AdFed U: Google AdWords Training

I was recently invited to present at AdFed U – an ongoing series of educational presentations open to the public and put on by the local Advertising Federation of Charleston chapter. The topic was near and dear to my heart: Google AdWords.

The Google AdWords platform can be pretty intimidating at first – especially for small business owners or those not familiar with how it all works.

So, I had three goals for the presentation:

1. Lay the foundation for launching a successful AdWords campaign – some of which didn’t even involve being in the Google AdWords program.

2. Explain the core features as clearly as possible without getting overwhelming detail.

3. Not use powerpoint. The presentation was at the College of Charleston’s Tate School of Business, and after scoping out the giant white boards I thought it would be more fun to illustrate some key points and just memorize the rest.

To help illustrate some key points, we called in our creative director and master doodler, DW. Here are a couple shots of the white board with a close-up of his masterpiece.

Keeping The Audience Engaged

Getting into the nitty-gritty of AdWords can be a bit mind-numbing at times, so there were a couple things we tried to keep everyone engaged and not passing out in puddle of their own drool.

I used a fake company – Chris’s Cat Emporium – for (slightly) humorous examples and provided a physical worksheet with key points for attendees to complete at certain moments.

Attendees were also asked to use their desk computers to perform some hand-on tasks like keyword research via Google’s keyword research tool.

Thanks again to the Charleston AdFed and specifically the hard work of Meredith English and Mike Haskins – both on the Board and part of the CofC marketing team.