Google: our dear friend

Container & Packaging Supply's largest advertising expense is with Google. We love Google. Google has been very good to us and we attribute much of our growth to our relationship with Google. I have a conference call with three Google Account Executives every other week, and we track progress, develop new campaigns and revamp ineffective campaigns on a continual basis. They even sent me a baby onesie with "Google" printed on it when Brock was born.

So how does it all work? Our advertising is one of the largest impetuses for getting your phone to ring. Here's the process:

We create ads. We create ads and choose keywords, which are words or phrases related to our business: plastic bottles, glass containers, trigger sprayers, 4 oz amber boston round. These keywords are deliberately generic and specific.

Our ads get displayed. When people search on Google using one of our keywords, our ad may appear next to the search results. This page is called a SERP (search engine results page). The search results are displayed in the left column, and our ads are displayed in the right column. Very often, we show up in both the search results (often called the "unpaid listings" or "organic listings") and advertisements or "sponsored links" sections. This is really good for us, but does not happen for a lot of companies.

We attract customers. Once people click on our ad (called a "click-through"), Google directs them to our website or landing page. Google has done its job and then charges our credit card for the transaction. This is called a "pay-per-click" advertising model. Currently, each click has an average cost of $0.44. That doesn't seem too bad, right? Multiply $0.44 by 80,000 click-throughs per month and it can start to add up.

Here are some quick stats and take-aways:

1. We spend $10.96 in advertising every time the phone rings. So make it count.
   
2. Our advertising strategy consists of 239 advertisements, split over 9 campaigns.
   
3. Those 239 ads are all powered by 774 keywords that we bid on.
4. Our ads, on average, display in the third slot (it's gone up 1/2 a percentage point in the last 12 months) ... we're a legitimate contender for attention.