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flyingrose Moderator
Joined: Oct 30, 2003
# Posts: 3361
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Posted: 02/24/2007 07:01 pm
There are numerous current issues that are causing spending spikes in Google Adwords accounts. Here are the actions you can take to protect yourself, the pros and cons, and the probable results: 1. Consider deleting all broad matched keywords in your account. You cannot delete just some of them because Google's expanded match system will simply show other ads for those searches and they will be those with the highest cost per click in your account. NEW: Instead of deleting broad matched keywords try pausing them first. This SHOULD be effective in controlling this issue and allow you to resume them later. I am currently testing and if I find out otherwise I will advise. See third post in this thread for directions on how to pause keywords. PROS: Limit risk and spending spikes CONS: May reduce traffic and sales by approximately 50%. ALTERNATIVE METHOD: Watch your account daily and immediately take action to block non-relevant impressions. Requires enormous amounts of time and research. Add as many negative keywords as you can find. If you choose to go this route be sure to read and understand Google Broad Match Turned into Expanded Match. 2. Consider opting out of both content and Google's Partner Search Network. I have changed my advice on partner search. Even though I have always run ads on it for every advertiser in the past, the increasing percentage of traffic from parked domain sites full of ads can severely impact results. PROS: Reduce junk traffic, lower ad costs, increased conversion rates. CONS: Loss of quality traffic and sales from major ISPs such as AOL, Earthlink & AT&T. PROBABLE PRO: Loss of potentially enormous amounts of traffic from Social Networking sites such as MySpace. Clicks from these sources are likely to cause enormous spikes in traffic and spending that may only convert similarly to content. ALTERNATIVE: NEW: I have confirmed that Google will manually block search ads from showing on specific domains for specific accounts on request. Any requests made to Google may take two weeks or longer to become active. There is conflicting information on official Google sources regarding precisely what sites their excluded sites function will block. AdWordsRep has responded that parked domain sites CAN be blocked with this function - even those showing search ads and not content ads. See Site Exclusion Now Available for Search Network for details. I am compiling a list of sites advertisers may wish to block . Please post, pm, or e-mail me with your suggestions. See Excluding Sites from the Search Network for step-by-step instructions and domains to block including: searchportal.information.com landing.domainsponsor.com sedoparking.com Until you can block traffic from these types of domains you may wish to opt out of the Search Partner Network completely. Each advertiser must weigh whether the loss of those sales outweighs the cost of bad traffic. 3. Use Negative Embedded Keywords to block your ads from being shown for general keyword phrases that are included within your specific keyword phrases. [NOTE: I have now tested this and it does work. A big thank you to AussieWebmaster for this great tip. I will be posting information in the future on how to use it to further optimize your accounts.] 4. See also the tips I posted on 02/23/2007 12:14 am (currently the last post in the thread called Watch Spending When Using Google Broad Match. Google has announced even more changes that are now live again (after being backed out once). Monitor Google's Official Adwords Blog for announcements. |
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flyingrose Moderator
Joined: Oct 30, 2003
# Posts: 3361
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Posted: 02/24/2007 07:41 pm
There are numerous threads with details on the various current issues with Google Adwords. Although now you can easily access these threads by going to the Main PPC Forum Index eventually they'll be mixed in with other threads so I am providing direct links to each below. Issues caused by Google Adwords Expanded Broad Match Quality Score Issue Examples of Huge Surges in Spending and Their Causes See Think You Know the Google Search Network for more details on what other sites are showing your search ads. Understanding Distribution Fraud (Distribution Fraud is the new term coined to describe search ads being shown on sites that are clearly not quality search sites such as parked domains, myspace.com, and others.) |
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flyingrose Moderator
Joined: Oct 30, 2003
# Posts: 3361
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Posted: 02/24/2007 08:06 pm
Google's official instructions on How to Pause Keywords. I was hoping I could use Google's keyword search tool to find and pause all broad matched keywords. No luck with that but I found yet another bug. I went to Tools, Advanced Search, Find and Edit Keywords, and searched on all broad matched keywords. I get a report that shows keywords in paused campaigns as active. Fortunately they are NOT really active. |
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flyingrose Moderator
Joined: Oct 30, 2003
# Posts: 3361
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Posted: 02/26/2007 05:24 pm
SEO Round Table reports that domain blocking works to keep ads off many parked domains. He quotes AdWordsRep (AWR) as saying "Essentially, it is possible to exclude most parked domain sites using the site exclusion tool. For technical reasons, however, some sites will currently require the assistance of the AdWords support to exclude, as you have noted." We should start a list of parked domains and a separate list of non-search engines that use Google search the way MySpace does. You can post them in this thread or PM or e-mail me with them. Either way I'll post the complete lists for the use of all. |
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flyingrose Moderator
Joined: Oct 30, 2003
# Posts: 3361
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Posted: 02/27/2007 01:57 pm
The domain blocking page specifically indicates that it is only for content ads. If that is true it won't keep your ads off many parked domains, myspace, and other similar sites because they are showing SEARCH ads, not content ads. MySpace has a search the web function. Showing search ads on it might be fine. They also have a search MySpace function and it is showing SEARCH ads. This is absolutely not acceptable. |
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flyingrose Moderator
Joined: Oct 30, 2003
# Posts: 3361
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Posted: 03/07/2007 12:17 am
I am bumping this thread back to the top to ensure the maximum number of advertisers who may be affected see it. |
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flyingrose Moderator
Joined: Oct 30, 2003
# Posts: 3361
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Posted: 03/16/2007 01:43 pm
In February, 2007 Google's system started showing whatever the most expensive related ad is for a specific related product for the most general keyword(s) for that product. This has caused enormous jumps in traffic and spending for many advertisers. I can pinpoint certain jumps in traffic to that specific cause and this particular timeframe. I do not yet know if that behavior is new across their system or it has always existed and it only became obvious to me when they started displaying ads tied to these specific keywords for these specific very generic keywords. In the past I've seen targeted keywords that were performing very well suddenly drop off the first page of results because broad matched keywords were now being displayed in competition with those targeted keyword phrases. I believe this behavior is different and fairly new because it is the reverse situation. Instead of broad matched phrases targeting specific phrases, the new behavior is for ads for specific phrases to be shown for generic searches. To determine if this situation is affecting you do some searches for the most generic words for your products and look for your ads for specific brands and/or multiple advertisers ads that specify a particular brand. In many industries an advertiser sells multiple brands. Most sharp advertisers would choose to display a generic ad for a generic search and a specific brand ad for searches for that brand. If you see multiple ads for specific brands when searching for a generic word it is very likely that Google's system is displaying the ads with the highest bids in each advertiser's account for that search. You can control this behavior by adding that generic search as a negative embedded keyword in every campaign and/or ad group except the one you do want to display an ad for that specific search. You must do this across your entire account. If you do not add negative embedded keywords to every ad group OR you try pausing or deleting just the keyword(s) getting high impressions, Google's system will keep moving this traffic to the next highest cost broad-matched keyword. You may want to compile a list of every generic term you can think of and add them all to every campaign or ad group you don't want to show ads for those searches. Even if you are not experiencing this issue now it is very likely that this behavior will appear for more and more keywords. To add negative embedded keywords use this format: -[widget] -[widgets] -[wholesale widget] -[wholesale widgets] Doing the above SHOULD prevent your ad from being shown for searches for widget, widgets, wholesale widget, or wholesale widgets and still allow it to be shown for any other phrase with the words widget or widgets in them. Be sure to watch your account to see if you've effectively blocked this traffic. There may be additional phrases that show too much traffic or you may see a huge drop in traffic if you implement this change. Where your traffic drops and where your spending and cost per conversion is reduced tells you what ads were being shown for generic searches. Some accounts may see little change and others enormous change so don't forget to monitor your results. You may then want to create more targeted ads for specific products to replace the lost traffic OR create a separate Campaign for these generic keywords so you can control spending and track results. Since Google's system is showing high bid keywords for these generic searches you will probably have to bid fairly high to get your ads onto the first page of results. |
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