The Ad Add-On: PPC and Social Ads Made Simple

Creating, managing, & evaluating ads and ad campaigns just got a lot easier thanks to HubSpot's new Ad add-on.

Announced during Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah's keynote at this year's INBOUND conference (along with a whole gaggle of new and exciting Hubspot add-ons and updates), the Ad add-on – even if it is still technically in beta mode – is the easiest way for marketers to create, measure and leverage great ads without being at the mercy of all that is traditional PPC.

Revolutionizing The Process

What makes the Ad add-on nothing less than magical is that it literally integrates every component of the PPC and Social advertising process – from ad and campaign creation to evaluating ROI – into the Hubspot platform.

Like many of the new product launches, the Ad add-on's value is derived from the fact that Hubspot has once again taken a crucial aspect of marketing and given it the full inbound treatment; they've streamlined the process, upgraded the tools, and made it all about the content. Now, let's take a look at how it works...

Create, Measure, Optimize & Repeat 

Step 1: Create

Once you've goals in mind, it's time to start crafting your campaign. One of the best things about the add-on is that it allows users to create a Sponsered LinkedIn or a Google Adwords campaign – within Hubspot!

Along with integrating all your existing marketing materials, like landing pages and blogs posts, directly into your ad campaigns, the add-on also allows users the ability create targeted and buyer persona-centric efforts in order to enhance your content's reach. And the cherry on top? Users can stop, tweak, adjust, and optimize their ads at any time.

Step 2: Measure

To borrow Hubspot's words (because I couldn't phrase it any better if I tried), campaign success isn't about clicks, it's about conversions – and the Ad add-on allows users to measure exactly that. 

Built into the add-on are some incredible features, including automatic conversion and ROI tracking (no tracking code required), a "holistic" view of your ROI (see all the data across ads, campaigns, and keywords in a single place alongside the rest of your existing marketing data), and full – easy to understand – campaign tracking. It really is PPC metric made easy.

Step 3: Optimize

It's during the optimization stage of the process the value of the Ad add-on becomes most apparent. By eliminating some of the more cumbersome aspects of traditional PPC and incorporating tips and guides into the add-on's core functionality, Hubspot has made it possible for marketers to navigate the PPC waters with ease.

The Ad add-on can walk marketers through tasks like establishing the right bids relative to goals because it allows marketers access to all the data necessary to get the job done right.

Step 4: Repeat

Personally, this is my favorite step. One of the best aspects of the Hubspot Ad add-on is the fact that because of its construction, functionality, and simplicity (relative to every non-Hubspot way of tackling PPC and social advertising) is that it allows for consistently (and repeatably) great results. 

With the introduction of the Ad ad-on, marketers who have never learned or fully understood PPC advertising have been given a tool that can not only help them learn, but a tool that has the ability to maximize the value and success of every PPC ad or campaign they put into place.