AdWords Tips Posts from the Internet Marketing Blog
The Mystery of Quality Score
Quality score can be confusing, there’s no doubt about it. Many different factors can affect it, and it can be difficult to determine how to influence it. It’s also in a state of constant evolution, so every time you think you have it down pat, think again. There’s no need to pull your hair out though – I am going to show you what you need to focus on to start seeing more 10’s in your account!(More: Revisiting the Economics of Quality Score: Why QS Is Up to 200% More Valuable in 2013)Google defines its Quality Score using the following components:Past click-through rate (CTR) of a keywordPast CTR of a display URLAccount history (overall CTR for ads and keywords)Landing page qualityRelevance of keywords to adsRelevance of keywords to search queriesGeographic performancePerformance... > Read more
Revisiting the Economics of Google Quality Score: Why QS Is Up to 200% More Valuable in 2013
Just over 4 years ago, Craig Danuloff at Click Equations wrote an article called “The Economics of Quality Score” that provided a simple model to determine the value of Google Quality Score in your AdWords account.We all know the value of Google's Quality Score in a high-level sense – Quality Score plays an important role in determining your Ad Rank, which is how Google determines the position in which your ad appears, which in turn determines the amount of exposure and clicks your ads will receive.
We also know that Quality Score plays a very important role in determining how much you’re charged per click. A now famous video by Hal Varian, Google’s Chief Economist, helped clarify this point – that your cost per click is calculated using the formula: Ad Rank of the ad below your... > Read more
The PPC Toolbox, Part 1: Tracking, Bulk Editing, and Keyword Expansion
Like any good carpenter, as a PPC manager you need to have a number of tools available to you in order to get the job done and done right. Through the years, I have come to find a number of different PPC tools to help in a variety of different areas, from competitor analysis to setting up conversion and analytics tracking.
Here are some of my favorites!PPC Tools for Setting Up Analytfics and Conversion TrackingGoogle Analytics URL Builder: One of the most time exhausting tasks is setting up Bing in order to properly track it in Analytics – you have to go in and add the special coding to the ad (or even keyword) destination URLs. Google offers a simple tool that allows you to fill in a few fields and then spits out a full URL with Analytics codes added! Just change the destination URL to ... > Read more
'What Do Those Plus Signs Mean?' Modified Broad Match for Beginners
Almost every week a client asks me, “What do those plus signs mean?” and I am constantly reminded that even though this match type is fairly common, there are still a lot of people who have no idea it exists.If you haven’t caught on yet, this match type is known in AdWords as the Broad Match Modifier, but it is more commonly and widely known as simply Modified Broad.
People tend to shy away from using this match type because they don’t understand what it means or how it works. It can also be a time-consuming task to add the plus signs to each of those keywords you want to switch, but in the long run, this match type can be a big help to your account.Essentially the idea is that whatever keyword you put the plus sign in front of is a “modifier” to the broad match keyword. You ca... > Read more
AdWords' Trick to Click Policy: Can You Use the Words 'Click Here' in Display Ads?
Recently I had a heated argument with one of our clients about using the word “click” in Google AdWords display banner ads. There are many questions about inappropriate language on Google AdWords, especially for banner or flash ads. Most advertisers take unnecessary precautions because they are worried that the design will be disapproved by the Google Policy Team.
Google prohibits advertisers from using the word “click” or “click here” as a call to action in text ads, which is clearly stated on the Google Policy Page under “Inappropriate language”:The words “click” or “click here” could be easily replaced in these text ads by the words follow, see, check, find etc.However, as a Paid Search Strategist at WordStream, I receive a lot of questions when it comes to a ban... > Read more
Dear eBay, Your Ads Don't Work Because They Suck
Does Google AdWords work? There’s a story making the news this week about how eBay supposedly wasn’t able to make paid search work for them so they stopped using Google AdWords. Ray Fisman, who wrote up the study for Harvard Business Review, said “Their findings suggest that many paid ads generate virtually no increase in sales, and even for ones that do, the sales benefits are far eclipsed by the cost of the ads themselves.
”I couldn’t help but laugh when I read this, and I’m sure many of you did as well, because it’s pretty well-known within the search engine marketing community that eBay is the butt of many jokes when it comes to adopting advertising best practices.eBay is probably the world’s biggest abuser of an ad writing tactic in AdWords known as Dynamic Keywor... > Read more
3 Reasons Your Keyword Has a Low Quality Score
When Larry Page and Sergey Brin first launched the Google search engine in January of 1996, no one, including the creators, realized the gold mine that they had just designed. By May 2011, Google had surpassed 1 billion unique visitors per month and had expanded to much more than just a search engine.
Now with Google+, Gmail, Maps, Drive, Chrome, Shopping, News, YouTube and perhaps a self-operating automobile in the near future, Google has revolutionized the internet and, whether we like it or not, our lives as well.Despite of the impact that Google has had on both our professional and personal lives, operating and understanding their advertising system can be a frustrating and tiresome process. As a Customer Success Specialist here at WordStream I get all sorts of questions; however the m... > Read more
Be Certifiably Awesome at Paid Search – Tips on Getting AdWords Certified
I swore I’d never study for anything ever again once I graduated college. That was until I started a career working in paid search. Until I got into the field, I had no idea what paid search even was. And I certainly didn’t think it was anything I’d ever understand. What is PPC? What is AdWords? I refuse to learn!However, being in a particular field requires expertise, of which I had none.
My only option was to shake off the cobwebs and put my studying hat back on. But where to start? Sure, I could do some research on my own, maybe pick up a pointer here or there. That didn’t seem sufficient enough, especially if I was planning to make a career in this field. I thought that I would need a source of substantial information, and where better to turn to than Google AdWords itsel... > Read more
AdWords Targets Mobile App Market with New Mobile App Promotion Ad Format
Google has rolled out a new ad App Promotion Ad that allows users to download your app from iTunes or the Google Play Store, adding to their already impressive line-up of mobile innovations.They've also rolled out a new mobile app promotion ad template for advertisers to easily create the new App Promotion ads.
The New App promotion ads are like the next version of click-to-download ads which have existed for several years now.The new App Promotion Ads are only available if you’ve upgraded to enhanced campaigns. Google recommends that advertisers create new new app promotion ads to replace the older, existing click-to-download ads, in order to take advantage of new built-in, smarter ad-targeting capabilities of the App Promotion Ad.Both the new ad-creation template and upgraded click-to-d... > Read more
When Is 2% Not a Good CTR? The Relationship of Click-Through Rate & Ad Position
Everyone always asks me, “What’s a good click-through rate?” The standard answer I always hear is 2%. My answer is always, it depends.If you don’t want your Quality Scores to suffer, you need to think twice about always targeting a 2% CTR. Quality Scores are very dependent on your CTR by Average Position, so it’s worth getting a good understanding of what this means.
So, what does it mean? People will usually click on the top ad of a SERP (search engine results page), because, well, it’s the first thing that they see. Position 1 will always have a high CTR, and CTR will continue to descend naturally in positions 2, 3, 4 and so on. This being the case, Google knows that position 1 and position 4 are not created equal, and therefore does not treat them equally.Google does not want... > Read more
