Tag: Google AdWords

We’ve seen a strong downward trend in the cost per click in Google AdWords starting in January. If your account is still set up for clicks based on the cost per click increases you had to make in September and October to salvage your AdWords business, now is the time to take a careful look to see where you can start trimming back.

Google had a decrease of about 64% in income in the fourth quarter of 2008. The economic stagnation is finally hitting Google AdWords with advertisers moving out of the mix causing profits to fall for Google and impacting the cost per click in Google AdWords. With over 5 years as a professional account manager and managing accounts for businesses in a broad number of sectors, we are seeing several strong trends in activity.

1. The opportunities to drop the cost per click and still retain excellent ad position on AdWords is happening right now. Although this is not across the board in every business, we are seeing a marked trend down in the cost per click needed to retain page position.
2. Although impressions for many accounts still remain high, we are starting to see a drop in impressions for some accounts as a reflection of decreased searches.
3. For our client accounts at this point we are not seeing a marked decrease in conversions. In fact for many clients due to the decreased competition online for clicks, we are actually seeing an increase in conversions.
4. For my own business, I am seeing more clients come in to AdWords for the first time as well as more prospects wanting information or just consulting but wanting to self manage their accounts to keep expenses lean.

My biggest tip on AdWords at this time is to review your cost per click to see if you can start to drop your bid without impacting performance. For some account this means as much as a $1 per click drop and for others we are incrementally moving down at $.05 to $.10 at each review. For some accounts some keywords can go down and other hot property keywords have had to go up in cost per click, but the general marked trend is a downward drop in the cost per click.

If you haven’t read Jeremy Chatfield’s predictions on what will happen with Google AdWords for 2009 I would recommend that you click in to read his blog post on this topic.  I think as Google gets squeezed more by the economic realities of our time, we will see Google try to squeeze more dollars out of each click and work hard to stop the slide in their revenues by looking to creatively increase the cost per click for advertisers. We’ve already seen Yahoo add a minimum cost per click level on many keywords which is simply a bogus “grab for cash” and Jeremy expects Google to do likewise this next year with a big push on using broad match, minimum cost per click bidding, and “spin” on the impact of personalized search.

Jeremy’s been right before particularly on the September 2008 AdWords quality score adjustment. It will be interesting to see how Google reacts as we see an even greater decline in their profits for the first quarter of 2009.

It is shocking, but there are business out there that are spending thousands of dollars on Google each month without any checks and balances in place to monitor the performance of their programs.

Before we start working with an AdWords client we want several things in place. (This is really in the client’s best interest.) We want to have metrics to evaluate the success, or lack thereof,  of their Google AdWords program.

This is what we recommend:

1. Have a website statistics package installed. AWStats is not enough. We like Urchin and second best Google Analytics.
2. Have a contact form on the website that when the script is triggered drops the client to a new URL for the thank you page. Contact forms that simply place text on the same page thanking the client for a form submission will never be able to have Google AdWords conversion tracking installed.
3. Make sure that AdWords conversion tracking is installed on the thank you or order confirmation page.
4. Have a budget established for $800 to $1,500 per month for clicks to start with. Less than that, you really should not use our services as we will add too much to your program’s overhead.
5. Consider custom landing pages targeted to your ad group’s themes. Some clients don’t always need this as they may have a page on their website that is a good match, but we never recommend dropping the AdWords clickee on the home page of the website. When we do custom landing pages we always enable a form at the bottom to allow for fast questions and an additional way to capture the lead for further contact.

If you are not using metrics to evaluate your AdWords program, you are just leaving your pocket book or wallet open on the table for Google to grab your cash without accountability. You should only spend on Google AdWords when it is smart for your business.

I’ve seen and made happen some absolutely wild success stories with Google AdWords, but I’ve also told some clients that AdWords is not working for them and they should stop advertising there. If you don’t measure the activity and leads generated by your program, you will simply be guessing at whether AdWords is working for you. You should not be guessing, you should know!

I have been a Google AdWords Qualified Professional for nearly four years which is just about as long as Google has had the program for professional AdWords managers. Recently I found out that I am one of only 236 AdWords Qualified Professionals in the world. Wow, actually I thought there were more, but according to the www.Google-Advertising-Professionals.net that’s all there are.

You can check out their directory and find a professional who can speak and write in your own language. If you’re based in the United States, call me first at 301-705-7303, to receive first class service. In fact I just set up an account this past week for www.LeadBoosterClub.com and here’s the unsolicited comment that Kathy Goughenour sent to me after we had set up her account and helped her fix her website in preparation for her new AdWords campaign.

You need to rename your Google AdWords Quick Start Plus program to Faster-Than-a-Speeding-Bullet program.  Nancy started work on my Google AdWords program Thursday morning and by Friday evening she’d set up my Google account, written 4 landing pages, rewritten my home page, generated what seemed like thousands of keywords, researched my competition, written 12 (it could have been more, I lost count) brilliant Google ads.  Saturday morning she put the Google AdWords campaign into action.  Whew!  I was worn out watching her work.  I forgot to mention that she’d never heard of my business before.  She grasped my business concept, understood my target audience, and made me feel that anything was possible.  Thank you, Nancy McCord, for making me believe in miracles, again.  I believe.

Kathy Goughenour President – www.LeadBoosterClub.com

Thanks Kathy for your kind words. Google AdWords services are one of our core businesses. I love working with Google AdWords. I consider each client’s needs like a big puzzle – how best can I create a program to get results, not just clicks, but real leads.

So if you’re looking for one of only 236 Google AdWords Qualified Professionals to help you, and a passionate one focused on your success, look no further.  For more information we invite you to review our AdWords set up and management program.