prices.

At $329 a year it looks like an absolute bargain but at $349-25% a month not a bargain...although I have yet to look at all the other benefits of the tool.

Will have a good look at both of them now.

[JasmineA]

I use Spyfu now for competitive research and like all competitive research it's not more than 60% accurate. I used SearchEngineMetrics and they aren't extremely accurate either (for my own clients as well as for their competitors).

Is the client not using Google Analytics? I feel like this would solve all the problems you're having.

If a client is using GA, here's a step by step way you can get the information you're looking for at no cost

1. Navigate to the Search Overview in Traffic Sources.
2. Select the Ecommerce option from the Goal Set nav
3. See the Average Value per Transaction
4. Simultaneously have AdWords up.
5. Customize your column view to show the Conversion Many Per Click options (Cost / Conv, Conv Rate, Conversions, and Total Value if you don't already have it)
6. Multiply GA Average Value by the target Cost (opposite of profit margin).
   This is your middle-of-the-road CPA (cost per acquisition or Cost / Conv target).
7. Compare to each campaign in AdWords.
8. Make the necessary changes in AdWords to work toward this goal. 
   If the average value increases, technically so does your CPA.
9. This gets a whole lot trickier if you are tracking a non-eCommerce goal and the client is lead gen based.

I know that looks like a lot to go through, but it's cheap, faster than it seems, and AdWords is really better than any bid management or campaign management system I've found. I'm still looking for the right one for my clients. Analytics is the best way to go. All of it's already right there.

[Brian-H]

Thank you. A few people have said adwords and excel is a better combo than any tool so you are probably correct. Have a thumbs up

I suppose the bit I am then missing is turning that data in to snazzy reports that look nice and convey information to the client in a succinct manner.

[JasmineA]

Yeah, I have that problem sometimes as well. If a client is new to paid search and they don't understand a lot yet you can keep it simple. If you deliver SEO reports on keywords, include a report on the top converting & top traffic KWs from Paid Search as well.

As far as costs and stuff go, it depends on how detailed you want to go. I think you could probably stick with a simple information if the client doesn't want to know much.

@AnnieCushing is definitely someone to follow if you're looking for excel tips.