One of the first things you should be doing in any dental Google Ads campaign, is ensuring the location targeting is set up correctly. After all, there is no use in a person in Scotland seeing your dental implants ad if you are based down in Bournemouth, right?
It’s easy enough to set up a simple location radius – i’ll show you how. But, if you want to take things a step further and really stand above the competition – there are some nifty tricks you can do. That’s exactly what you will learn in this article.
Related: Learn more about how Google Ads for dentist works
The Simple Google Ads Location Targeting for Dentists
In its simplest form, you can just add a radius around your location. It works. It does the job. It’s a great starting point for sure. Here’s how it looks:
Generally the size of location you want to target is gong to depend on your location. If you are based in the centre of London, for example, you may suffice with a 2 mile radius. However, if you are a practice out in the countryside, you’ll have to branch a little wider.
Another factor to consider is the size of your ad budget. The larger your budget, the wider you have to cast your net. You may find that increasing your location radius is one way to do that if you are in search of extra clicks.
Advanced Google Ads Location Targeting for Dentists
If you want to take things a step deeper – you absolutely can. I am going to show you a few options that you have.
Enhanced Bids Based on Radius
Your first option is to actually set multiple radius locations around your practice. These would all overlap. If you wanted to target a maximum location of 5 miles radius then you would place one radius of 5 miles, one of 3 miles and one of 1 mile.
It looks like this:
But, that is no different to adding just a 5 mile radius by itself? Not quite. Actually, there is one more step we have to take. We know that if somebody very close to your practice (within 1 mile) clicks your ad, then they have, on average, a higher chance of converting than someone 5 miles away.
That being said, we can then ad bid enhancements onto the inner, 1 mile radius. This effectively says to Google, bid a little more for people very close to my practice and a little less to those a bit further away but still inside my 5 miles radius.
It looks like this:
Enhanced Bids Based on Micro-Location
Your final option is to actually scrap the whole radius altogether and bid on micro locations. Within Google Ads, you can actually target groups of locations in and around your practice.
It looks like this:
So, what’s the benefit of doing this? Well, inevitably you will find that people from certain towns or regions have a higher conversion rate on your dental landing page than others. You should therefore add bid enhancements on those regions.
There may also be regions that still do convert but tend to have a lower conversion rate. As they’re a bit less valuable, you can put a negative bid on those towns and regions.
It looks like this:
Which is the Best Google Ads Location Targeting for Dentists?
If you want to dive deeper, then one of the advanced strategies is always gong to come up trumps. Which of the two depends on a few things.
- If you don’t have a lot of data on conversions from micro-locations yet, you are better off going with the multiple radii.
- Sometimes you don’t have that many micro-locations around your dental practice. if that’s the case, you are kind of forced to use the multiple radius option.
- If you have been running campaigns for a while and have lots of data, then micro-locations will tend to get you the best results.
- If you specifically know that certain regions around you convert better – or historically you know that lots of your patients come from certain towns, then feel free to use a combination of the two. This would mean you place your full 5 mile radius but then add some micro locations with bid enhancements on too!
Conclusion
You have lots of options when it comes to location targeting. The key is to ensure that you set up the location correctly at the start and periodically check your conversions to optimise your locations.
Most of the competition are not doing this – put this into practice and you have that one extra trick up your sleeve that will pay dividends in the long term!
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