Sometimes the estimator says a common one-word search, "widgeting," will produce 0.1 clicks per day at $0.05 CPC, but moments later that same keyword produces an estimate of over 2,000 clicks per day at $0.44 CPC.
I've not changed the bid at all. I just clicked the "re-estimate traffic" button.
I've used the estimator several times before, but I don't recall such a wide range. Does anyone have an idea of what's happened?
If G would implement some sort of tool like OV, even if they used groupings like OV, I'd be much happier.
I started idly tracking the estimates for during a two hour span, and I saw numbers that ranged fully between 0.1 and 2,000 clicks per day. That's four orders of magnitude.
I'm willing to accept a percentage of error with a traffic estimate. As a advertiser, I'd accept with a 20-30% variance, but a 2,000,000% floating range of estimates makes it impossible to get even a vague guess.
"widgeting," will produce 0.1 clicks per day at $0.05 CPC, but moments later that same keyword produces an estimate of over 2,000 clicks per day at $0.44 CPC.
Nevertheless: Generally the estimates of Google are too high.
I agree that changing the bid could skew the predictions, but in this case, I didn't touch the max bid at all.
I just refreshed the page, and that alone caused the predictions to jump wildly. That's what I found odd. I could refresh the page twice within 20 seconds and see two incredibly different predictions.
Thanks for making your point in a rather compelling way.
BTW, I can assure you all that work is always underway to improve the accuracy and usefulness of the tool. I look forward to the day when threads are started about how cool it is! ;)
AWA
Keep it just like it is! It keeps the wanna be's nervous......
(helps separate the wheat from the chaff.....)
Will there ever be a point where one does not have to create a new campaign in order to use the estimator tool? maybe there is and I don't know about it.
Also, Currently, we must specify a max cpc and then it shows us the average position for a list of keywords. With power posting, we often upload thousands of keywords at once in an Adgroup, however, it is very rare that we would ever want the same max CPC for all of these keywords. We find it more common to want to know what the max CPC's would have to be if we wanted everything in the the 3rd position for example. What I am ideally envisioning, is power posting 1,000 keywords, and then checking a box for either the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd position, and the tool then spits back what the max cpc's would be for each keyword, along with the estimated number of clicks.
Having had over 25 clients across many verticals in all PFP programs in the past few years, we've found that Google's estimator is one of the weaknesses of the tool, when it comes to making a case to clients to invest in this channel. In order to make, even close to accurate projections for yearly traffic, budget, conversion, revenue and ROI projections, it would be helpful to have a more flexible tool.
thanks AdwordsAdvisor for passing any/all of this along.
Thanks for listening and passing the information along. It's very helpful to have this open line of communication.
Will there ever be a point where one does not have to create a new campaign in order to use the estimator tool? maybe there is and I don't know about it.
Fenwya, there are actually several ways to get to the traffic estimator without creating a new campaign or Ad Group - but I agree that they are perhaps not obvious enough! I'll pass on the feedback that 'How to get to the Traffic Estimator' is not clearly evident in the interface.
That said, here are several ways to get there:
* Near the top left of any Ad Group, you will see a line of text under the Ad Group name that reads: Current maximum CPC: USD $x.xx [edit]. If you click on the edit link, it will take you to a page with an 'Estimate Traffic' button on it. This will give you the Traffic Estimator for your current keyword list in that Ad Group.
* Above your keyword list, at the Ad Group level, there is a link that says 'Add Keywords'. Here you can create a list of new keywords, then click on the 'Estimate Traffic' button to get estimates for those new keywords, plus your existing ones.
* Above your keyword list, again at the Ad Group level, there is a link that says 'Edit Keywords'. You can do the essentially the same thing here too.
* And of course, the Traffic Estimator is part of the Ad Group creation process - if you want to use it for an entirely new group of keywords, unrelated to existing Ad Groups.
I'll certainly pass on your other comments/suggestions too.
Thanks!
AWA
