Google AdWords
Success Stories
Hear from other Australian businesses
and their success with Google AdWords.
Healesville
Glass Blowing Studio
Glass blowing studio based in Victoria
hgbs.com.au
Tali Dalton met her business partner Tim while studying at university and they decided to set up a Glass Blowing studio together, sharing a mutual passion for the art. “After spending many years using friends’ studios we decided to set up our own in Healesville, Victoria,” Tali said. Their dream came true and now Tali and Tim own and run Healesville Glass Blowing Studio (HGBS), located in the scenic Yarra Valley.
Their studio sells a range of products from glass art to functional products such as bowls and drinking glasses. They also offer courses in the art of glass blowing. Tali knew that she needed to drive new business, so she set up an AdWords campaign to increase awareness of the company as well as to encourage sales. Initially Tali was also using print ads but found that they weren’t very effective. Tali said, “Print ads were very expensive and there was no visible or tangible return on investment.”
AdWords provided Tali with targeted advertising. “I have found that by using keywords I can direct interest to specific products we are trying to promote,” Tali said.
“Bookings have increased across the board for
classes and now we’re booked out until the end of
the year”
Tali Dalton, Healesville Glass Blowing Studio
At the moment, Tali has two different AdWords campaigns running. One campaign promotes the glass blowing courses which the studio offers whilst the other campaign is more general, and is aimed at people looking to buy their products.
Tali can see results from her AdWords advertising. “The day I set up the AdWords campaign I started getting calls about specific glass blowing classes,” Tali said. Over time, she has been happy with the consistent performance of her AdWords campaign, which attracts both tourists and locals to her studio. Tali said, “Bookings have increased across the board for classes and now we’re booked out until the end of the year.”
The future’s looking bright for Tali and Tim’s business. “We’re expanding our showroom where we will showcase our contemporary chandeliers,” Tali said. In their future AdWords campaigns they will be targeting interior designers and architects to ensure that their chandeliers are seen by as many of the right people people as possible. “We will continue to use AdWords as it provides real results.”
The Gastronaut
Boutique chocolate and coffee shop in Victoria
thegastronaut.com.au
“AdWords definitely attracts people who are ready
to buy as opposed to people who are just looking,
so about 60% of people who come to my website
end up buying from me”
Marco Dabizzi, The Gastronaut
Marco Dabizzi started his online store The Gastronaut a year ago when he and his family moved to Port Fairy, Victoria, all the way from Italy. He wanted to bring fine European products to the Australian market, and so
he now spends his weekends in his chocolate and coffee shop baking beautiful European style desserts. As a complementary business, Marco set up The Gastronaut website to sell gourmet European chocolate products and coffee.
Marco promotes his products at trade shows but he finds online advertising the most economical. Now, all of his marketing budget is put into AdWords. Marco said, “We only use Google AdWords now. We’re in a niche market and I think AdWords is the best way to reach our customers in a targeted way.”
Marco only started using AdWords less than 12 months ago but has already seen huge benefits to the business.
He says, “AdWords definitely attracts people who are ready to buy as opposed to people who are just looking, so about 60% of people who come to my website end up buying from me. They also tend to buy from us again, and that’s really important to us.”
Marco is looking to increase his AdWords budget because he wants to do more of what works.
Marco is excited for the future: his family have settled into life in Australia and he is looking forward to growing his business. “We really enjoy living in Port Fairy and want to expand our online business even further, adding more products to our online shop.” Marco is also opening a new coffee and chocolate shop in Tasmania, which he is very much looking forward to.
Artlandish Aboriginal
Art Gallery
Online Aboriginal art gallery based in Western Australia
aboriginal-art-australia.com
“I recently received a phone inquiry from someone
in Egypt, so AdWords is definitely reaching a
worldwide market”
Brian Linklater, Artlandish Aboriginal Art Gallery
In 2001 Brian started Artlandish Aboriginal Art, an online art gallery which sells authentic aborginal art and artefacts from Kunnarra, far East Kimberley, Western Australia. The region is the home of ochre art, the original medium used by Australian Aboriginal artists for cultural ceremonies (body paint) and artefact decoration.
The Artlandish Aboriginal Art Gallery website is e-commerce-enabled so people can purchase artwork online. Google Adwords has helped Brian to direct traffic to the website. “Each product has excellent profit margins so we’re happy to drive lots of potential customers to the website,” Brian said.
Brian uses magazines and tourism publications to promote the website but finds that they only reach a local market.
With AdWords, he is able to reach an international audience and target potential customers searching for Australian aboriginal art. “I recently
received a phone inquiry from someone in Egypt, so AdWords is definitely reaching a worldwide market.” Brian now invests 85% of his marketing budget in AdWords and says that “AdWords is definitely the most effective marketing tool I use.”
Brian purchases his artworks from
independent indigenous Australian artists and is happy that he can support them through his business. As he expands his activities, he is excited about the prospect of promoting these artists’ work to people all over the world.
Vinyl Cafe
Independent record store based in Brisbane
vinylcafe.com.au
Brisbane-based Trevor Oakley always wanted to work in the space where his passion lay: music. In late 2009 he took the plunge and quit his job in corporate insurance. Now, Trevor proudly runs his own independent online record store, catering to a niche market of indie music lovers.
Trevor knew that a strong online marketing strategy would be key to the success of his business. “We’ve been using Google AdWords for two years now, to reach buyers, increase sales and promote the company’s profile,” said Trevor.
Trevor finds AdWords an effective tool for marketing to fanatical lovers of particular bands, and has found it “simple to use and so effective - 100% of our marketing budget goes to AdWords.” In March of this year, Vinyl Cafe was selling a limited edition Foo Fighters release. “Using AdWords I was able to target both Foo Fighters fans and fans of similar bands like Nirvana to let them know that we had a unique and rare product,” Trevor explained. It was also great timing for targeting. “Foo Fighters also had an album release so we were able to sell a vinyl and new album bundle on the site, plus there
“The Google AdWords marketing campaign not only
generated a lot of traffic to the site, but it was also
great to be able to target people at a time-sensitive
moment”
Trevor Oakley, Vinyl Cafe
was increased awareness of Foo Fighters as they were touring in Brisbane at that time,” Trevor said.
Trevor found that “the Google AdWords marketing campaign not only generated a lot of traffic to the site, but it was also great to be able to target people at a time-sensitive moment, when there was lots of local awareness around the band.” Trevor didn’t increase his AdWords spend at this time; he explains, “I shifted the budget and began focussing it on this specific release, and the results showed that the increase in site traffic came from good targeting through AdWords.”
Trevor has found that by using Google AdWords “conversions and revenue have increased dramatically; in fact, sales have been so good that we are having to pause AdWords as stock has sold out and we’re currently waiting for new deliveries from overseas.”
In the future, Trevor hopes Vinyl Cafe will continue to reach its niche audience: indie music fanatics and lovers of vinyl who value a physical music product in the digital age. Trevor is also hoping to order bigger shipments of stock to expand the business.
The Smooth Groove
Musical group based in Sydney
thesmoothgroove.com.au
Jaime Gibson is the saxophonist and music director of his Sydney-based band The Smooth Groove. The way that Jaime markets his band has changed dramatically since their inception seven years ago. “In the past, we used to put together promotional DVDs which might have cost about $15 each to create,” Jaime said. “Then I would take them to businesses and meet with the people who might be in charge of putting together functions or parties. After that, it came down to how well I could communicate and get along with them.“ Chasing new business was a time- consuming process for Jaime, so after six months he decided to go online.
“I put a website together and began using Google AdWords,” Jaime explains. Jaime and his business partner now manage the band’s AdWords campaign themselves and spend around $500 a month. “We check in during the month to see what our click-throughs are like and our cost per click is really quite small - for us to bring in a client costs us about $4.”
“Ninety-five per cent of our work comes through
AdWords”
Jaime Gibson, The Smooth Groove
AdWords has enabled Jaime to tailor their campaign around music trends. “A few years ago, we noticed that people were getting into (chill out CD series) Cafe del Mar,” he says. “So we go with the flow of what the market wants and we used keywords like ‘Cafe del Mar dinner music’.” “We can track what people are searching for and whether that eventually translates into a booking. At the start, we had about 30 different keywords in our ad campaigns. And about every six months our competitors would catch on and pay a bit more for those words, so we’d drop down in listings. But we check our stats every month and, when necessary, we pay extra to make sure we’re back up the top again. Ninety-five per cent of our work comes through AdWords.”
Since The Smooth Groove got on AdWords their business has taken off - they now perform three to four gigs a week at venues all over Sydney!
