AdWordsAdvisor talks about the option of removing keywords with no clicks from your AdWords campaigns and its advantages.
Link to quote"I have many ad groups that have keyword with high impressions and no clicks. Should I remove those keywords so that my CTR will go up? I have tracked these keywords over the last 60 days."
So - IMO, when keywords have been around for 60 days, on a system on which tens of millions of searches happen every day, and they've gotten no clicks - the message that I get is that they're not real winners. And I can't really think of any real advantage in keeping them.
I'd also say the same thing for keywords that have been around awhile with no impressions.
On the other hand, there are advantages to getting rid of them. Just a few advantages, off the top of my head:
* less stuff to monitor
* makes it easier to monitor the keywords that remain
* may create room for keywords currently 'on hold' in your account
* our system will no longer 'budget' for them, which may make your other keywords show more often
* creates some 'head room' if you are near to a keyword limit for your account
And most important of all:
* gives you the warm fuzzy feeling of working to maintain AdWords system 'health', for the greater good of your fellow advertisers. And AWA. ;)
...
AWA
AWA provides an update on a question about AdWords selling PageRank. In this response, AWA seems to suggest that doing so it not allowed (without makinga direct statement either way).
Link to quoteOK, I've got some more feedback on this question.
So, advertising to assist with PageRank isn't a problem. Selling PageRank, however, is another thing - and ads/sites are reviewed on a case-by-case basis along these guidelines.
If you're seeing ads promoting the sale of PageRank, then it's possible that those ads have not yet been reviewed/disapproved. At least let's hope that's it. ;)
In any case - thanks for the heads up. This has been passed on to the right folks.
AWA
DiscussAWA says that it seems like you are allowed to use AdWords to advertise PageRank for sale (at least for now).
Link to quoteThanks for the bump, but still waiting to hear, Macro. ;)
Essentially, it seems as if it is allowable now, as the evidence suggests it!
What I was hoping to find out is what future plans may be. So, I'll keep working on it, and post when I know more.
BTW, this may be a good time to say that I'll be 'out of the office' Friday thru next Tuesday, and won't be able to post here during that time. So, this week, last posts on Thursday - then back on 6/3. ;)
AWA
DiscussAWA replies to a member.
Link to quote" so you aint joining us at either SES or PubCon next week :( "
I should probably create some mystery by saying that, well, I may be there. ;)
But the honest truth is that I won't be, with regret. I'll almost certainly be at a future PubCon though.
Looking forward to it!
;) AWA
AWA replies to a new AdWords member.
Link to quoteWelcome to WebmasterWorld, ccpc!
"Initially the ad was rejected because they said that the URL I provided was not resolving. "
Most often when this message is sent out, it is simply that there is a typo in destination URL, and clicking on the ad gives a Page Not Found error message.
"Now my ad is active (so they say) but I have absolutely 0 impressions and clicks for my keywords. "
When you see that a Campaign or Ad Group is marked 'Active' it means only one thing: The Campaign or Ad Group is not paused or deleted. There can still be a variety of reasons for the ad not to be running, and writing to support is the best way to troubleshoot this - if the reason is not evident to you.
"I feel like I'm being descriminated against, like one of their other advertisers has the keywords locked down or something and they are refusing to serve my ad. "
Believe me, this is not the case. No advertisers, regardless of their size of budget, is able to 'lock down' any keyword. I assure you it is not a matter of discrimination. It is a matter of some issue with your account, most likely a very simple one, that needs to be resolved.
A few examples, off the top of my head:
* Have you set an 'End Date' that is now in the past?
* Have you set a Maximum CPC that is higher than your daily budget?
* Are your keywords ones that must be reviewed before they can show your ad, due to a potentially sensitive nature?
* Is the ad marked 'Disapproved'?
* Are there unresolved issues with other accounts that you may have set up?
In answer to your last question, I'd suggest replying to the email you received, and asking for more detail.
AWA
AdWordsAdvisor responds to a question about using AdWords to advertise PR for sale.
Link to quote"AWA, is it OK to advertise PR for sale? "
Good question.
I'll check with the policy folks and post again as soon as I've heard back from them.
AWA
AWA responds in a thread about listing recent compliants about the adWords system.
Link to quoteYet another chance to learn. I'll be passing these comments on, of course. (I've already done so in fact - and will continue.)
Thanks for the feedback, both positive and negative.
Sometimes, it's not easy to hear - but it certainly forwards the process of making AdWords the program you, as our advertisers, want it to be.
AWA
DiscussAdWordsAdvisor talks about the recent annoucement that Google is now offering banner and image ads as part of the AdWords program. The ads will not appear on Google though (at least not yet).
Link to quoteI haven't been around here much today, so thought I'd jump in now, and offer quick responses to a few posts quoted below.
"...It will only be evil if Google offers them as pop unders, or allows them to blink, play music or if the web page asks me to download Flash V7. to see a stupid 3rd party advertisement... "
You just made my hair stand on end! I'm pretty sure that we don't need to worry about those things! (Although I do really love a good 30 second long flash intro with fake harpsicords playing in the background.)
"Didn't someone earlier in this thread mention that graphics can be as large as 50kb?...Most people are still on dialup. When I use dialup, nothing is more irritating than a page that takes more than 10 seconds to load...A 50kb graphic may look nice if it's designed right, but if it slows down the page hosting the ad sufficiently enough, what's the point? No one can click on something that they never see... "
Such a great point. I will try to get some further details on this subject and post again. I'd be hugely surprised, though, if this had not been thought of and addressed. More later.
"I just added an image ad and it caused an error within the ad group. So now I can't access that particular group. I'm getting, " We apologize for the inconvenience, but we are unable to process your request at this time...." I guess they have a few bugs to fix still. "
Yes, we have had a few issues of this nature, and the posts here on WebmasterWorld served as an excellent early warning system. So thanks! Engineers are working on this, and it should be A-OK soon if it isn't already.
AWA
DiscussAWA replies to a member reporting that immediately after resuming an ad, it began showing hundreds of impresssions and a few clicks.
Link to quoteThanks for the details, Need3lives, which I'll pass on to the tech team.
AWA
AdWordsAdvisor lists some thing to consider when trying to track clicks for Google AdWords.
Link to quoteWhen you see discrepancies between your tracking and the reporting in your AdWords account, here are a few factors to consider:
* Impressions and clicks reported in your stats come from Google's servers, which host your ads. Before being delivered to your stats, both impressions and clicks are filtered for possibly invalid patterns of behavior.
* Your server's web logs are more reliable for comparisons than third party tracking will be.
* Some tracking programs may not register clicks that occur while the destination site is down.
* Some tracking programs will have limitations on the kinds and sources of clicks that they report.
* Your ads can display on a network of search and content partner sites, literally numbering in the thousands. So while the ads originate from Google, your tracking may not reflect this.
* Time discrepancies between different tracking programs can throw off comparisons of clicks. All AdWords reports are on US Pacific Time.
* Stats reported in your account typically run about three hours behind in the Campaign Summary page, and possibly more in individual campaign and Ad Group pages. So this delay must also be factored in.
* Third party tracking may filter out visits from your own IP address, while AdWords does not.
I probably missed a few, but I hope this'll help clarify things a bit.
AWA
DiscussAWA confirms.
Link to quote"Is this for United States users only? "
"Works fine for me in UK"
Thanks for the confirming posts.
(I've also consulted with the product team, and this is in fact a world-wide change.)
AWA
AdWordsAdvisor explains some of the details around Google's new policy of not show gambling ads.
Link to quote"When is Google intending to actually remove whatever ads they will stop removing? Online gambling ads certainly continue to appear for online gambling terms now. "
Point well taken.
We're aware that there are 'stragglers', and are working to complete the process. I'd guess you won't be seeing inappropriate ads by the end of the week.
"Is the ban on ALL gambling keywords or only for ONLINE related gambling? "
I've consulted with the policy folks, and was given this information:
* Google no longer accepts and runs ads for online casinos, online betting, online sportsbooks, online lotteries, online bingo, and online poker.
* This also includes ads for sites with a primary purpose of driving traffic to online gambling sites, affiliates of such sites, tips, odds, or handicapping sites, "free" online casino sites, and play money casino sites.
* However, on a case-by-case basis, we may allow advertisements for:
- Location-based gambling
- Books, magazines, or TV shows that discuss gambling
- Contests, sweepstakes, or raffles"
I think that'll clarify it.
AWA
DiscussAWA says thee can be delay in implementing changes to the max CPC for a keyword.
Link to quoteJenniferL, just a couple of quick notes regarding your original post:
"...this morning I reduced the cpc to keep the costs down - but I am still paying the original cpc. I know there is a delay of around 3 hours, but this was 10 hours ago and no reduction. I did call Adwords customer service, but all she said is that it must not be updated yet. Will I still have to pay the higher cpc even though I reduced it?... "
Firstly, as you noted, there will always be a server delay between the time you make a change, and the time it is fully updated throughout the entire server network. The delay can vary, depending on volume, etc.
Most often an hour is a safe rule of thumb, although there can certainly be exceptions. So don't quote me. ;) (And note that this delay is a slightly different animal than the 3 hour delay that one may expect for their stats.)
Now, on to your real question:
"...but this was 10 hours ago and no reduction. "
When you are viewing your stats, be aware of your date range setting. And be aware that the smallest period of time for which you can check is 'Today'.
When you are set to the date range of 'Today', you are viewing stats from just after midnight of the current day to roughly three hours before the time you are checking. So let's say you change your Max CPC at 2:00 in the afternoon, and then immediately check your stats for 'Today'. You'll be seeing stats for roughly midnight to 11:00am of the current day. In this case, there will be no stats including your current Max CPC reported yet at all.
Now, if you check 10 hours later at a minute before midnight, you'll be seeing stats from midnight to 9:00pm.
The important thing to note in this scenario is that the stats you see now include 14 hours when your Max CPC was at the higher figure - and this will of course be reflected in the stats for 'Today'.
However if you check for the date range of 'Today' on the following day, you will see that all of your clicks are below your lower Max CPC.
Hope this makes sense. Kinda has my head swimming just trying to explain it!
AWA
DiscussAWA confirms that two new date ranges have been added "last week" and "last business week".
Link to quoteAWA explains there there can be a delay in pausing an ad, because it needs to be updated on many servers.
Link to quote"I have noticed on several occasions now that ad groups that I have had paused for SEVERAL days, immediately upon 'resuming' them, these ad groups show something like 2 or 3 clicks on 250 impressions or something. That is on the page refresh after you hit resume. "
Interesting - and haven't heard of this before. I'd guess that it may have something to do with the 'date range' change while you are viewing your stats/resuming.
"Does Pause really Pause? "
Yes, it really does. But here a couple of things to keep in mind, that are entirely normal and to be expected:
* When you make any change in your account, it must be updated in many, many servers. So there'll almost certainly be a delay before your change is fully updated by all servers. (In the case of pausing an ad, for example, it may mean that you'll continue to see your ad run for a short time.)
* Also, and again due to server delays, stats typically run about three hours behind. So if you pause an ad, say, in this moment, you'll most likely continue to see stats come in for about three hours. These are impressions and clicks that occurred before you paused, delivered 'late' (as expected) due to server delays.
AWA
Discuss