Article

Joshua Schofield
Joshua Schofield 18 July 2019

Fads, Fidget Spinners and Digital Marketing

This story places the reader in the shoes of an online shop owner who comes across a warehouse full of fidget spinners just before the craze takes off in 2017, asking the reader what they should do in this situation.

This is a way into exploring the best digital marketing channels for making the most of E-commerce opportunities when demand for a product is high for a limited period of time.

By the end it becomes clear that the main digital marketing channel of choice in this situation is PPC. The story looks at the best ways of implementing a Pay-per-click campaign with a focus on the importance of AdWords term specificity.

The Fidgety Summer of 2017

It's March 2017, you are the owner of a website that sells kids' toys all over the world. A local business owner, who happens to be a friend of yours, has had enough of the toy business.

 She just wants to get rid of her remaining stock and retire to somewhere nice and hot. So, She offers you a great price on her remaining stock;

All it costs is a couple of thousand and the stuff off her hands by the end of the month'.

You know to trust your feelings on this; because this is after all, what you do, so you take the chance, pay the cash and moments later stand, key in hand, in front of the door to her warehouse.

The door creaks open to reveal a room filled on one side with all kinds of things you would expect: some big sellers and some not so popular.

However on the other side, you see something unusual: identical mini black boxes stacked to the ceiling, about the size of two CD cases, each with a shaped clear plastic window that reveals a red try pronged objects with metal circles on each of its rounded points.

To get a closer look, you pick up one of the boxes and read the words 'Fidget Spinner'. You take one out of its box, rest it on the palm of your hand, then, lightly tap it, and watch it whirl around, you think: This is sort of fun, I hope the kids are going to want these things...

Fidget & You'll Miss It.

Now in hindsight, we know that this a dream position for any store to be in getting hold of a cheap shipment of toys just before the big craze takes off.

If you look up a Fidget spinner on eBay today, you can find them for as little as 60 cents but back in 2017, they were big business. In 2017 the world's most expensive fidget spinner cost $16,800.

The vast majority of fidget spinners were not being sold for anywhere near that amount but you get the point of how crazy things got at the height of the trend. So how can an online business make the most profit in this limited time?

The search trends for the 'fidget spinners' shows how limited the time period is to make money during a fad. According to Google Trends data, the fidget spinner fad started to take off in late March and hit peak search volume in April/May, but by December it had collapsed to two of that volume.

So any business fortunate to have the spinners before the fad began would have two months, max, to make their money, before they would have to start thinking about selling them for cents on eBay.

PPC For Urgency

If a business has just a few months to sell their product what sort of digital marketing channels should they use?

Just optimizing keyword specific SEO terms like 'Kids Toys Fidget Spinners'  in March would take valuable weeks and months to take full effect. To make a product visible online in a few days we need to use an additional marketing channel: Pay-per-click (PPC).

Unlike with SEO, in which the placement of a site is decided by search engine algorithms choosing which site is most relevant for the enquiry, positioning on search engines with PPC is decided by a virtual auctioning process. Those willing to pay the most for a Clickthrough, on a term, get the top ad position. As a result, SEM is perfect for achieving quick visibility but this comes with extra considerations.

SEM: Making The Most Of Every Click

With Pay-per-click every time a potential customer clicks on a site through the paid ad, a fee is paid by the advertiser. This is set by the current going rate for that term in the positioning auction.

This price of a keyword is related to demand: the greater the popularity and overall bid threshold - the higher the price for a term. This cost per click makes it very important that users clicking through on ads are actually interested in buying the products that the company sells. If PPC is not done correctly, a company could be wasting its marketing budget one click at a time.

This is a key reason why the wording of ads needs to have the right degree of focus: it must not be too specific as this may exclude people that are using more general terms but not too broad as this could attract clicks from people with no interest in the site's products.

For example, the term 'toys' is much too broad for a website focusing on selling fidget spinners.

Fidget Spinner will have a higher accuracy but could be more expensive per click,  a more specific term like 'buy original fidget spinners' places more focus on the people looking to buy is a better balance, Especially in this case where some of  the people in 2017 will have been googling Fidget Spinners to find out what they were.

Fidget Spinners were the 8th most searched term of 2017 so at this time we are talking about literally millions of searches, that is a lot of money if we attract the wrong clicks and the SEM budget is not correctly controlled.

To make the most of trend online with SEM we need a keyword targeted paid ads campaign with budget controls, This makes sure that each click counts and protects the ad's owner from too many people clicking through with no intention of purchasing.

rankingCoach ads are the ideal tool for making the most of these situations. It gives the user the power to create a budget controlled targeted ad campaign in a few simple clicks.

Don't Just Fidget Alone!

It doesn't matter if you are a small business selling toys or an enterprising local restaurant looking to make the most of the latest food trend! The principal is the same. Make sure your products or business are visible while the craze is still booming.

To do this, they need an SEM campaign built from the ground up with an informed knowledge of Google Ads in mind. This is why businesses in this situation, should look for a Google Premier Partner to help them create their Pay-per-click campaign.

rankingCoach is a certified Google Ads Premier Partner, their Google Ads products are built with specialised knowledge of paid ads. They know what works with SEM on Google. Now, when the next trend takes off, you know where to start: a targeted and budget controlled Pay-per-click campaign to get your products seen quickly.

Create and track your campaign with rankingCoach ads to ensure that it is as effective as possible. Then hopefully you won't be selling them on eBay in a few years time!

Please login or register to add a comment.

Contribute Now!

Loving our articles? Do you have an insightful post that you want to shout about? Well, you've come to the right place! We are always looking for fresh Doughnuts to be a part of our community.

Popular Articles

See all
How to Collaborate With UGC Creators?

How to Collaborate With UGC Creators?

Learn how to boost your brand through UGC creator collaborations: define goals, identify and engage with creators, offer incentives, and measure success for long-term partnerships.

Shivam Rawat
Shivam Rawat 28 February 2024
Read more
Adapting B2B Digital Marketing for the Modern Buyer Journey

Adapting B2B Digital Marketing for the Modern Buyer Journey

Digital marketing also allows for precise tracking and measurement of marketing efforts, enabling data-driven decision-making and optimization. In an increasingly competitive B2B landscape, a well-executed digital...

Ghia Marnewick
Ghia Marnewick 21 February 2024
Read more
How To Be the Best Marketer in 2024: Traits According to Your Star Sign

How To Be the Best Marketer in 2024: Traits According to Your Star Sign

Have you ever wondered how your astrological sign might influence your marketing approach?

Jen Macdonald
Jen Macdonald 16 February 2024
Read more
7 Reasons Why Social Media Marketing is Important For Your Business

7 Reasons Why Social Media Marketing is Important For Your Business

In the past two decades social media has become a crucial tool for marketers, enabling businesses to connect with potential customers. If your business has yet to embrace social media and you want to know why it is...

Sharron Nelson
Sharron Nelson 29 February 2024
Read more
How to Review a Website — A Guide for Beginners

How to Review a Website — A Guide for Beginners

Whether you're a startup or an established business, the company website is an essential element of your digital marketing strategy. The most effective sites are continually nurtured and developed in line with...

Digital Doughnut Contributor
Digital Doughnut Contributor 7 January 2020
Read more