Google Adwords Quality Score and Landing Page Speed
Jun 25, 2008 Google Adwords, Landing Pages, Webmaster Tips
Yes, it’s June, and with July fast approaching, the new Landing Page Speed factor will start (if it hasn’t already) affecting your Google Adwords Quality Score. Last week I discussed single points of failure that could impact your Quality Score, but what about less common problems that will factor into landing page load time?
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Down time and Quality Score: a hole you might not climb out of
Jun 20, 2008 Google Adwords, Google Analytics, Omniture
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The dreaded “d-word” that many online marketers wince at hearing is “downtime”. For media buys or traditional landing pages the impact isn’t so bad, because visitors may click through to a page and either get redirected or a 404 error, but the ad serving program won’t necessarily penalize that advertiser. With pay-per-click it’s an entirely different ball game. Google Adwords algorithms penalize Quality Score for ads with high bounce rates, and if your site or landing page is down, all bets are off.
Adsspy plays hardball with Made-for-Adsense Sites
Jun 16, 2008 Analytics Tools, Google Adwords, Webmaster Tips, Yahoo Search Marketing
Playing on the content network is usually just that, a big unorganized and chaotic game. It pits advertiser against publisher, in a constant battle for cheap traffic, domain monetization, campaign optimization, and even fraudulent clicks. Marketers have a heck of a time keeping up with the onslaught of poorly converting clicks originating from hundreds and even thousands of unique domains on the content network. Enter Adsspy.com, a new tool by the creators of the hugely popular FireFox plugin SEO Quake.
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Highly Anticipated Sessions at SES Toronto
Jun 11, 2008 SES Tour
Since Search Engine Strategies in Toronto is often a smaller show than others on the SES Tour. That makes Toronto an interesting venue because sessions at the show have to be direct, crisp, and relevant. Much of the extra fluff is cut out, making choosing sessions particularly difficult.
Choosing sessions is further complicated by top industry insiders talking in parallel sessions, so if you have a few people going to the show with you, divide and conquer. Unfortunately, I’m solo this year, so I have my own “can’t miss” favorites for the show: some are obvious winners, but some may surprise.
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Poor Conversion? Nip it in the Bud!
Jun 9, 2008 Google Adwords, Google Analytics, PPC Basics
Poor conversion doesn’t have to be a life sentence, but that’s exactly what many advertisers are living with every day. Many advertisers accept status quo, mediocrity or starter campaigns as being industry-standard. Problems aren’t always obvious to beginners in the PPC game.
If your PPC campaigns don’t break even, you may have problems. As Barney Fife would say, we need to nip it in the bud. Sometimes it’s easier said than done to bring campaigns back to the wood shed, especially on high-profile campaigns that may speak more to branding efforts than strict revenue goals.
Find out where to look to determine problems in a campaign, and find out what you can do when campaigns take over.
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Phantom Yahoo Spending and Analytics: Omniture Search Center
Jun 5, 2008 Omniture, Yahoo Search Marketing
With substantiated claims that Yahoo automatically inserts keywords, bids, and new ads into existing campaigns, analysts are having a hard time learning the true impact those changes have on their bottom line. Yesterday’s news about Yahoo automatically ‘optimizing’ advertiser campaigns comes at a pretty labor-intensive cost for users of Omniture Search Center. Thankfully there is a solution, but you may not like it.
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Phantom Yahoo Spending not an isolated incident
Jun 4, 2008 Omniture, Yahoo Search Marketing
Although I had observed something similar happen to a few select Yahoo accounts I manage, Joe over at PPC Hero dropped me a line and confirmed that it is not an isolated incident. Apparently, Yahoo is optimizing campaigns automatically, which could spell disaster for your analytics and conversion spending. What’s surprising is that they have it written into their terms of service, I’m sure everyone’s read that, right?
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Geotargeting Paradox: Sometimes the parts don't equal the whole
Jun 3, 2008 Google Adwords
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At some point advertisers will start to wonder whether their mature Google Adwords search campaigns actually achieve the highest possible click quality. One of the easiest things to optimize on such campaigns is geo-segmentation, especially with the help of the Google Adwords Editor. Beware that although you may be targeting regions with finer control, often times the combined traffic of individual parts will not equal the whole.
