AdWords Keyword Discovery

Not every keyword you can dream up for your products is a good keyword to use in Google AdWords. When determining what keywords to use, I find it crucial to also think about the type of matching that should be used as well.

For some general keywords broad match should be considered off limits. A better use for some keyword phrases would be only phrase match or exact match. The default for AdWords is broad match. When you wrap your keyword phrase with ” it is called phrase match. When you wrap your keywords with [ it is called exact match. Google reviews your match type in determining how to show your keywords.

If you are getting many impressions but your click through rate is low, then you may need to carefully review what broad match keywords you are using and either pause them or show them instead as phrase match or exact match terms. Remember when it comes to broad match, Google adds other words in your phrase, before, after, in between, and even uses synonyms. In some cases your broad match term could be showing ads on search phrases that are not even remotely pertinent to your services.

I am not saying broad match keywords are not usable in a well structured AdWords campaign, but that thought should be given to the words before a match type is selected.

Transition from Yahoo Ads to Bing Ads

If you have been advertising on Yahoo, now is the time to carefully review your Yahoo account. Specifically in regards to the character count in your ad text titles. The reason for this careful review is for you to be ready for account migration from the Yahoo PPC platform to MSN adCenter which is the platform for Bing.com ads.

Yahoo has allowed up to 40 characters in the title. Bing/Microsoft will only allow 25 characters including spaces. For accounts that have been migrated already and did not make the changes, adCenter simply drops the ads. I had one client do his own migration and no ad text imported which was a huge problem for a program of his size.

By the end of this month all ads served on Yahoo and Bing will be controlled from the Microsoft adCenter control panel. It is by far better for you to control what gets imported and prepare now than to have an import arbitrarily done for you.

Don’t wait, get started in preparing your account this week to prevent end of the month problems.

Yahoo is Going Away – Well at Least the PPC Part

This past weekend I sadly removed all information about Yahoo Search Marketing from my website. I have been a Yahoo Search Marketing Ambassador for years and have offered Yahoo PPC set up and management services. MSN adCenter however is taking over the Yahoo PPC control panel and is already serving Bing ads and Bing search results on Yahoo.

A sad goodbye to Yahoo Search Marketing. I’ve seen plenty of changes over the years and have always felt that Yahoo PPC was a good product and in many cases had strong conversions for businesses who advertised there. But, I am looking forward to the changes that are ahead as Yahoo and Bing merge.

One thing that I have found as the transition from Yahoo to Bing continues this month is that the automated import from Yahoo to adCenter can be problematic for accounts that do not have a good account structure and which have not readied their ads. In one case that I just recently saw for a very large program, the keywords all came over but nearly none of the ad text imported.

Before you click to import your account to adCenter, make sure to review your Yahoo ad titles you must be at 25 characters including spaces to have your ads import. If you are at 40 which is what Yahoo had allowed, your ad text will most likely not import into adCenter.

So goodbye Yahoo we’ll miss you, but be savvy and prepare your Yahoo account before you migrate to adCenter. By the way, Bing says that most accounts will be fully migrated by the end of October or so. Bing and Yahoo want to have completed the change before holiday promoting and shopping for year end take place. – a smart move!

Yahoo Sponsored Search 1/2 Price Sale

That’s right if you have the right product, you can generate as many conversions as you can on Google AdWords but at nearly half the click cost! The big caveat is, is your product the right product for Yahoo Sponsored Search?

Not every Yahoo account will out perform a Google account, but here’s what I have found:

Beauty products will do better on Yahoo PPC  than Google AdWords.

Real estate will do better on Yahoo PPC than Google AdWords.

Some education programs and course offerings will do better on Yahoo than Google.

The biggest rule of thumb is if the product is personal in nature or needs a personal relationship to sell or provide it, then Yahoo will be better. If the product is more technical in nature then Google AdWords will beat Yahoo Sponsored Search hands down.

Sometimes you simply need to try Yahoo to see what will happen after you have a mature Google AdWords program. If you have success on Yahoo, you will most likely be successful on Microsoft adCenter. If you are not successful on Yahoo then don’t expand to adCenter in most cases you won’t do any better there. These are  just my personal observations from years of account management. Your best bet is always to start on Google AdWords first and then expand carefully from there.