PPC Help: Negative Keyword Strategy

September 20, 2011 By Leave a Comment

PPC Help

Everyone needs PPC help, and this series is part of our blog post series to help you improve your paid search campaign in 10 days.

Guest Post by Bethany Bey of PPC Hero

Negative keywords are an essential part of any PPC account. I mean do you really want to serve your daily deal coupon ads to people searching for the dietary habits of polar bears? Adding negative keywords to your account will help filter out irrelevant traffic, but if all your doing is running a search query and adding the strange/odd searches to your account, you’re missing out on a lot that negatives have to offer.

For the rest of this post, I’m going to pretend I own Pretty Princess Clothing, a store that sells girl’s clothing for babies, toddlers, and kids. I will use this example to illustrate 5 tips to enhance your negative keyword strategy.

1. Think Negatively. Positive thinking can reduce stress, improve your health, and drive you to success and happiness, but negative thinking can save you money. Any time you are researching keywords to add to your account, you should also be looking for potential negatives.

Let’s say I’m doing initial keyword research to set up an AdWords account for my store.  I type in “girls clothing” into the keyword research tool to generate some keyword ideas and get the following results:

Adwords Negative Keywords

There are a lot of great keyword ideas to add to my account, but I can also quickly identify keywords for which I don’t want ads to show. Since I only sell clothes for children, I should exclude all searches with the words “teen” or “teenager.” If there are keywords you definitely don’t want to show for, add them into your account before you pay for a click.

2. Create Negative Keyword Lists. When I started working with PPC, if I found a negative keyword that would apply to the whole account, I would have to add it into each individual campaign. Now with negative keyword lists… [Read more...]

Filed Under: Keywords, Paid Search, PPC Help

PPC Help: Keyword Research

September 19, 2011 By Leave a Comment

PPC Help

Everyone needs PPC help, and this series is part of our blog post series to help you improve your paid search campaign in 10 days.

Keyword research is where it all begins for achieving better paid search management. There are too many tools and nooks of the Internet to find amazing keywords, so there are no excuses not to get it done. We’re going to cover a myriad of ways to get your keyword research up and running.

Take a Peek at Your Competitors Keywords

It’s always interesting to see what your competitors are up too, and what keywords they are trying to rank organically for. How can you peek behind their SEO curtains? If you’re on Safari, go to the tab “View” and select “View Source.” It’ll show you the keywords in their meta description. If you’re on Firefox, go to Tools and Page Info and it’ll show you their meta description and keywords (shown below). So now go and check on your competitors.

View Pagesource

If you’re interested in looking at what AdWords keywords you’re competitors are purchasing, check out SpyFu. They can also tell you the organic keywords that they’re using.

What Search Terms Are Doing Well for You?  [Read more...]

Filed Under: Keywords, Paid Search, PPC Help

Little Money, Less Keywords? No Problem!

September 15, 2011 By 2 Comments

Bagel SlicerGuest post by Josh Bernstein

Ever heard if you do one thing, you should do it well?  Well, say that applies to your business that wants to explore PPC but you don’t have a big budget.  What to do?  One of the biggest mistakes I’ve seen is companies running 60% or more of their keywords on broad match. It isn’t good folks. CPC’s are high and budget caps get eaten by noon. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Keywords, Paid Search

What is a Long-Tail Keyword?

September 6, 2011 By 5 Comments

 

Long-tail keywords drive less traffic to a website, so why would anyone want to use them? The answer is simple: traffic conversion rate is much higher. Not sure what that is or how it works? No problem – the rest of this post has you covered.

What is a Long-Tail Keyword?

Long-tail keywords are three to five-word phrases that are based off of shorter original keywords. These phrases are very specific, like “handmade mahogany iPod case,” an example based off of the popular keyword “iPod case.” Long-tail keywords can be used to define web page content and show up on search engine results just like regular keywords.

How Are Long-Tail Keywords Important For Pay-Per-Click Advertising?

A keyword like “iPod case” would probably field a lot of big-time corporate competition that would be hard to bypass without serious time and money. A site owner selling handmade mahogany iPod cases, however, has a special niche product [Read more...]

Filed Under: Keywords, Paid Search

SEO 101

August 23, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Guest post by Marianne Pratt. FIrst Day of School

We recently talked about PPC for beginners, so it’s time for a primer on SEO. And don’t forget the difference between SEO vs SEM vs PPC.

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of ensuring that a particular website appears on search-response lists as frequently and as close to the top as possible.

Search engines drive traffic to your website from free, “natural” listings, as opposed to from paid search, or “pay per click” advertising. Your goal is to make your website search-engine friendly by identifying and using words or phrases most likely to generate traffic and accumulating in-pointing links (from other websites to yours).

SEO rankings are based on a combination of internal and external factors. For example, you might be attracted to someone who is good looking, but if they’re also smart, witty, friendly … you get the idea. More positive attributes equals a higher ranking. There are many factors involved. Some are common-sense and others can be highly technical, complex, and confusing.

SEO 101 Glossary:

  • Content is just that – specialized, detailed information about your products or services. It must be immediately engaging and give visitors reason(s) to stick around, because search engines can measure “time on site.” If people don’t stay long, your ranking will drop. Try to set yourself apart from the competition, with added value or a unique offer.
  • Keywords are the words or phrases that searchers are using to find you. Use those words – the searchers’ own language — in your content or you won’t be found. Good keyword research is essential to know which keywords will be most productive for you.
  • Keyword density is simply how often keywords appear within your content. Although opinions vary as to optimum frequency, the point is to ensure keywords appear every 2-3 paragraphs or so, but not so much that text seems unnatural
  • HTML is code used to create website pages.
  • Title tags are the most important HTML. They describe what your site is about, so use keywords in page names.
  • Meta tags are brief descriptions that affect how you appear when listed. They don’t directly affect ranking, but your listing has to actually attract click-throughs so your description is important.
  • Headline and sub-head tags can also include keywords, but their real value is content organization, not necessarily ranking.
  • Architecture is the structural design of your website. Search engines “crawl” (scan) sites and make copies of pages, store them in an “index,” then scan the index for relevant listings in response to a search. Over-use of JavaScript or Flash on your site can actually obscure links.
  • Quick-loading sites are search engine-friendly as well as user-friendly.
  • Descriptive URLs (using keywords in domain names and page URLs) can help boost rankings. Studies show that searchers are more likely to choose pages with short, descriptive URLs.

Off-Page SEO 101:

  • Links are the most important off-page ranking factor. (Just like people, search engines like those who have lots of friends.) Quality and quantity both count, so lots of in-pointing links are a plus, as is the perceived quality of those links.
  • Link text, or anchor text, is the words other sites use to describe yours.
  • Social media links are also ranked by search engines, which look for the number of “friends” and “likes” as well as reputation. Make sure you’re using top social sites, to expand your viral (word of mouth) marketing via sharing.
  • Trusted authority means your ranking could improve if your site is perceived as a go-to resource, but it’s not clear how search engines measure this.

There are some SEO negatives, too.

  • Violations can include “spam” and other indications your site doesn’t have much value.
  • Blocking of sites can be done by anyone. It doesn’t matter unless your site is blocked often.

Website analytics can help you identify well-optimized aspects of your website and weak spots to work on. You can even check out the competition.

SEO can be mind-boggling and it’s constantly evolving, but understanding SEO 101 basics can get you off to a good start. What you really need to understand is that spending time and money on SEO is critical to achieve top ROI and productivity from your website. After all, if you’re going to expend effort on creating a website you want it to work its best for you. Otherwise, it’s like hiring a salesperson but not caring if they do their job.

(Photo courtesy of Flickr user april1930s)

Filed Under: Keywords, Marketing Tools

4 Common PPC Mistakes

August 17, 2011 By Leave a Comment

At the whiteboardAt Trada, we have a lot of SMBs who come to us after struggling to run a paid search campaign on their own, and never saw a return on their advertising investment. Having worked in marketing for a number of small and medium businesses, I’ve experienced their frustrations. PPC can be complex and SMB marketers are perpetually short on time – something that’s required to run an effective PPC campaign.

Here are some of the common PPC mistakes we see from the many SMBs we encounter.

1. Head of Tail Keywords - Many SMBs unwittingly spend a lot of money running broad match, head of tail keywords thinkingthey’ll bring more potential buyers to their site. While this intuitively makes sense (the more people thatwalk into my store the better) they end up paying for clicks that will never result in a sale or lead.

For example, if I’m selling running shoes, I might be tempted to run the keyword ‘shoes’. While you will attract searchers looking for running shoes, you’ll also attract a lot looking for men’s dress shoes,women’s cycling shoes, etc. You’ll pay for clicks with virtually no chance of converting those clicks into sales.

Instead, focus on running very specific long-tail keywords that will attract searches looking for exactlythe product you sell. You’ll have a lower volume of clicks, but a higher conversion rate and lower costper conversion.

2. Paying for Keywords that Never Convert - As a SMB marketer, you may think that a keyword or set of keywords are the perfect keywords todescribe your product. You may be correct, but you may also be wrong. Too often we SMB marketers continue spending far too much ad spend on keywords that we just know should convert, but for whatever reason don’t. Stay disciplined in your keyword research and don’t fall in love with your keywords. If they’re not converting, get rid of them and test new keywords.

3. Large Ad Groups – As I mentioned earlier, SMB marketers are perpetually strapped for time. Creating and maintaininga large number of tightly focused ad groups can be incredibly time consuming. The logical solution to those competing statements is to simply create a few ad groups with a huge number of ads and keywords.

Unfortunately, this approach is likely to hurt your CTR, Quality Score, and ultimately PPC ROI. Paid searchworks best when a small number of keywords are tightly coupled to a few highly relevant ads and a veryspecific landing page. This can only be done by creating a large number of very tight ad groups. If you don’t have time to manage all of the ad groups you’d like to run, scale back your paid search campaignto a more manageable size by promoting fewer products with highly relevant ad groups. Better to stayfocused on your most profitable products than to waste a lot of ad spend trying to market your entire product line when you don’t really have the time to do so.

4. Set and Forget - Probably the most common mistake SMB marketers make when running a paid search campaign isthinking they can set up the campaign and then just let it run. Or they set up a campaign with greatintentions of optimizing it regularly, but competing priorities continually get in the way, so their paid
search campaign rarely gets the attention it needs.

Failing to regularly review and optimize your campaign is a recipe for wasting a lot of ad spend onpoorly performing keywords/ad groups, and killing your paid search ROI. Spending even just 20 minutes a couple times a week is better than nothing at all. That will allow you to pause the most egregiouskeywords that are driving up your CPA, and do a bit of expansion on the keywords and ad groups that are performing best.

Those are a few of the (many) PPC mistakes I’ve made over the years. What are some other mistakes you’ve made that we all can lean from? Leave your biggest mistakes in the comments section.

If you enjoyed this post, check out 13 Conversion Killers for Landing Pages. Photo courtesy of Flickr user Klean Denmark.

 

Filed Under: Ad Groups, Keywords, Paid Search, PPC Tips

Using Dummy Keywords to Find Hidden PPC Assets

July 28, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Guest post by Josh Bernstein

Yep, I know you may associate dummy with the person who thought that chocolate cake, twinkies & nachos would be good keywords for that national gym’s PPC account.  Unfortunately, today is not the day to dwell on poor keyword choices. Today dummy references the dummy keyword; the smart way to track non-traditional PPC assets that may not be directly tracked by the search engines or your 3rd party search management tools.

Why a Dummy Keyword?

Well sometimes you have things in your search account that you want to track but can’t.  Example one is Google sitelinks. (Explanation on Google Sitelinks).  We know that sitelinks are tied into ad text and keywords, but Google only goes as far to provide you the usual metrics for the links.  If you want actual conversion data off the conversions then you’re on your own when sitelinks came out.  But now there’s a solution that’s spanning the globe (or your SERP).

Example of Google sitelinks in PPC


Say you have four sitelinks within a brand account that drives a lot of your account’s conversions (in this case, an e-commerce site).  While you know most of your revenue is based off of this campaign, how do you find out how many orders and revenue are tied directly off of a click from a sitelink?  It’s easier than you think.

Step 1: A New Ad Group

Yep, a whole new ad group full of new keywords, but in this case these are dummy keywords. Call the ad group “sitelinks tracking,” and put in some generic ad text and then pause the creative when it goes live.  Say your first sitelink is a promotion for some free shipping on orders $69 & up. Create a new keyword and be sure to include the promo specifics, date and your brand. Oh, and try and make sure the new ad group is within the campaign your sitelinks are going towards.

Creating a New Ad Group for Sitelink Tracking

Step 2: The Keywords

So now we have keyword “SuperDenim FSH $89+ sitelink 072011,” and be sure (and be sure again) to set the keyword on exact match.  Why?  The last thing you need is clicks coming off this keyword that is broad matched.  Imagine some of the keywords that can be tied to a broad-matched keyword.  Super can lead to superman, superstar, supersize me, etc. Denim?  Well denim, denim jackets, denim jeans, jeans, Levi’s, Lee and of course the dreaded jeans shorts.  FSH can bring up a ton of free shipping related ads and so on. You get the point. Exact match is your friend (and if there happens to be a SuperDenim out there I had no idea).

Now that you (and two interns) have checked for exact match, make sure you give that keyword a $0.05 bid. That’s in case some genius decides to search for “SuperDenim FSH $89+ sitelink 072011,” you’ll pay a nominal CPC if this person clicks on your ad.

example of dummy keyword

Step 3: Landing Pages

The last part in terms of setup is the landing page for your keyword. This is important because this IS your landing page in reality. Make sure your landing page is very relevant to your sitelinks text. For the FSH offer above, we can land on the homepage or if there’s a landing page promoting the FSH offer, use that instead.  For instance, if you want to create a sitelink for 40% off all SuperDenim toddler jackets, you’d be best suited to land on the toddler jacket’s page (and who isn’t into getting a discount on a jeans jacket for your little one?).

Step 4: Waiting…

Once the keyword, match type, bid and landing page are in place, send the keyword away through your search management tool through the UI or a bulksheet. Now we wait for Google to send the keyword through their review process that can either take 2 minutes or 2 hours.  As always, no gambling on this.

Step 5: Implementation through AdWords

Once our imaginary time has elapsed, go into the new ad group in AdWords and find the keyword you just created. Because you kick posterior, I am going to bet you’ve created at least four dummy keywords to fill the four slots for Google sitelinks (so you’ll have four keywords to find).  Now that you’ve found your keywords, bring up an excel spreadsheet and make one column for your Sitelink text and the other for your landing page URL.  Once you’ve created your sitelinks text you’re ready to pull the destination URLs.

Pull the URL? Is this a new procedure?

Yep, go into Adwords and the new sitelinks ad group with your four (or more) dummy keywords and find the Destination URL column.  In this column you should see a pretty long URL that typically starts with your 3rd party tool (DoubleClick, Omniture, Clickable, etc.).  Copy the URL associated for each dummy keyword and paste it next to your sitelink text your Excel sheet.

Now go to your sitelinks for the campaign and start creating (or updating).  Add in your four sitelinks text and then the URLs.  What you’ve created essentially is a redirect within AdWords that will bring in any activity on your sitelink (clicks, orders, revenue, etc.) and push the data directly to your reporting interface.  Once your sitelinks are up and running all you need to do is drill down to the sitelinks ad group and run a keyword report to see how each “dummy keyword” is performing. You’ll be able to match up the sitelink based on how you’ve named each keyword.  With just a couple of extra steps you no longer have to worrying about figuring out how to get measurable results for sitelinks and hopefully you’ll be able to attribute more orders and revenue to your accounts as a whole.

So in summary…

Create a new sitelinks tracking ad group within campaign where sitelinks are going.

Create & launch new dummy keywords on exact match with low bid and specific landing page and specific wording related to the actual sitelink.

Create your sitelinks ad text then match up the destination URL from your dummy keywords in AdWords.

Load the sitelinks within AdWords for your campaign with your ad text and destination URL.

Enjoy measurable results from sitelinks at no extra cost!

And don’t forget you can use dummy keywords to track results display ads within Google, special display ad testing (good for a single independent site) and other areas where direct tracking is unavailable but you want to bring in the revenue to your overall marketing efforts.

Enjoy creating your dummies!

Josh Bernstein (@jdb426) started his foray into advertising with four years of traditional media buying/planning then did three years of paid search and digital media planning at a local agency.  Josh just celebrated one year on the client side where he also handles affiliates, data feeds & social media (plus enjoying free parking and 25-cent sodas at his office). He is a third-generation Georgian and is a graduate of the University of Georgia and was a student judge for the 2002 Peabody Awards.  Along with being fairly skilled at SEM, Josh also loves to cook, travel, write and sports.

Filed Under: Keywords, Paid Search, PPC Tips

Beginner PPC Advertising

July 26, 2011 By Leave a Comment

First Day of PPC SchoolWhat we frequently see from those who want to start PPC is that they don’t even know where to begin. It’s overwhelming when so much of the language isn’t intuitive or native to most marketers or small-to-medium sized businesses. We wanted to do a post that we can refer to people who are just beginning in their quest for PPC. So if you’re an advanced PPC advertiser, skip this post! But if you’re new, here is an easy look at beginner PPC advertising.

What is Pay Per Click (PPC)?
Pay Per Click (also known as search engine marketing, paid search or search advertising) is an Internet advertising model. Advertisers run text ads on search networks (like Google and Yahoo/Bing), and pay each time an ad is clicked. They bid on keywords – words or phrases they hope a user will type in to a search engine – and ads appear alongside organic search results.

When a user enters a search query into a search engine, an instant auction takes place determining which advertisers’ ads will be displayed and in which order. The auction takes into account not only the bid price, but also the ad’s relevance to the query and several other relevancy and quality-related criteria.

Quality Score is Google’s way of determining which ad is the most relevant (the Yahoo/Bing Search Alliance has a similar model). The relevance of the keyword to the ad, the quality of your landing page, and click-through-rate are some of the many factors that go in to calculating Quality Score. Paying attention to your Quality Score is important for your campaign’s success.

Beginner PPC — Metrics:
• Impressions: Also known as ad views, “impression” is the term used to describe the number of times an ad was displayed to searchers.
• Clicks: The number of times a particular ad is clicked.
• Click-Through-Rate (CTR): The ratio of impressions to clicks. CTR is a good indicator of how relevant your ad is to the keyword being searched.
• Conversion Rate: A conversion occurs when a user completes a desired action like a purchase, sign-up or registration. Your definition of a conversion will depend on what your goals are. Conversion rate is the ratio of conversions to unique clicks.
• Cost-Per-Click (CPC): The amount you pay for each click on your ad.

Beginner PPC – Keywords:
Building a comprehensive and targeted keyword list is time-consuming, but it’s essential for campaign success. The challenge is thinking of every keyword variation a potential customer might use to search for your product. Remember that your campaign is constantly evolving, and you should curate and build your keyword lists throughout the lifetime of your campaign.

Keyword research tools are valuable for building lists and brainstorming, but make sure to hand- manage the lists these tools help you create.

Beginner PPC – Ads:
Want to beat your competitors and get lots of clicks that will convert? The best way to do this is by writing concise, targeted, and attention-grabbing ads!

In a PPC ad, you are allowed a limited number of characters, but luckily everyone is working with the same rules. Make sure you keep your ad copy highly relevant to your keywords and landing pages for the highest possible Quality Score – but remember, your ad also needs to be readable and compelling.

Anatomy of a PPC Ad:

Anatomy of a PPC Ad

Ad Copy Tips:

  • Use keywords in the ad copy
  • Use title casing
  • Differentiate yourself
  • Make a limited-time offer
  • ALWAYS use a call-to-action
  • NEVER stop testing ads

Beginner PPC – Ad Groups:
Ad groups are collections of keywords that share a common set of ads. Keep your ad groups small (around ten keywords) and organized thematically: a product, offer, concept, or topic. Designing and maintaining focused ad groups can make the difference between a stellar PPC campaign and a stalled one.

Beginner PPC – Bidding:
Remember, PPC works like an auction. You tell the search network how much you are willing to pay for a click on an ad that is triggered by a given keyword. You choose bid prices for keywords.

Use the first page bid estimate provided in AdWords’ keyword tool to get a sense of how much you’ll need to pay per click to appear on the first page.
Ranking on the first page is crucial, as impressions and click-through-rates drop dramatically if your ad is placed after the first page.

Beginner PPC – Landing Pages:
When a user clicks on your ad, where will you take them? Although it may seem logical to drive traffic to your homepage, they tend to be poor at generating conversions. Instead, a savvy PPC advertiser will drive traffic to specific landing pages that are directly related to the keyword and ad.

What makes a good landing page?

  • Relevant to the ad copy and the ad group
  • Has a clear “call-to-action”
  • Answers the searcher’s question
  • Displays everything above the fold
    Uses testimonials, reviews, and certifications to earn trust

NOW WHAT!?
You’ve set up landing pages, keyword lists, ad groups, and ads, but your job is far from complete. A PPC campaign is ever-changing. Successful search marketers continue optimizing for the life of their campaigns.

PPC uniquely generates instant real-time data that you can use to inform changes within your campaign and even across your other marketing efforts. If an ad is performing well, consider using the messaging from that ad for an email campaign or a banner ad.

In addition, data from PPC – specifically which keywords generate conversions – can be used to build SEO keyword lists. Great search marketers never stop learning.

(Top photo courtesy of Flickr user D Sharon Pruitt.)

Filed Under: Ad Groups, Keywords, Landing Pages, Paid Search, PPC Tips

20 Most Expensive Keyword Categories

July 18, 2011 By 1 Comment

The competitiveness of your industry will play a key role in determining your PPC strategy. Our friends at Wordstream have put together an infographic that highlights the top 20 most competitive keywords categories in Google AdWords.

So if you’re in one of the most expensive industries, what can you do?

1. Follow all of our 9 PPC tips for keywords

2. Be sure to watch how many broad-match keywords you are using.

3. Include a healthy dose of negative keywords into your keyword mix.

4. Make sure you’re using all of the keyword tools at your disposal.

5. Ensure your Google Ad Groups has a strong architecture.

6. Follow these tips for PPC landing pages.

Where Does Google Make Its Money? [ infographic ]

 

Filed Under: Keywords, Paid Search

Two Simple Keyword Bidding Strategies

July 14, 2011 By 1 Comment

Bidding Strategies for PPCOne of the great things about Trada is that we see optimizers taking lots of different strategies with their paid search work. While there are some guidelines, there is much debate about the best way to do things in PPC. Everything from ad group structure, how many keywords per ad group you should have, and PPC bidding strategies is the subject of much debate.

The primary reason for this is that all campaigns are not created equal. What works in a campaign is driven many times by the type of search queries users are looking for. Some categories, such as credit score reports, have a fairly tight search landscape. There are only so many search terms that most people would come up with to go looking for their credit score. Other categories, such as retail, are very rich in their keyword landscape based on the permutations of model numbers, product names, and adjectives (discount, used, new, cheap, best). After looking at many campaigns I have notice two distinct keyword bidding strategies. I have experimented with both and feel they both have merit. I encourage you to try them for yourselves.

Match-Type Bidding

The basic PPC bid management strategy uses the logical concept that broad-match keywords will likely convert at a lesser rate. There are two simple reasons for this. First, the broader the search query, the less specific the intent of the user may be. For example, if I type in “blackberry cell phone” I may be looking to buy one, sell one, or download software for one. Second, search network’s algorithms take liberties with what queries they match to broad-match keywords so sometimes the matching is a bit off the mark. If you have a broad-match keyword of “tennis shoes”, Google may match “workout shoes” to this. For some users, these can be vastly different things (if you’re looking for cross-training shoes designed specifically for the gym, a site selling tennis equipment is going to miss the mark for you).

As you narrow the field of matching with phrase match and exact match, in general, you should expect the conversion rate to go up on those keywords. The simple PPC bid management strategy is to price your keywords higher the more specific the match type. While you’re spending more money, the conversion rate is higher, and the net cost of advertising per sale from those keywords should stay the same. By bidding higher, you also achieve higher ad position and quality score which has a positive reinforcing loop. So, if nothing else, take a look at the conversion rate of the same keyword with different match types and change your bid accordingly. For example:

tennis shoes (broad match), conversion rate 1%, price $1.00

“tennis shoes” (phrase match), conversion rate 1.5%, price $1.50

[tennis shoes] (exact match), conversion rate 2%, price $2.00

You’ll have to watch conversion rates over time, and landing pages and ad copy matters a lot, but in general this is a relatively safe bidding strategy.

Pay for Research Bidding

A more controversial PPC bid management strategy I have seen is what I’ll call the pay-for-research model. This works well in categories where there is a wide search term landscape. It may be very hard to discover all the search terms up front or the complexity of possible search terms may be overwhelming.

In this strategy, you use broad match as a sort of bright shiny fishhook. You intentionally bid a broad-match term very high so that it has high ad position and thus generates lots of data. You then constantly monitor the actual search terms matched with this broad term and then build out your phrase and exact-match keyword list from these terms. You’ll end up likely pricing your phrase and exact keywords less than the broad match.

What you want to do is cover your cost of the broad-match research with the more predictable pricing in the phrase and exact match. In one of our early campaigns at Trada, I used this strategy effectively as the keyword landscape was very large. I put a couple of broad-match keyword terms into an ad group and pumped up the price. Lots of data and good quality scores followed and then I systematically pulled terms from the matching search term list into that ad group and priced them accordingly. After a few weeks of this, I had an extremely rich keyword list priced correctly. Over time, if you have more specific terms in the ad group, Google should match those instead of the search query so your volume of higher costing clicks from the broad match goes down and your profits really start to kick in.

I say this strategy is controversial because many folks never want to stray from the safe math of match-type bidding. I highly recommend trying it in an ad group or two though, the results can be fantastic.

What bid management strategies do you use? Have you tried the pay-for-research model?

(Photo courtesy of Flickr user Dave McClean)



Filed Under: Keywords, Paid Search
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