Handling Disabled AdWords Keywords

Posted: January 29, 2004

When Deleting Keywords - Do it Everywhere
If you decide you want to delete a keyword, either due to poor performance, the keyword being disabled, or moving it elsewhere, there is a very important rule to remember: Delete every instance of the keyword in your account.

If you have a keyword listed multiple times in your account, and the keyword is disabled by Google, it is difficult to resume if it appears in other places in your account.

To delete a keyword and then put it into a separate ad, do the following.

Search every ad group for this keyword (this includes deleted groups). When the keyword is found, edit the keyword list and remove the keyword. Remember to save the changes.

Once it is deleted from every group, you can make a new ad with this keyword which should be found.

As long as one instance of this keyword still exists anywhere in your account, then the history of this keyword is kept by Google AdWords. If the keyword was disabled, it cannot be enabled again until it is seen as a new keyword.

A keyword can be considered a phrase, i.e. (Mexico, Mexico City Travel, and Mexico Travel are 3 different keywords) If the keyword is “Mexico Travel”, then only remove that exact keyword from your groups. You will not have to remove “travel” or “Mexico city travel”.

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