You have to use the new AdWords interface in 30 days
I received the below email from Google today for one of my accounts which is not currenlty using the new interface. It seems they now have only 30 days before they are forced to use the new one. I sure hope that Google finishes fixing the bugs as I have to go back to the old interface quite a bit these days as there are so many things that are either faster, easier-to-read, or just only in the old interface.
Hello,
In the coming weeks, we’ll upgrade your AdWords account (Customer ID: xxx-xx-xxxx) to a new web interface designed to make campaign management faster and easier. You can try it now; log into your account to use the new interface immediately.
You’ll have at least 30 days from the date of this email before you’ll be required to use the new interface to manage your campaigns. During this time we’ll continue to release additional features and make adjustments to the new interface based on advertiser feedback.
We’re working to ensure that the new interface contains all of the reports and controls you need to manage your campaigns effectively. We won’t upgrade your AdWords account to the new interface until we’re confident that it will meet your advertising needs.
Before we upgrade your account, you can switch between the new and previous interfaces at any time. Click the "Previous Interface" and "New Interface (Beta)" links in the top corner of your account (next to your email address) to switch back and forth.
To make sure that you’re prepared for the upgrade, we recommend that you familiarize yourself with the new interface as soon as possible. We’ve prepared a set of online materials to help you get ready for the changes:
* Review the new interface microsite to get a quick overview of the changes and watch videos demonstrating the improvements: http://www.google.com/adwords/newinterface/
* Our "Getting Started Guide" will give you an overview of major new features and their benefits. You can download a PDF at: http://www.google.com/adwords/newinterface/new_interface_guide.pdf
* Wondering how to complete common AdWords tasks in the new interface? Visit our "How to" guide at: http://www.google.com/adwords/newinterface/standard/ads-and-keywords.html
* Search a full set of frequently asked questions in the Help Center for the new interface: https://adwords.google.com/support/aw/The help materials above will still be available after your account has been upgraded.
We hope you find that the new interface increases your advertising efficiency and makes it easier for you to improve your results. If you have any thoughts about the new interface, please let us know by clicking on the Feedback link in the top corner of your account. And as always, thank you for advertising with AdWords!
Sincerely,
The Google AdWords Team
Use Google’s new Wonder Wheel for Keyword Research
Google just launched a few new site refinement enhancements such as viewing results based upon time, reviews, forums, etc (informative video below). However, there are two enhancements that should be used for keyword research.
Introducing the Wonder Wheel
The Wonder Wheel lets you see related information to your initial query in a pretty diagram. Each link of the diagram is clickable, and let’s you resort the information. While it looks similar to visual thesaurus (which is paid). The data is relatively similar (but better) to KwMap.net (please note the .net extension – do not visit the .com extension).
While you might not use the suggestions as keywords, they are fantastic for understanding ad group organization and choosing negative keywords. In addition, you can click on a link and pull up related information to that link.
For instance, if you view the results for canon printer (below), the top six terms are:
- canon printer manual
- canon printer portable
- canon printer support
- canon large format printer
- canon printer driver
- canon printer review
If you are selling Canon printers, you probably do not want to pay for clicks from people looking for support, drivers, and manuals. Instantly, you have three keywords (and you should add some variations on those as well).
In addition, your canon printer ad groups should be broken out to include different landing pages for large format printer and portable printers as they are different products.
While this tool will not give you the answers to your keywords and organization, it can help you with ideas.
You can also combine this data with Microsoft adLabs Search Funnel to receive a nice picture of not only related queries, but how the search queries change over time.
Related Searches
Google has shown related search information for some time, but it’s a good review – related search information can help you find keywords, and structure your ad groups.
New Search Option Video
If you’d like to see how to find these new search options, here’s a short 2 minute video:
Remember, none of these items aren’t magic bullets. They should just be added to your keyword research and organization ideas and tool sets, such as spidering search results for ideas.
Connect Your Google Analytics Goals to Your AdWords Conversion Tracking
Google very quietly rolled out a new feature – use your Google analytics goals as conversions in your AdWords accounts.
It’s been live for at least a week; and very straightforward to use.
Navigate to the conversion tracking screen (in either UI); and there’s a link for ‘Link your Analytics goals and transaction’.
However, when you go to link your AdWords and Analytics goals together, you can only use Goal 1 from your Google Analytics account:
Hopefully, this will be fixed sometime in the future.
Goal Confusion
I looked for a while; but as much as I could have – so if you know the answer or the link please post it in the comments.
Google Analytics treats a goal as the last site entrance, and is attributed to the day of the click.
Google AdWords treats as goal as the last AdWords ad clicked, and the goal as the date of the click (not the date of the conversion).
Therefore, is linking these two together just going to create more goal confusion – or will some nice pattern work itself out?
Google has a help file on connecting AdWords and Analytics; however, on that page the link to the help file “Read about how AdWords Conversion Tracking works with Google Analytics once the two are linked.” goes to a 404, not found page; hence the unanswered questions above.
Future?
I might have to set up another couple profiles and just set up single goals to see how well this works.
Since Analytics is a 1st party cookie, and AdWords is a 3rd party cookie – the analytics would be a better tracking mechanism once the details for how a conversion is actually counted are determined. The business rules laid out by Google will determine if this is actually useful for all.
I’d love to hear comments, links to other articles where this is discussed.
links for 2009-05-07
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No one really knows how many people visit websites. No established third-party supplier of audience measurement data is trusted. Internal Web logs exaggerate audiences. This matters to more people than investors, like McNamee, who worry that they have no way to evaluate new-media businesses. The issues involved are technical, and occluded by ugly jargon, but they concern anyone anxious about the future of media as print and broadcast television and radio shrink in importance.
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I remember Thompson saying something to the effect of “When a 14 year old kid can blow up your business in his spare time, not because he hates you but because he loves you, then you got a problem.” I think about that conversation a lot these days.
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Excellent read if you are in the media space.
AdWords Mobile Pages Officially Close
I just received this email from Google:
Hello,
We’re sorry to inform you that, beginning May 6, we will no longer host AdWords Business Pages for mobile ads. As of that date, the product will be retired due to low usage. This means that all mobile Business Pages content will be removed, and any ads you have that link to an AdWords Business Page for mobile will stop running.
To continue running mobile ads after May 6, you’ll need to direct them to a different mobile landing page or to a phone number. For suggestions on how to create a new mobile landing page for your ads, visit http://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=138513. For directions on creating a “click-to-call” mobile ad that links to your phone number, visit http://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=32541.
We decided on this change after much consideration, and we apologize for any inconvenience it might cause you.
Sincerely,
The Google AdWords Team
As a reminder, here’s a guide to make a quick Wordpress mobile site if you want to either move your Google mobile page, or test out mobile advertising.
links for 2009-05-06
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"Researchers found out that only 49% of Internet users in the US are willing to use native online payment methods like PayPal and Google Checkout. "
I'm still not sold on how the above stat was achieved - digging into it - however, the PDFs that are linked to in this article are excellent reads for anyone in the ecommerce industry.
links for 2009-04-26
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“Connectivity is poverty” was how a friend of mine summarized Sterling’s bold theme. Only the poor — defined broadly as those without better options — are obsessed with their connections. Anyone with a strong soul or a fat wallet turns his ringer off for good and cultivates private gardens that keep the hectic Web far away.
Google releases whitepaper on the content network’s effectiveness
Google released a whitepaper that highlighted the content network’s effectiveness. I wanted to make a few notes and points before linking to the paper:
- Google says that the two most common features used by advertisers who see good returns from smart pricing are site exclusion (blocking your ad from being shown on certain sites) and Google’s conversion optimizer.
- Unfortunately, Google does not make mention of account organization (content only campaigns, search only, mixed, etc)
- In general, I agree that using excluded domains is key, but only after your organization is correct. However, I’m a larger fan of site targeting and a different keyword sets.
- Google only mentions the CPA differences, not the bidding differences of successful advertisers.
- The paper breaks spend down into three categories (per month)
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- Less than $1,138
- Between $1,138 and $5943
- More than $5943
- I must admit, those numbers seem confusing to me. They seem to indicate that of those advertisers in the study that 1/3rd falls into each spend level. Unfortunately, they don’t call out if that spend is only on the content network or the overall spend of the account.
- Google has found that the smaller spends do better on content network, and that there seem to be a limit to the total numbers of available conversions on content.
- I really wonder, and have absolutely no data to support this, if affiliates are throwing off those spend numbers. Many ‘make a million dollars overnight’ affiliate training classes are made up of individuals with smaller spends; but hear wonderful things about the content network (I often find that the more sophisticated the advertiser; the more likely they like content. This does not mean that the content network will work for all advertisers even if they do it right – just a general observation as more sophisticated advertiser’s often test things themselves to see the results).
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- Overall, the content network and search network end up with similar CPAs (a bit of variety by country).
- Again, this does not surprise me at all as it’s an aggregate number. I see many companies who do fantastic with content, and many who see the opposite. If that’s average out; seeing similar CPAs isn’t surprising.
- In addition, since the other feature that Google states is a common thread between account who do well on the content network is conversion optimizer where you set a CPA; seeing the CPAs on those accounts regardless of traffic should be similar.
Anyway, it’s a good read, just remember to optimize your accounts properly:
Very important things to keep in mind about the content network:
- Search Ads & Contextual Ads Are Different! You Need To Treat Them Separately
- How to optimize a contextual search advertising campaign
- Block low quality traffic
- Peak behind the curtain to see to learn what AdSense sites are doing for you
- About smart pricing
- Content network suggestions from Google
links for 2009-04-20
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This is big news in the local space. One of Reach's biggest issues was a solid margin cap (since they didn't have an actual site to display ads and keep a larger ad margin). The way this plays out an expands could be huge for reach (it's about quality, impressions, and reach (geography) - you need all three).
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Fantastic article about robots.txt files with some 'how-tos' and explanations.
Be careful of using discount codes in your ad copy
I was doing a search this morning and an ad caught my eye “Use Discount code udf80 for 10% off”.
I clicked thru to the landing page; and could not find the discount code anywhere.
I went back to the search page, the ad wasn’t there (probably a budget limitation).
I refreshed the page a couple times, and saw a different ad for the company that did not have the discount code it in.
After ten minutes, I gave up trying to find the code.
This type of experience should hurt your bottom line. Most people do not stop and copy a discount code in the ad copy before clicking through to the landing page.
Reinforcing your ad copy on the landing page is important. In this case, showcase your offer by reinforcing the discount code on the page (and this will create a static page that the user can return to again).
The use of discount codes can help get a sale if someone can easily use the code.
Offering a code that can’t be found later will frustrate the user and can result in a lost sale. You don’t want to send the user on a chase for a discount code for your product that could easily lead them to a competitors site instead.
Always make sure the buying process is easy.
Always make sure the landing page is an extension of the ad copy.
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