Any advice for a AdWords user?

[johnnydequino]

I spend about six times on Overture then I do on adwords, and it's not the mix I want. I would love to at least triple or quadruple my current google adwords spending. After studying adwords for months, testing, creating ads, I am just about fit to be tied.

I first tried to use the "" method with millions of negative keywords. This works ok, but the CTR rate is only around 1.5 to 2. Plus, half the traffic I generate is junk, I monitor the logs weekly and ad negative keywords from junk keywords that click on my ads. Still no help.

I am now trying the [] method. At least I know what I am trying to target will get clicked. Now, impressions are way down, which is great, but clicks are way down as well. This is not the direction I want to go.

But what is worse is that on the Interface, it forcasts my ads between 3-5 position lets say. But now that it's live, most of the keywords are showing up 25th or 26th, why is that?

And the most frusterating part about adwords is all the irrelevant ads above me.

I guess I feel a little better now, but what can I try to improve my traffic except raising bids? My CPC on google is already twice that of overture. Am I destined to spend six times less on adwords forever?

If anyone has any white papers, hints, etc., sticky me. I have already read several and at this point I may just be box in on adwords. Sigh.

jd

[cayenne]

At least with [] you are getting serious clicks. We have found that if you are patient enough with the [] method, the junk ads above you disappear due to their own irrelevance, and as a result you get promoted higher with increased clicks.

Adwords can be frustrating from the constant tinkering that G does. As soon as you think you have everything optimized, along comes another change.

Case in point: Getting promoted to premium slots is even more of a mystery (since 24/10). When someone figures out what this week's secret for getting promoted is, please let me know.

-c

[vibgyor79]

JD - Are you explaining your services in the ad copy 'properly'? Bad ROI can also be due to badly written ad copies. Other possible reasons for your poor ROI -

- Content network syndication is enabled (Disable it and see if it improves ROI - sorry AdSense people!)

- Expanded broad matched keywords. Use the keyword suggestion tool to find these keywords. If the keywords are relevant, create a new adgroup and if not, put them in your negative list.

A simpler solution is of course, to disable expanded broad matching alltogether (using the TOOLS link in the AdWords interface)

- Ads in the partner network. Traffic from Google's partners like AOL, MyWay etc are sometimes better than that of Google (depends on the industry, of course). Try to get into the partner network - even if you have to pay more initially.

Do install the Google ROI tracking code in your pages - quite useful.

>>> it forcasts my ads between 3-5 position lets say. But now that it's live, most of the keywords are showing up 25th or 26th, why is that?

It's just a forecast. The traffic forecast is as reliable as your local weather report.