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MSN’s PPC Keyword Research

Posted: October 21, 2005

MSN’s pilot PPC program has a keyword research tool.

The tool has three functions.

1. Inventory with the same keywords.
Functions like the Overture suggestion tool, however, it contains the search queries for two months instead of just the previous month.

2. Inventory with related keywords.
Functions like the Google Keyword Sandbox for the ‘expanded broad matches’ or ‘other words to consider’. These keywords might not contain your original keyword, but keywords that are horizontal in nature to your query.

3. Page Spider
MSN Launched the spider before Google did (On 10/20/05 Google launched a site spider keyword selection tool). This spiders a webpage and brings back keywords based upon what the spider found on a particular page.

Overall, the functionality was quicker than Overture, slower than Google. However, as it’s a beta system, bugs and query times are expected to be a bit erratic.

Hopefully, with Google and MSN launching new keywords tools - the competition will be good for the advertisers. If the search engines get into keyword research tool wars, the victor is the advertiser with additional data to work from.

Compared to the competition, it’s the best so far. If Google were to bring back counts in their listings, it would be the best based on speed and having multiple category suggestions. However, counts are a very wished for commodity, and that simple addition puts MSN as the top keyword selection tool among the PPC engines at present.

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