There are a number of reasons why your ’Google’ content campaign should be seperate from your ‘Google’ search campaign (a topic I won’t be focusing on in this blog)…mainly the fact that the user isn’t specifically searching for your product or service but rather browsing sites that are related to your keywords and adtext. The users on the ‘Google’ content network are in a different mindset to the user on the ‘Google’ search network hence the need to change keywords, adtexts and often campaign structure to make the most of your content advertising campaign.

Which brings me to my point, the necessity to sculpt and shape your ad-texts to suit these content network users….

1. Be Catchy: As I mentioned earlier the mindset of the content network user is different as they are not actively searching for you or your product – you MUST literally jump off the screen and grab them.
2. As with your ‘Google’ seach campaign adtexts use a ‘call to action’ to draw the user in, also a ‘value proposition’ making it clear that what you are offering is of the upmost value to this potential customer.
3. Try playing on people’s heartstrings, if the adtext has a personal connection to the user there is a better chance they will click on your ad, ‘Emotional messaging’ can be a great technique to draw users in.
4. Highlight the relationship of what the user may be reading and what your product or service may be offering.
5. Recall the needs,interests and profile of target readers.

The above should have helped entice the user to your website but once there the site itself must work in order for this potential customer to become an actual customer.This can be helped by..

• Choosing an appropriate landing page.
• Initially setting the right expectations on your adtext to what the user will find once they navigate to your website – there is no point in guideing the user to your website on false pretentions.

Hopefully by using the above tactics/techniques you will now have the edge on bringing an increased level of relevent customers to your website.

While studies have shown that search (PPC) advertising in conjunction with content network advertising will drive an increase in website traffic and with it conversions, It was always difficult to gage just how many conversions the content network was providing. Of course you could view the conversion stats on your adwords acct page,  but this may only reveal a portion of the actual conversions that have been driven by the content network for your product/service without you realising it. Did these impressions have any other impact on your potential customers?? (apart from being influential in creating brand awareness)  – There was no way of telling, until now……

Google’s solution – ‘view through conversion reporting’…In a nutshell, a user will view the impression of your banner ad (not yet set up to work with text ads), but will not click on this ad immediately, instead they will navigate away from the page. At a later date they will seek you out and follow through to convert for whatever you may have been advertising initially. (the conversion must be within 30 days of the ad being viewed for the conversion to register)

Now this section of users who will view your ad impression on the content network, maybe one in the tens of thousands that doesn’t immediately click on your ad but the details or information in it will be burnt onto their retina, play on their mind and they will actively seek you out at a later date, following through and purchasing the product or service that you offer. Before there was no way of tracking this conversion (you’d presume they arrived at your site through the organic listings/word of mouth/ referral etc) ….. but this new reporting tool will give you hard data that the customer in question had viewed your ad impression somewhere on the content network at an earlier stage, and the effect it had on that customer resulting in them following up and making that all important conversion, reaffirming the value of the content network as a whole.

Imagine what the world of today would have been like with no Hitler or for whatever reason dinosaurs still roamed the earth!!!! – maybe if one tiny little thing had gone differently that would be the case… ( Jurassic Park theory )

With Googles new tool you can go back to see what the results would have been like had you done something differently. Its a free tool that helps you make effective bidding decisions on the google search and content network, it estimates the clicks, cost and impressions that your clients ads would have received in the last seven days had you set different keyword max cpc bids

Ok, so you can’t use the tool if any of Googles other advanced tools are being used ( Budget optimiser / conversion optimiser / position pref. and ad scheduling )… but what this feature is great for is when you are starting a campaign off, you’re never sure exactly where you’re bidding will get you! – you take an educated guess or follow Googles advice for the first week. But once that week is over you can fire up the ‘bid simulator’ and see if you had bid that bit less would you have achieved the same position or if you had bid that bit more would you have achieved top position rather than second or third??

Also in terms of impressions, you can work out exactly what is required to gain 100% impression share and make sure you are missing none due to budget, all in all another great tool from GOOGLE – keep up the good work!!

Need help with your Adwords campaign? Contact Ireland’s leading Adwords agency.

1. adjusting max cpc
2. re-organising adgroups
3. re-writing ads
4. changing targeting optionsed
5. adjusting keyword match types
6. choosing relevent destination URL’s

All of the above are indeed key components of an involved campaign optimization, but a tool/report that i’ve found indispensible to my optimization process is the Search Query Performance Report.

The data collected in this report can be used to gain a better understanding of how users are finding your ad’s and how they react to them – tracking the performance of keyword variations that trigger your ad. 

How I use the Search Query Performance Report!

• Firstly i’d make sure i’ve selected the correct match type for existing keywords. ie. look at ‘phrase’ and ‘broad’ match types with high volumes of searches and add these as ‘exact’ match keywords.
• Secondly the report is a great tool for weeding out negative keywords – when first running these reports to optimize for a homecare company- with ‘care’ and ‘carer’ as keywords - what showed up as the word with the highest number of impressions?? – turns out it was ‘cars’… basically just a typo error from the user but still costing our campaign money ( as a percentage still clicked through to the ad even though it was totally irrelevent in terms of their search- needless to say ‘cars’ was added as a negative keyword )
• Thirdly, by viewing each search in relation to its cost – you may notice that you a paying more for a search that is not directly linked to what you may be advertising, by eliminating that search query you may be able to keep your costs down and focus the users search to what you are trying to sell/advertise ( in essence deleting existing keywords and replacing them with better targeted keywords )

There a couple of points to remember when using the report,

• The report only includes queries for ads that were shown and clicked on.
• The report only shows search network data.

In conclusion we have seen how useful this report is as a tool for campaign optimisation, but all the same for a complete and extensive optimisation other tools / reports must be used in conjunction with this – but as i have explained above the report has helped reduce cost, direct searches to where i want them and generally organise each campaign better.

As an avid football supporter ( Stoke City!!! – Best team in the premier league )… i’ve often wondered if the manager was getting the best out of his players ( which Mr.Tony Pulis did without a doubt last season ), but generally were the best players picked? are they playing in their best or optimum position? are they playing the right formation? – with all these questions there is obviously a right answer – unfortunately in a lot of cases this right answer does not become evident until the game is over – and even then if the team record a victory, could that victory have been more conclusive???….

I believe the relationship between quality scores and adtext is not too disimilar.When creating adtexts/groups, in essence you are creating miniature teams- with mixed components hoping they will perform to their optimum level and get results ( goals /conversions )- often an adtext you would have expected to work well will perform poorly and surprisingly ad’s you wouldn’t have had a hope for will perform well….

But as a manager or adwords advertiser you will always strive to play your best team, make sure your players are in their right positions and play the formation that you think will best suit the team or players. Again when creating an adtext you have the message you want to get across and the tools to do this but for optimum results the relationships between these aspects need to work together ( ie. Man.U playing Van De Sar up front with Rooney in Goals and Michael Owen playing centre back??? – while all the components of a good team would be there – would they play well? perform? – i would guess not!!! – ) but played in the right positions there’d be the basis of a good team.

When creating adtexts – the advised rule of thumb is to

1. create a headline containing your keywords

2.create a second line advising of a benefit

3.create a third line containing a feature or special offer.

Just like picking your players in their best positions if you don’t organise your text in their best positions they will also not perform.

This is where i come to ‘quality score’….. Google advise

‘Quality score is determined by your keywords clickthrough rate, relevance of your adtext, historical keyword performance, and other relevancy factors’

But lets place these in terms of importance…

1. historical keyword performance accross Google- whether this keyword has performed over time ( in my analogy i’d liken this to the teams all round relationship – they know how they have played previously and have an idea how they will continue to play and this can be confirmed through previous performances )

2.Keyword-to-ad text match- the relevance of your text – are your keywords present?? ( best players on the pitch? in the correct positions?? )

3.Other Relevancy factors?? – Google aren’t too clear what these others factors are – possibly linked to Googles tracking of human behaviour ( could we call this the supporters / crowd - a group of glory hunting fans jumping on the bandwagon?? – but hence increasing the support for an already successful club )

4. CTR – clickthrough rate of all the ads and keywords in your account- ( apprently the least important factor of the four – )

So in conclusion we have seen the similarities – an ad-texts performance can be increased once managed in the correct manner, through testing and re-testing – basing your next move on actuals events or happenings you can slowly but surely increase the performance of your campaign/adgroup/adtext….. and without going to deeply into the costings of it all – with an increased quality score you can lower the cost you are paying for each click - ( bring in the right players for the job you want them to do – ie. trying to buy top position on a page will not always guarantee a top place finish – definitely not with Google anyway! – unfortunately we can’t say the same in the world of football with Chelsea proving it can be done in the past and we will watch with interest to see if Manchester City can do the same this season with their billions!!!! )

Users type their query into google search. When they are presented with the Search Results the Sponsored links section (the right hand side of the results page and often the top 3 entries) are all adwords advertising.

As an Adwords advertiser you can choose what keywords show your ads, how much you want to spend per click and how much you want to spend per day.

Adwords’ pay per click pricing model means you only pay for people who click on your ads and visit your site.

Targeted- Only advertise to people searching for your product

Cost Effective- Only pay for people who click on your ad and visit your site

Measureable- Get accurate stats for how many people searched your keywords, clicked your ads and enquired/purchased through your website.

To discuss how Adwords can help your business contact the good folk at OnlineAdvertising.ie- Irelands Adwords Specialists.

Here are the principal differnences between Organic and sponsored listings:

Sponsored Links v Organic Listing

Pay per click                            no cost per click

Instant visibility                      3-6 months consistent SEO work

Can appear for unlimited Keywords  10 words at a push per page

Clickers tend to be shoppers  Clickers tend to be info seekers

As you can see both listings offer their unique characteristics.

The optimal marketing strategy is to use Adwords in conjunction with SEO to maximise your Google coverage.

Adwords can be  a complicated programme and if you dont 100% understand it you may have an inefficient campaign which is not meeting its potential and wasting your hard earned money!

How do you make sure your campaign is fine tuned and performing like a 5 litre BMW engine?

Well luckily Google has recognised Adwords experts with it’s Google Adwords Professional Certification.

This logo means the bearer has passed the rigorous requirments set out by Google which include: 75% plus mark in the  Google Adwords pro exam and 3 months campaign monitoring by Google.

To maximise the benefits of Adwords to your business employ the services of a  Google Adwords Professional