Yandex. Direct. Instructing a young fighter

Just a few years ago, conducting a Yandex.Direct advertising campaign was not like a competition of competing companies, but like an intimate party by candlelight. The competitors winked at each other, smiled sweetly and shared customers. Fortunately, no one felt the lack of them.

In the fashion was the tactic of "why spoil relations, customers at all enough." The sun was warming all the market participants equally well, the rates and the dollar rate were extremely stable, the grass was green, and the cabbage was in large quantities.

There were two special placements, the CTR was a granite or steel ... no, rather a titanium rock. Turn off the radio "Nostalgie" (it, incidentally, also ordered to live long). This will not happen again. Basta.
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Good times have irrevocably sunk into oblivion (such a river). It is necessary to raise the head, and you will be riddled with bullets. One has only to fall - your market will immediately be dismantled into its component parts up to the last screws, loaded into trucks and taken away in an unknown direction. A small marketing mistake - and you will be labeled “economic corpse” forever.

It is worthwhile to dwell on a halt in the wrong place - hordes of wild competitors will trample you, albeit randomly, but rushing forward. For every more or less suitable key request, several dozen vultures fly in, ready to peck out the last penny from customers.

Customers are getting smarter quickly, and chaos reigns in the markets in the form of a limitless range of products. The buyer is no longer eager to wave a pen to money. For each owner of cash is a hand-to-hand fight. Alas, these are the realities of today. And if you, the owner of strong teeth, a tight wallet and a well-developed strategy, have decided to play a game called contextual advertising in Yandex Direct, this article is for you.

Put on a camouflage uniform . Do not forget about body armor and hard hat. Keep your weapons clean and full of alert. Take more hand grenades with you. Personnel (sales managers, operators) must be fully ready to fight at the first order. Welcome to the battlefield. As in a real war, there are fighting over territories (market / countries) and natural resources (customers / oil).

If you are a recruit, be prepared for war with well-entrenched enemies who will simply never give up their warm positions. They have been here for a long time, they sat down at strategic heights (special accommodation), their fortified areas (first places and guaranteed shows) are in most cases impregnable, and the defense is well organized. The market, in their opinion, has long and honestly divided. Your goal is to smash their armies with the least losses among the personnel and win back your piece of cake. And do not rely only on luck, although without it, too, can not do.

Advertising on Yandex is a war in the literal sense of the word. Cruel, very interesting, in some places - funny, sometimes - gambling. But all over again come to Yandex for the same - profit. Not everyone can make a profit; many are carried out from the battlefield on stretchers with severed limbs.

Inspection on site . So, you have the goods, the desire to compete for a place under the sun and, importantly, the money for this noble cause. First of all, you will find several advertising agencies, the benefit, like mushrooms after the rain, and send them requests for the preparation of strategic media plans.

In most cases, the response dispatches will try to feed you with a cartoon presentation in PowerPoint, which in the most detailed way (people spare no effort and time) tells you what you should be interested in least about the advertising agency, its high mission and role in the world. The cartoon is more like Tarzan's victorious scream in the jungle. Tarzan though a good guy, alas, does not understand anything in contextual advertising.

Having reached the last page of the treatise, you will forget what was said on the first page. It's not scary. Remember, in war you have to be careful and watchful. An endless field of flowers can be crammed with mines and unexploded land mines. The wider the palette of colors and more pages in the presentation, the higher the likelihood that you are trivially led by the nose and the office at the most crucial moment can become not a friend, but a traitor to your vital interests.

Be prepared for the fact that the total budget amounts in media plans will differ several times. Some advertising agencies will multiply the real budget by two, some without a twinge of conscience and by three. The most rabid advertisers will try to sell you the exact number of clicks at a fixed price. Perhaps they will offer a rollback (easier - they will return your money to you). But this is not so scary. Remember, no one in our sinful world, including the stupid businessmen astrologers, is able to foresee the future. One can only, proceeding from today's realities, trace the market development trends, but no more.

From all commercial proposals, choose where the least words are about “what we are good” and more specific calculations in the form of numbers. Do not buy into empty promises. If you are not told the story “Here we will find the enemy’s weak point and use infantry, and here we will capture their flanks with the help of tanks. And for persuasiveness we back up our correctness with assault aircraft ”, run away from such advertising pseudo-strategists.

A commercial offer must contain detailed information about requests, your closest competitors, forward-looking data on transitions and well-developed recommendations on tactical and strategic goals. This is important, so you trust them with the future of your business. Be sure to check with the advertising agency who will monitor the rates of your campaign: a robot program or a specially trained employee?

Attack units The agent is selected, it is the turn to talk about resources, because the main thing in war is the right strategy, the right tactics, well-trained soldiers and serviceable military equipment.

The first and main resource has always been and will remain, you are absolutely right, money. If you do not have enough money to reinforce your idea, do not rush to declare war and become "cannon fodder." Wait for food and fuel to tighten. Financing is the most important component of an advertising campaign. Its shortage, both at the beginning and during the advertising war, most often leads to complete surrender. At best, you will lose some money, at worst, your idea will be stolen and used by competitors.

Strong rear The second most important resource is your website. He is a training ground where you exchange money from potential customers for your goods or services. We do not specifically touch on strategy and tactics, since we can talk about them for hours, and we focus your attention on a crucial aspect: if there is no coherent strategy, you simply must have not only a worthy, but a very worthy resource, compared to competitors' sites.

Otherwise, you will see crowds of customers pass through your site, as if on a neutral front-line, leaving traces of dirty boots instead of orders. Simply put, your bad site will help the work of good sites of competitors. Clients, comparing them, will choose the goods of competitors. In other words, your money works on a competitor’s campaign. Is the idea clear? You hoped to fill the cash desk with cash. Forget, these are just illusions. Enough to dream, come down from heaven. Without a decent website advertising in Yandex Direct - a waste of time and money. Disappointment is guaranteed.

Adequate weapons We know that you are in love with your product. We even know that you are confident in its "best quality." Forget about quality. If you go to Yandex.Direct, the quality fades into the background. People often buy not high-quality goods, but those that they like and are visible at once, always and everywhere.

Look around, try to evaluate the quality of the items and goods you purchased. Is your car the fastest? Your apartment is the largest, and the telephone is the most expensive? Is all that you possess - of the highest quality? Of course, it is not. The buyer is always ready and always compromises. You buy what you like. And most people like it, sorry for the tautology that most people like. Therefore, sell not a product, but a benefit © - nothing has been thought out yet.

Competitors Or enemies, as you like. Anyone who denies this statement, can no longer read. Local natives (competitors) are patiently waiting for you to make a mistake. They look at you at the sight, all your actions are carefully analyzed in headquarters and cabinets. Your campaigns are monitored day and night and total monitoring of prices and display positions.

Your strongest ads should hit the weakest points of competitors. It's so hard, you say, where will we find weakness? After all, they have more range, they are richer, they are shown above. Nonsense.

Do not look at their ads, look at their sites. Somewhere in the depths of their combat positions, that small crack lurks into which you need to stick a grenade and pull the check out (and have time to retire yourself). Any, even very large (large - more often) company has weaknesses and gaps in defense. Find and take advantage of this weakness, reflecting it in your advertising texts. Do not let them live in peace. Use your mobility.

The right goals Mobile units must become the cornerstone of your personal advertising war. Do not be afraid of major competitors, they are extremely slow. A thick layer of bureaucratic layers will never give them the opportunity to make quick decisions. The decision that had to be taken yesterday, they will take a month. Their employees do not see beyond their nose, are confident in their infinite power and worship the brand.

At that time, while their loaf-managers are in an endless stream of coordinating proposals (more often - fundamentally erroneous), embracing the thresholds of the bosses' offices, you with a small group of soldiers (with focused requests) will easily and naturally go to their rear, and they won't even will notice. When you notice (this will happen in two or three weeks), you will tear out part of the market with your teeth and you will be out of reach (CTR from reinforced concrete).

Purposefully and without knowing mercy, surround their sluggish combat formations with low-frequency and precisely formulated inquiries, do not go into a frontal attack on strong competitors. You do not need to be a hero and risk without the need, your premature advertising demise will not help anyone. Look at the flanks (regional, time targeting), in 99% of cases it is there that there are unprotected or weakly protected positions, the seemingly impregnable fortress of the enemy.

After identifying targets and gaps in defense, immediately arrange them with massive shelling from all large-caliber guns (in some cases). Do not give them time to think, capturing strategic heights (special placements). Panic and confusion in the camp of the enemy - the best ally. Destroy everything in its path, taking prisoners is not recommended.

Tactics Setting the right goals requires at least the right tactics to achieve them. Simply defining a goal without understanding effective solutions or, even worse, inaction is a waste of time.

The main tactical moves may be as follows. With strong and rich competitors - flank attacks, repeatedly cutting off parts of the market. Competitors are not able to protect the entire market. When they rush to the defense of one flank - hit the other. Work on narrow fronts, putting maximum effort in the minimum protected part of the competitor's defense.

If competitors are weak, then it should be beaten in the forehead, not sparing the soldiers, ammunition and shells. Do not take prisoners. Destroy everything in your path until Yandex.Direct reminds you of the rules of the game, saying “stop, buddy, that's enough, you are already claiming a monopoly issuance”. Prior to this, of course, no need to bring. Be smarter. Yandex.Direct is a delicate instrument that requires jewelry handling.

Defense Strengthened on the heights - build a strong and reliable defense. Dig trenches around the perimeter. Pay special attention to their weak points. Improve the site, systematically grinding and honing the contents under the maximum sales. Remove all unnecessary, leaving only what is required to sell. Do not spray power - keep the main course.

Forget about growing permanently to nowhere. Try to overcome the temptation to expand horizontally. Climbing to other people's commodity lands, you risk to be completely crushed. Mine all approaches to your positions (high input rates). Stay on top of market affairs, follow the statistics, do not neglect the rumors (usually they are the most reliable information).

Destroy the approaching weak armies immediately and without regret, do not give anyone even the slightest opportunity to dig in near your positions. The rest of the "force the world", forcing to work and play by your rules.

Instead of an epilogue, the winners tell jokes, the losers convene press conferences. Ready? Then go ahead and with the song. Although it may still be worth trying to advertise in the paper guide "Goods and Prices"? What do you kindle a fire in the country?

With this article I open a cycle of articles about contextual advertising. Articles will be many. With practical examples, figures and screenshots and with long filsofskimi reasoning. I would be glad if the article will be useful.