Survey: 37% of Local Businesses Say Leads Generated From AdWords Are Low Quality

Google AdWords is used by about 4 in 10 local businesses, according to a recent survey conducted by Reply.com. However, local merchants using AdWords aren’t getting great results.

According to Reply.com’s survey, 39 percent of respondents have used Google AdWords. Of this group, 39 percent said they find AdWords to be somewhat easy to use, 37 percent said it’s somewhat difficult to use, 14 percent said it’s very easy to use and 10 percent said it’s very difficult to use.

While the difficulty or ease of using AdWords for local businesses appears to be debatable, this point does not: AdWords isn’t that great for generating quality leads for local merchants. According to the survey, 59 percent of local merchants said they haven’t seen a strong return on investment (ROI) on their AdWords program, while just 18 percent said they’ve seen a strong ROI. Additionally, 37 percent of respondents using AdWords said the leads generated via this channel are mostly low quality, while 17 percent said they’re mostly high quality and 46 percent are unsure.

These findings likely point to a mix of possible reasons, including a lack of sufficient education about how to successfully leverage AdWords and how to measure the quality of leads that come through that channel.

One recent occurrence that might make AdWords a more favorable tool for local businesses is the upgrading of all AdWords accounts to the new version of the platform, which features enhanced campaigns. Announced back in February, enhanced AdWords campaigns appear to offer small businesses some notable benefits, including the improved ability to run relevant and actionable mobile ads.

To illustrate the potential benefits for local merchants, Google notes that a family-run bakery in New Jersey used enhanced campaigns to boost in-store visits by 10-20 percent, nearly double business during peak hours and boost the number of Web clicks by 20-35 percent. Of course, business owners hoping to benefit from enhanced campaigns won’t reap rewards by merely sitting back and doing nothing