Many webmasters fail to take advantage of seasonal traffic peaks, which are an excellent way to generate new sales and traffic. ‘Back to school’ searches are happening right now and are the second highest traffic season after Christmas - so it’s well worth taking advantage of!

Back to school searches can have a very wide target; from influences (teens and kids) to decision makers (parents and college students). In order to target the most amount of traffic, its best to develop an advertising campaign that speaks to both decision makers and students.

The first step is to modify your ad text. Edit your PPC ads to match the target audience of your campaign. If you’re going to target parents, offer back to school discounts and highlight features such as ‘Quality’ and ‘Affordable’ which will appeal to this demographic.

On the other hand if you’re going after students, be sure to mention phrases like “student discount” or “students save 10%” to attract this type of customer. Also consider expanding your contextual advertising to feature on social networking websites.

The next step would be to expand your keyword list. For example if you were a clothing manufacturer, target terms like “school clothes”, “back to school clothing”, “back to school supplies” and “back to school bargains”. If you don’t want to create a new campaign, just add these keywords to your current campaigns.

Finally, don’t forget to monitor the changes and see which new areas of your campaign are having the biggest impact. Have a play with some of your campaign settings during the rush to see which combinations generate the best results!