GEICO AdWords Campaign

I choose to plan an AdWords campaign for GEICO and I used AdPlanner to figure out the relevant keyword that has the highest average monthly searches over suggested monthly bid.  Among many products that GEICO offers, "car insurance" actually has the highest average monthly searches of 823,000 with high competition and $21.61 estimated cost per click.  This cost is a little bit too high than what I expected, considering when I added a brand modifier keyword, so that the keyword becoming "GEICO car insurance" the average search is only about 5% of the initial amount and the suggested bid is 42% of the initial estimated cost per click.  Looking at this figure, it seems like GEICO will either need to spend more time improving its brand awareness or find a differentiating factor that allows GEICO to win over customers.

One differentiating factor could be targeting strategies based on location.  For example, looking at Michigan alone, "GEICO car insurance" has 720 average monthly searches with daily estimate only 1.27 click.  This shows how all those advertising spot on TV has not been effectively reaching Michigan customers. 

Car in Michigan has to go through harsh winter weather.  Many car won't start running and the number of weather related accident rises.  GEICO could take this opportunity to build relationship with its customer by using the GEICO blog to give not only some regular tips to survive, but also to remind customers that GEICO could cover them in time of needs. 

GEICO could offer cheaper insurance upgrade to cover inexperienced winter driver, reevaluation of car insurance coverage, or even encourage customers to perform a pre-winter examination by partially covering the cost.  By showing that GEICO cares, GEICO could earned the searches on the search engine and increase the likelihood of a potential customer to click and choose GEICO over other insurance provider. 

Afterwards, GEICO could enhance its position by investing on pay per click ads.  GEICO should try using both AdWords that focuses on the price of its car insurance and one that focuses on the differentiating factor.  Then GEICO could evaluate which AdWords leads to most return on investment.  Nevertheless, both AdWords should lead to GEICO website that allow customer to get an insurance quote in an instance by inserting customer and vehicle information.

When GEICO uses both customer focus and pay per click advertising, GEICO would be able to attract customers to its website.  Then GEICO would just need to deliver its promise to retain the customers.