How many times have you been shopping online and got to the point where you were almost ready to make a purchase, but you just had a few questions that could be easily answered with a quick phone call? After picking up the phone, how many of those calls resulted in your being able to chat directly with an actual human being, as opposed to pushing buttons through layers and layers of automated menus? If you had to navigate through those menus, how many times did you actually wind up making a purchase from that particular merchant?

Although it may seem ideal to run as much of your business online as possible as a cost-saving measure, if you're not making yourself available to speak directly to your potential customers when they have questions, you could be missing out on sales opportunities. Below are a few quick tips to help drive phone calls to your business from your Bing Ads campaigns.

1.) Add a clickable phone number to your ad. This tactic is especially important for capturing traffic within the growing mobile market. People on-the-go may not have the time or opportunity to poke around your web site; they may simply search to find the business that has what they're looking for and then make a quick phone call to confirm details like a specific brand, price range or even store location and hours. Learn more about call extensions.

2.) Include a strong call-to-action in your ad copy. The reason why services like Groupon and Amazon Local are so successful is because they offer limited-time only discounts; that sense of urgency created by a quickly approaching expiration date motivates people to act in order to take advantage of the offer. You can create that same sense of urgency in your ad copy by including a short-term promotional offer, e.g. "20% off Memorial Day weekend. Call now to make your reservation."

3.) Increase bids during business hours. Under "Advanced targeting options" on the campaign level of your Bing Ads campaign, you can increase your bids by using day-of-week and time-of-day targeting to ensure that your ads (with your phone number displayed) are showing most prominently during the times when there is someone at your business to accept calls from potential customers.

4.) Analyze your call data. For advertisers in the US and UK who have access to a desktop PC or tablet, you can review your campaign's performance by pulling a "Call Details" report.

For more information on increasing calls to your business via your Bing Ads campaigns, visit the Get more phone calls page here on the Bing Ads site.