ADVANCED STRATEGIES FOR GOOGLE ADVERTISING – Part Two
BY ALEC CAMPBELL, CONSULTANT, ICHANNEL STRATEGIES

SOLUTION: IMPROVING CLICK QUALITY

Completely eliminating irrelevant clicks is close to impossible however, a number of steps can be taken to drastically improve the overall quality and performance of search marketing campaigns. Incorporating the following tactics into the campaign strategy should result in significant improvements in the overall conversion rate.

1. Content Match
Content match should not be considered part of a search marketing campaign. Google and Yahoo serve these ads on their publisher networks, AdSense and Content Match respectively. The ads are placed on sites that are deemed to be contextually relevant to the product or service being marketed.

Content match typically generates a lot of impressions, a fair amount of clicks but few conversions. This is because these clicks are not from active searches. They are from users who spotted an ad while surfing an AdSense or Content Match network site. This is similar to online advertising with one important distinction – the advertiser is paying on a per click basis instead of a cost per thousand impressions basis.

The option to include content match clicks should only be selected if the marketer believes the value of the awareness generated from the number of impressions outweighs the poor conversion results.
If this isn’t the case, it is best to deselect content match and focus only on direct search.

2. Broad vs Exact Match
In theory, a keyword list could be large enough to include all of the possible search terms that someone might use to find information on the products or services a marketer offers. If this were the case, broad match (or advanced match in Yahoo) would not be needed. Using only exact match to exert complete control over the searches for which ads appear, a marketer can be confident that all clicks would be relevant.

In reality, it is highly unlikely that a marketer will think of every possible combination of search terms. Thus, a combination of broad and exact match is usually the best solution. To cut back on the number of irrelevant searches, enter the same keyword terms twice – once for broad match and once for exact match. The exact match terms should be bid at a higher rate than the equivalent broad match terms. This will result in the exact match term being used when someone types in that exact keyword phrase. This is important as the exact match term is more valuable because it is a higher quality click. All of the information about that search is present; it is an exact match and therefore, highly relevant.

Broad match selections can still be useful. If the user enters a keyword term that contains all the words of the marketer phrase but in a different order or with other words added in, it might still be of value to show the ad. Not knowing exactly what are they are looking for though means that this click is not as valuable on average, and therefore, the bid should not be as high as the exact search term. A good rule of thumb is to bid all broad match terms at 50 to 75% of the amount bid for the equivalent exact match terms.

3. Negative Keywords
Information from keyword discovery tools and web referral stats on the relevant keyword terms people are actually using to find certain products and services will also uncover a lot of related keywords that are not relevant. These can be used as negative keywords to prevent ads from appearing when broad match keywords cause ads to be served for non-relevant searches. For example, a provider of high-end products or services will not want ads appearing when someone uses the terms ‘cheap’ or ‘cheapest’ in addition to the keyword terms that are relevant. Adding these as negative keywords will cut down on the number of low quality clicks.

4. Ad Copy
Modifications to ad copy can be a very effective way of filtering out low quality clicks. There are generally several criteria a user might contemplating the purchase of a particular product or service. Price is almost always one criteria, and there are bound to be several others including product features, specials, service guarantees. For example, a company that provides seminars knows that its customers value date, location, price and course content. If the price is too high, date or location inconvenient or the course content not to the user’s liking, a conversion will not occur. Though not in great detail, enough information can be included in the ad copy that only people interested in that particular course at that time, location and price will click through the ad.

5. Geographic Limitations
If the product or service has geographical limitations – i.e. the marketer only services or delivers to a particular geographic area, then it might be best to limit ads to only show in this area. Be warned though, people from outside this area may be legitimate customers. For example, they might be looking for services on behalf of other people.

6. Time-based Limitations
There are instances where a marketer might consider limiting their ads to showing at particular times. Here are two examples:

a. Most leads are generated by phone calls and the business does not have an after hours answering service. In this case, it is probably best to limit ads to show only during business hours. At the very least, a marketer should specific on its website that after hours, a person should send an email. It is unlikely that they will leave a phone message.

b. From the campaign stats, it might be obvious that most leads are generated at a particular time of the day or days of the week. If this is the case, it might be worth considering turning ads off at times or days when conversions are poor.

7. Click Fraud
There really isn’t anything that can be done to prevent click fraud as there’s nothing to stop anyone from repeatedly clicking on ads. However, Google has built in click fraud detection which should capture and filter out a lot of fraudulent activity such as repeated clicks from the same person during a specified period of time. For added security, click fraud detection tools may be useful. There are many available either as stand-alone products (Click Forensics) or as add-ons to website statistics programs such as ClickTracks. Click Forensics also provides a free tool for marketers that register for their Click Fraud Network.

AD RANKING: THE CTR ISSUE

One possible side effect of implementing the tactics discussed above is a change in the click-through rate (CTR) which is an important factor in where an is ranked in the search results. As Google, Yahoo and MSN factor bid rate, click-through rate, and ad quality into their ranking criteria, a lower CTR will lead to a lower ranking. Tactics designed to limit when an ad appears to only relevant searches (e.g. using exact match) will improve CTR and ranking at the same bid amount. However, tactics designed to lower the possibility of an ad being clicked (e.g. ad copy limitations) will inevitable result in a lower CTR and thus, ranking.

Maintaining ad visibility near the top of the search results may now require higher bids. This may seem unfair but on average, it still works in the marketer’s favor. The average cost-per-click might be higher but the average cost-per-conversion should be lower as the increase in conversion rate due to the elimination of a great percentage of irrelevant clicks leads to a higher return on investment.

SUMMARY

Marketers have typically measured paid search advertising success in terms of visibility – their ads were ranked at or near the top of the search results. The majority of search marketers spend too much time focusing on clicks and not enough time on conversions and the actual return for the marketing dollar spent.

An effective search marketing campaign should be measured in terms of quantifiable results such as sales or leads. Success is determined by the ability to convert clicks into actions that lead to new business. Optimizing campaign performance is therefore dependent on maximizing the conversion rate.

Improving the conversion rate can be achieved by removing low-quality clicks that have little chance of converting. The low-quality clicks have resulted from a poor match or connection between a user search and the product or service being marketed. Improving the overall relevance of the marketing campaign using tactics designed to eliminate poor quality clicks will result in a higher return on a marketing budget.

Alec Campbell is the founder and managing partner of iChannel Strategies. iChannel Strategies is a consulting company specializing in developing customer-centric search marketing strategies incorporating paid search and search engine optimization. Alec earned his Master of Business Administration from The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

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