Category Archives: AdWords

Calculating Quality Scores: What Does it Influence?

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Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes, 15 seconds. Contains approximately 1053 words.

Knowing how to calculate your quality score is crucial to the success of any online marketing campaign you put forth. Why? Google uses its Quality Scoring to communicate with you, the advertiser, what they think about the quality of your keywords. Therefore, it would behoove you to learn how your quality score may or may not be impacting the success of your online marketing campaigns and business.

Quality score is Google’s way of aligning the interests of three different parties within the online advertising ecosystem:

  1. The Publisher (aka: Google) – Google wants to monetize your ads
  2. Advertisers – want to get new leads/sales/customers
  3. Users – those seeking information

What Does Quality Score Influence?

Quality score determines the eligibility of an ad to go to auction to appear on Google. If your quality score isn’t good enough, Google won’t allow you to participate in the auction at all. Therefore, the relevance of your ad matters! Similarly, if you have two advertisers competing for an ad placement, the ad with the higher quality score (more relevance) will win out. Other areas that the quality score influences includes:

  • PRICE: the price you need to bid in order to maintain a given position
  • TOP SLOT: only available to high quality ads (minimum threshold for ad to show above the organic search results). If no ad meets those requirements, then Google will show the organic results.
  • DKI (Dynamic Keyword Insertion): There is a minimum quality score threshold before Google will allow DKI.

Quality Score = CTR + Relevancy + Landing Page

What Contributes to Quality Score?

It’s not necessarily a linear curve that determines quality score. Instead, the following three things contribute to your quality score:

  1. CTR
  2. Relevancy
  3. Landing Page

Click-Through-Rate (CTR):

By far, CTR is the most important factor contributing to your quality score. Have a new account? Your keywords will be used to determine the quality score. Google also looks at a number of different factors to determine what your expected CTR will be. A couple of other things worth noting here:

  • **Google does not use the campaign ID or the adword ID to determine your quality score.
  • **You do not have to have an account full of exact match keywords to get a good quality score.

Relevancy

Google has a notion about how the different words in the query are going to change the CTR of your ads. It is constantly performing correlations. If they find that there is something that has a strong correlation, then Google can use it as a determining factor. Google knows, at the exact moment that a search is done, how it will affect your quality score.

Key Takeaways:

  • Google uses relevancy signals unique to the specific query to help inform quality predictions
  • Google looks for correlations to use as “utter relevance factors” — aka “does CTR vary based on these factors?”

Landing Page

Your landing page is the last part of determining your quality score; it is also the smallest part of the trifecta. Google measures the user experience based on how relevant your landing page is to user engagement and how the website is dealing with the user’s information.

Changing your landing page to drive conversion rates is one of the biggest impacts you can have. However, too many people make the mistake of only worrying about their landing page when it comes to their quality score.

**One way to determine if you have a landing page problem: In your Analytics and Adwords accounts — check pages with the highest bounce rate, exit rate, time on page etc.

layered_puzzle_pieceGoogle Ad Extensions

Do your ad extensions boost your CTR? If you use ad extensions and another competitor doesn’t but has the same bid, then you will have the upper hand.

Which ad extensions will actually give my users more information and increase my CTR? –This is the question you need to be asking yourself.

  • Ad extensions typically improve CTR and overall campaign performance because they make ads more useful.
  • Google does not care if you use ad extensions if it doesn’t improve your CTRs.
  • The only thing that matters is if you are using an ad extension relevant to your ad and it, in turn, improves your CTR.

8  Quick Optimization Tips

  1. Build better ad groups. Create tightly-themed ad groups. don’t put everything into the same group!
  2. Use multiple ad texts in each ad group.  A one-word change can make a huge difference, but you won’t know that until you test it. [Ex: eBay in the Netherlands changed their wording from “Find” to “Buy” and saw an immediate increase in conversions]
  3. Use all ad extensions that make sense, but only if it makes sense. [Ex: If you have a client that does not take phone calls, then don’t set up a phone call extension for them! However, you may want to set up a ‘review’ extension, put it in your ad and see if it will boost your quality score.]
  4. Create a compelling Call To Action (CTA) in ad texts. Don’t make an ad text that no one will want to click on!
  5. Fix keywords with lots of impressions and low CTR.  Optimize with ad text to try to raise up quality score [Ex: If so many people are searching for this keyword and I have a low quality score, then what am I missing?]
  6. Fix keywords with very few impression and low CTR. These could really affect your account level quality score [Ex: If you have  a lot of long-tail keywords, make sure you pay attention!]
  7. Set bids based on your business goals. Focus what matters to your business first. Your Quality Score should only be used as a guiding metric, not as an end-all-be-all metric.
  8. Use Search Query Reports (SQR) to discover what users look for. Look for negative keywords as well as new keywords to add. The more specific you are with your negative keywords, the less guesswork Google will have to do.

 

In An Ideal Ad Group:

Keywords Should:

  • …contain 5-30 closely related keywords
  • …not always use different match types for same key word

Ads Should:

  • …have at least 2 ad texts
  • …use the keyword in the ad text
  • …deliver relevant information!

Some Final Thoughts to Consider:

  • Be patient. Give Google at least 100’s of impressions before you start drawing conclusions.
  • Respond to bad Quality Score ASAP.
  • Optimize or delete poor Quality Score keywords.
  • Experiment. Always experiment with your Adwords account; never let an account become static.
  • Track the history of your Quality Score.

For more information about Quality Score, or to speak with a certified Google Adwords specialist, contact C0MPLÉX1 today at 919-926-8733.

Using AdRank to Improve Relevancy

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Estimated Reading Time: 2 minutes, 28 seconds. Contains approximately 495 words.

As Internet search has become more prominent over the years, relevancy with regards to search has also increased. People now want to be able to type in a search term or phrase and receive a specific set of results related to their search. This is where Google AdRank comes in.

Google Ad Extensions

Using Ad extensions, users are able to see more specific information that is both relevant to their search as well as useful to them. By providing more relevant information, business owners have the opportunity to capitalize on attracting more potential customers via search. Take Google +, for instance. By providing more information about your business and including relevant hashtags, someone could search for keywords or search terms pertaining to your business, find your business and be provided with a wealth of information from your Google + page. They can call your business, see where you are located on a map and even see what other customers have had to say.

Google ad extensions can (and usually do) improve your click-through rate as well as boost campaign performance. Why? They make advertisements more useful.

Improvements  to Google Ad Rank

Ordering advertisements on search results pages involves using a type of calculation, referred to as ‘Ad Rank’. It used to be that  Google Ad Rank was calculated using your max cost-per-click (CPC) bid and your Quality Score. However, Ad Rank has recently updated and now takes into account a third component:

Google has also increased the importance of Ad Rank in determining whether your ad is even eligible to be displayed with extensions and formats.
Details as well as the implications of these changes are summarized below:

  • Ad Extensions and Formats – now influences the position of an ad on the search results page. Ex: The ad with the more positive expected impact from extensions will generally appear in a higher position than the other.
  • Expected Impact of Extensions and Ad Formats – Google now considers click-through rates, and the prominence of the extensions or formats on the search results page.
  • Quality Score – Because Ad Rank is now more important in determining whether your ad is shown with extensions and formats, you might need to increase your Quality Score, bid, or both for extensions and formats to appear.
  • Auctions –  Your highest performing and most useful combination of extensions and formats among those eligible will be displayed, removing any guesswork over what extensions work best for you.
  • CPC – You may see lower CPCs if your extensions and formats are highly relevant, and Google expects a large positive performance impact relative to other competitors in the auction. In other cases, you may see higher CPCs because of an improvement in ad position or increased competition from other ads with a high expected impact from formats.
  • Who it Affects – For now, this update only affects search ads appearing on Google Search.

For more information about AdRank, make sure you check out the following page about Understanding Google Ads.

C0MPLÉX1’s Noah Boswell now Google AdWords Certified Partner

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Estimated Reading Time: 22 seconds. Contains approximately 74 words.

Just quick update to C0MPLÉX1 Clients…Google just posted the new Qualifications for Individuals and Companies to be a “Google AdWords Certified Partner” this morning at 3am.

In my continued efforts to stay on top of all that is Google for your benefit (my clients) I have already today taken Both Paid exams and passed and am officially a “Google AdWords Certified Partner” on the first day available to do so.

Information from Google on the Program:

http://adwords.blogspot.com/2010/04/new-approach-to-how-we-work-with.html

Get your Google Adwords Campaign off the Ground

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A Google Adwords campaign is a great way to bring targeted traffic straight to your Web site. If applied correctly, with just a little investment you can start to see real results in very little time. However, do it wrong and it will be a complete waste of your time and money.

Many people wrongly believe that Google Adwords is an easy way to advertise online. However, if you don’t know exactly what you’re doing, then it can quickly turn into a costly mistake. To combat this, consider hiring a professional Google Adwords management service to do the job for you. Not only will it be easier, but it will be a lot more cost effective in the long term.

There is a simple reason why Google Adwords is the preferred choice of online advertising for millions of companies. Google is the biggest search engine, and therefore if you can make yourself here then you have a greater chance of being found. If carried out correctly, a Google Adwords campaign will have a higher return on investment than other forms of advertising.

Some companies regularly spend thousands of dollars a month on their Google Adwords campaigns, and that is not money that you can afford to throw away. The benefits are clear?you are reaching customers who are specifically looking for the products or services that you offer. All you have to do is make yourself visible.

There are many factors which make up a successful Google Adwords campaign, and each factor must be considered carefully to achieve results. Firstly, there is keyword research. Getting the right keywords takes time and effort, and if you go wrong here the rest of your campaign will be a waste of time.

But this is only the beginning. Once you’ve started your Google Adwords campaign, you’ll also need to create adverts that are powerful and effective and that get people to click on them. This is something that takes time and effort to get right, as numerous techniques are necessary to gear the campaign towards bringing in results. After that you will need to manage the campaign closely, to observe the results and statistics that will help you to improve your conversion rates.

Trying to do this all yourself is hard work, especially if you only have a little experience in the field. A professional management service will inform you on the progress of your campaign, explaining how it is performing and making the changes that are necessary to bring in the most clicks for you.

Don’t waste your time on a Google Adwords campaign that does not convert and ends up losing you money. Always go with a professional management service that will not only take charge of the whole campaign for you, but will provide you with a better return on investment. Professional services are often cheaper than you realize, and if you are making an investment then it is always worth getting it right from the start.

Google Adwords can really make a difference to your business, but don’t throw your money away. Hire a company with experience and a proven track record to match, and start seeing the conversions pick up today.