Omar Kattan

Archive for the ‘PPC’ Category

On it’s official Adwords blog Google has announced Interest-based ads, a new advetising model that serves ads based on what a user has previously viewed in their browser. 

This, according to Google will allow them to serve better targeted ads to users of their network including YouTube.  But how does this fair in terms of privacy concerns? 

Google has officially stated it’s plan to combat the privacy issues arising from such advertising model by allowing users to opt out of such model.  This can be done by installing a browser “plugin” that controls whether or not internet users wants to participate in such a programme, but is this enough?

Not according to many webmasters who feel that Google’s new interest-based ad model, while in alignment with their objective of increasing click through rates of their ads, is a huge blow to online privacy efforts.

I for one feel that Google is right in trying to maximise returns from it’s cash cow (Adwords) and the introduction of interest based ads will do just that.  However, the idea that you would need to download a plugin and clear your browser cache in order to safeguard your privacy disqualifies many non-techie internet users who will be unable to understand how to do this let alone even know what a “plugin” is. 

Will interest-based ads succeed? Sure they will.  Will Google fair well out of all of this?  Sure it will.  Will advertisers be happy?  Definitely.  Will internet users complain?  ofcourse they won’t, that is until internet privacy becomes more of a top level priority for governments around the World.

There is no denying it, the credit crunch is upon us, it’s severe and for the foreseeable future, its here to stay.  Everyone is tightening their belts to get though it and so must advertisers.  How do you “tighten your belt” as a PPC advertiser?  Follow these 5 simple PPC optimisation tips.    

1. Focus your ad copy on low prices, value and savings

2. Create very targeted and relevant ad groups

3. Trim the fat, don’t waste money on non-converting keywords

4. Improve your site’s usability and conversion points, make it simple for customers to buy from you.

5. Focus your budget on high-performing ads and keywords

The above tips should not only be used during a recession, they should be best practices to be used all the time (unless you’re using PPC for branding purposes).

By following the above simple tips, you’ll ensure that your PPC budget goes further.  Improvements in your ROI will soon follow!

What is Adword’s ‘Quality Score’ and how is it calculated

Quality Score is Google’s dynamic formula that assigns a score to each of your PPC keywords to determine where your sponsored ad appears in the reults pages. Quality score is calculated using a multitude of metrics  to measure how relevant your keyword is to your ad text and to a user’s search query.

About Quality Score

Quality also determines your keywords’ minimum bid. In a nutshell…

the higher the Quality Score, the better the ad position and the lower the minimum bid

Quality Score is Google’s way of ensuring that only the most relevant ads appear on Google’s search results pages and the Google Network.

Components of Adword’s Quality score formula:

• The keyword’s historical clickthrough rate (CTR) on Google; CTR on the Google Network is not considered

• The relevance of the keyword to the ads in its ad group

• The quality of your landing page

• Your account history, which is measured by the CTR of all the ads and keywords in your account

• The historical CTR of the display URLs in the ad group

Google recently announced changes to improve the way quality score is calculated in a nutshell…

• Quality Score will now be more accurate because it will be calculated at the time of each search query

• Keywords will no longer be marked ‘inactive for search’

• ‘First page bid’ will replace ‘minimum bid’ in your account

Google’s Keyword research tool found at https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal has been updated to include actual number of searches per keyword and suggested keywords.  This is a fantastic development for both paid (PPC) as well as natural search (SEO) campaigns as we can factor Google’s data into the keyword research projects conducted for clients.

More imprtantly, this update will enable us to measure Google’s data against a client’s very own analytics data to begin to understand the synergies between paid and natural search and to better advise how to spend our client’s money for maximum ROI (return on investment).

 Some of the benefits of the new functionality in the Google Adwords tool: 

• Discover high-traffic keywords to include in AdWords campaigns.

• Maximise ROI by analysing CPC and search volume data side by side.

• Identify niche keywords to be be included in Adwords campaigns.

• Analyse average search volume figures to get a better understanding of keyword seasonality.

The official Google Adwords Blog has further information on this new development.

Google announced today that it will lift the protection it previously provided for brand owners on its PPC network (Adwords).  This was an unanticipated yet not very surprising move on the part of the search giant.

Adwords is Google’s advertising program that allows companies and individuals to bid on keywords in an auction-based system.  In the past Google protected advertisers from others bidding on their brand name but as of next month this will no longer be the case.

What does this mean?

For Google: More money… MUCH MORE

For the Advertisers: Higher budgets because now they have to compete against others for their own brand name.

For Agencies: Also more money as advertisers would need to shed a whole lot more dough for their ppc budgets

For Affiliates &  Affiliate Networks: Also more money, as now Google allow for brand bidding on broad match thereby the affiliates will get more targeted traffic, more conversion and therfore more commissions (Affiliate Networks get a cut from that).  

So all in all everybody wins but the advertisers!  well done Google thats how to win friends and influence people!

Its worth a note that Google never protected advertisers in the US and that MSN and Yahoo never protected advertisers in the US or UK.