Recent Posts

Q&A - Why & how do I separate content vs search information in AdWords Reporting?

Posted: September 9, 2008

At times I can be a lone voice speaking about the effectiveness of the content network. As with all marketing (and most decisions), it’s not that the content network is inherently bad or good (and the same can be said for search). It’s a distribution channel that needs to be treated differently than other channels.

Differences between search and content

The engagement process is different from search vs content. Search is about an active consumer looking for information. Content is about advertising products or services next to content where the subject is related to your offer.

I’ve written an extensive article at Search Engine Land about this topic: Search Ads & Contextual Ads Are Different! You Need To Treat Them Separately. Please read the article, it will explain in depth about the two types of networks.

Why treat them separately?

The above article also goes into why to treat them separately. To recap, since they are so different, the stats of one network have no bearing on the stats of the other network. You may have a landing page with a 10% conversion rate for content, and that same landing page just does not work on the search network. Conversely, you may have very specific pages for search and more general product and informational pages for the content network. It all goes back to assessing your goals.

How to view search only Search or Content stats

When you run a report in AdWords, in the Advanced Settings there is a label for ‘filter your results’. When you click on this, you can choose to see only content or only search based information.

When you run reports that only show you search or content, suddenly your account statistics will become more clear. Remember, there are some stats that matter significantly less for content (CTR, conversion rate) that are more applicable to search. Where some stats, such as cost per conversion is one of the top statistics to analyze on the content network.

More Information:

Share and Enjoy: