Frustrated by 'At Risk' yet Prosperous Keywords

[dkoller]

It becomes even more disturbing when they are disabled. When a term can earn an overall CTR of 2-5% or more, yet still be disabled -- that's plain wrong. I know it means the google CTR is hovering around 0.5%, but for the ad to be doing so well overall means it is doing superbly on network sites. How can the ad be deemed irrelevant?! argh.

Many terms like this can provide excellent ROI and losing them is a loss to both google and the advertiser.

Sorry this is more of a rant than a question, but i feel strongly that this is bad policy.

[Sowe]

agreed.

And because the system is able to show and calculate with the overall CTR I can't see the need why the status is measured only by clicks on googles sites.

[vibgyor79]

>>> is more of a rant than a question

But I hope you are open to suggestions..

Step 1-> Delete the AT RISK keyword (eg - Blue Widgets) from the AdGroup

Step 2-> GoTo Google AdWords suggestion tool and type in Blue Widgets. You will probably see keywords like -

blue widgets
widgets blue
fuzzy blue widgets
blue widgets UK
-free
.
.
and so on.

Keep an eye on keywords under Expanded Broad Matching. If a particular keyword is not relevant, put them under your negative list.

Step 3 -> Have a broad/phrase/exact matched option of each of the keywords in your keyword list. That is, the keyword list should look like -

blue widgets
[blue widgets]
"blue widgets"
fuzzy blue widgets
[fuzzy blue widgets]
"fuzzy blue widgets"
-free
.
.
and so on.

Step 4- Create an ad copy that has important keywords mentioned in the title/body of the ad. Preferably, have two ad copies per adgroup. The first ad copy should be keyword rich while the second ad copy could be the old one you are using.

Step 5 - If it turns out that fuzzy blue widgets is getting more than 200 impressions per day, go back step 2, else, jump to Step 6. If you are back in step 2, type in "fuzzy blue widgets" in the Google keyword suggestion tool.

Step 6 - You mentioned you are getting excellent ROI. Increase the adgroup CPC initially. You can reduce it later once your ads are "established".

[eWhisper]

That is, the keyword list should look like -

blue widgets
[blue widgets]
"blue widgets"

I agree that this should work, but in reality, you won't necessarily get accurate results by doing that.

If someone were to search for blue widgets, G will look at the CTR/CPC of those ads to determine which should be displayed, and they will compete with each other.

So if broadmatched blue widgets does well from the startup gaining a nice CTR, as it will get more impressions, exact match blue widgets will have problems competing as it's not searched as often and a slow start on CTR even though it's potential could be a much higher CTR than broadmatch, will keep it from showing it's true potential.

A workaround is to set the max CPC a lot higher for exact match, a bit higher for phrase match, and the lowest for broadmatch. This won't solve all the associated problems, but it will help a bit in getting the actual match associated with that term to be displayed.

[wayne]

It looks like I am going to have to start trying
out alternatives to Adwords for when they no
longer work. Has anyone else noticed keywords
that have been working for months are now getting
a low click thru rate on the google search engine.
I just got a keyword disabled that was one of my
better performers as far as ROI. I have another
keyword at risk that is getting over 10% click
thru. It seems the keywords perform very well on
the search partner sites but it is getting harder
to get a decent click thru rate on Google. Maybe
the problem is with Google's search engine and
not with our keywords.

[cline]

CTR depends on a number of factors outside our control, including competitors' ads and how good the editorial SERPs are. I've had high-volume ads run just fine for months, then either the SERPs get better and/or a competitor enters and pulls away traffic, and the CTR will plunge such that the ad goes offline.

[anallawalla]

So if broadmatched blue widgets does well from the startup gaining a nice CTR, as it will get more impressions, exact match blue widgets will have problems competing as it's not searched as often and a slow start on CTR even though it's potential could be a much higher CTR than broadmatch, will keep it from showing it's true potential.

I agree with eWhisper. I was running a test for:

"blue widgets" 123
blue widgets 123
[blue widgets 123]

and only "blue widgets" 123 showed any impressions.

How would the system know which keyword was relevant if the user typed blue widgets 123?

[BitBiter]

An ugly but effective way around this, that I've used (was forced to use...) in the past is this.
As soon as the keyword is at risk, create an all-new campaign with the exact same keyword, text, parameters, whatver you want. The Google stats then start building anew.

In my case it enabled the ad and keyword to remain on for another three weeks. As said, ugly, but it worked for me.