1. How long have you been advertising? If the keywords don't have much of a history, then just go increase the bids.
2. Are you increasing the prices because of past problems with 'slow' or 'at risk' keywords and you need a higher position? In that case, I'd make a new campaign.
3. Is your current CTR higher than what you estimate the average CTR is for everyone whos advertising for your exact keywords? If you think your CTR is higher, then increase bid prices and don't make a new campaign.
4. I've done both in the past. In the course of a short time, depending on your ad impressions, just increasing bids, you'll see the change in position. If your ads get a lot of impressions, in just a few days after the ads are syndicated, you'll see the changes. If they get few impressions, then it will take longer for your new CTR to level out.
What should happen, is increasing prices will raise your position a little. This will raise CTR over 1000 impressions. As its the past 1000 impressions that matter, you'll slowly see your CTR climb until it levels out with the new bid prices.
5. I'm sure I'm forgetting something (happens a lot with multitasking), what did I miss?
If you decide to make a new campaign, what you should do is:
1. Make the new campaign with the ads & new bid prices.
2. Wait for the ads to be syndicated with partner sites.
3. Delete the old campaign and every keyword in those campaigns.
Anyone know if this a work around to not type in all the new ads for making a new campaign:
If I edited all my keywords, copied them to a .txt format. Deleted all the keywords. Saved changes, and then went back into edit keywords, pasted them all in, and then saved changes, would the keywords be counted as new if they were in the same adgroup again and thus now having the 'phantom CTR' instead of their own CTR history?
With the above workaround, the ads are already syndicated, so even through the adgroup didn't have any keywords for a short period of time, are they are still considered approved for syndication, and thus I'd only not be shown on AOL for the few minutes I had no KWs in my adgroup?
That seems too easy...I must be missing something there.
Thanx for your input, but how can you estimate if your current CTR is higher or lower than the average of everyone elses?
...fresh with no CTR history in a new campaign.
It has been my experience (despite what the G tech support folks say) that this is not possible. The history is 'inescapeable' even when deleting the term and re-adding it in another group or campaign.
(or with broadmatch terms anyway)
I'd love to hear what AWA has to say....
how can you estimate if your current CTR is higher or lower than the average of everyone elses?
The decision has to be based on pure speculation.
If you have a 10% CTR and 5 competitors, you're probably higher.
If you have a 3+% CTR and 20 competitors, odds are you're higher than the average.
If you have a 1% and 20 competitors, that have consistantly been around (thus they all have at least 1% CTR since they haven't been disabled), then you're running average or lower.
Look at your CTRs, average position, your consistant competitors, and then make a good guess.
Thats about the best I think any nonG employee can estimate.
In this thread [webmasterworld.com], AWA said that 'all time' CTR rather than the CTR for the last 1000 impressions is used to calculate costs. With so many things going on (competitors possible bid changes, new competition, G only CTR, etc. etc...) I can't really tell on my own. eWhisper, have you been told it is last 1k impressions in the calculation?
nyet: I believe that I have been able to start with a 'fresh CTR history' by following the instructions that AWA and others have provided. I don't use broadmatching though, so perhaps it applies differently to those terms.
Maybe the ctr in position formula is all time and I've confused them over time.
AWA, could you please clarify this for us?
Thank you.
I'm 99% certain keyword status is determine by last 1000 impressions.
Maybe the ctr in position formula is all time and I've confused them over time.AWA, could you please clarify this for us?
In terms of positioning, it is the CTR of the keyword in the moment it is searched on that matters - but this is a reflection of its entire history.
The most recent 1000 impressions are weighted (slightly) more heavily, though the entire past history is considered as well. Part of the reason for considering the entire past history it to protect a keyword that has worked well for a long time from being disabled if it has a truly miserable 'most recent' 1000 impressions.
I hope I am answering the right question here - this thread has covered a lot of ground!
AWA
Do you know if the workaround in post 2 would work or not?
Anyone know if this a work around to not type in all the new ads for making a new campaignIf I edited all my keywords, copied them to a .txt format. Deleted all the keywords. Saved changes, and then went back into edit keywords, pasted them all in, and then saved changes, would the keywords be counted as new if they were in the same adgroup again and thus now having the 'phantom CTR' instead of their own CTR history?
With the above workaround, the ads are already syndicated, so even through the adgroup didn't have any keywords for a short period of time, are they are still considered approved for syndication, and thus I'd only not be shown on AOL for the few minutes I had no KWs in my adgroup?
AWA, thanks for that clarification. Do you know if the workaround...would work or not?
OK - to be honest, eWhisper, I haven't fully understood your suggested work around. For example, I am not sure what the intent or goal is.
It seems that you are sort of suggesting a keyword 'transfusion', into an existing Ad Group in an existing Campaign, right?
Would you please describe what the work around is intended to achieve, and give a little more detail? I'll do my best to find out if it'll work.
Sorry I've not undersood it. It must be either be a... (pick one):
* too much coffee day.
* not enough coffee day.
(In any case, I'm blaming the coffee.)
;)
AWA
If someone wants to dramatically increase their bid prices often this will result in a position change, and thus a higher CTR as in most cases a higher position results in a higher CTR.
Since the CTR used in position formula is all time, it can be advantageous to completely delete that KW history so you can start fresh with such a bid difference.
It's been noted in the past that if you delete a word everywhere in your account, that essentially you've 'killed' the history for that KW. I'm working off the assumption that this is still true.
It is possible to delete a word everywhere in a campaign, save everything, thus deleting the KWs history for the new campaign.
However, that would cause a lot of work because you then have to rewrite all the ads.
Is it possible to delete all the KWs from an adgroup, leaving all the ads still in place, save the changes, thus the KWs are currently nowhere in your account (history gone). Then just add those same KWs back into that adgroup, thus restarting the exact same adgroup with those same KWs, yet with no history. So now, the new bid changes will help you out more than if you just increased your bids?
Also, since you're just adding these KWs back into the same adgroup, would those new KWs immediately be shown on partner sites as the ads are already approved and its just KWs that were changed?
This is a bit confusing, hope this clarifies it better.
I'd like to consult/confirm with a techster, and will get back to this thread asap with what I've learned.
AWA
Since I'm still on the run, I'll give you a bottom line answer now, and then provide a bit more detail tomorrow. I've got to figure out a way to boil down the technical stuff.
The bottom line is that sorry, no, your workaround won't function as you'd hoped: to provide a fresh keyword history to a existing Ad Group, while also side-stepping the review process. :(
More Tuesday.
AWA
1. If the disabled keyords are introduced into the existing ad group where these keywords have been deleted, the keywords will be re-disabled in a short time since both their current and entire history stats are still there.
2. If a new ad group is used for these disabled keyords once they are deleted anywhere in the account, the keywords have to make any gain in hurry for survival. The reason is that, as I believe, the recent stats is gone but the entire history stats is not erased in the account. why? I did this repeatly for the same keyword which I like very much. Note that its CTR is above 1. At first, it's lasted for couple of weeks and then by days. The survial time is shorter and shorter and up to the time it went directly to "disabled" from "moderate". It did not bother to go through "at risk" any more.
Who says it will start fresh from a new ad group once it has been deleted? I don't buy it.
I suspect it is a possible indicator to the inner workings of the algo and they are not allowed to go into it much.
In terms of positioning, it is the CTR of the keyword in the moment it is searched on that matters - but this is a reflection of its entire history.The most recent 1000 impressions are weighted (slightly) more heavily, though the entire past history is considered as well. Part of the reason for considering the entire past history it to protect a keyword that has worked well for a long time from being disabled if it has a truly miserable 'most recent' 1000 impressions.
Hmmm, that gives me a concern. I get clients who have been running their own Adwords campaigns enough to accumulate huge keyword histories. The reason the clients have come to me is that their campaigns aren't performing that well. I rebuild them from the ground up doing extensive keyword research and segmentation to get the targeting spot on and do heavy creative testing.
I had assumed that the old keyword history was heavily discounted after 1k impressions. If it isn't, then shouldn't I be shutting down these old accounts and starting fresh with a new account that has no keyword history?
In post #14, I mentioned the work-around wouldn't work, and would provide additional details. Here they are.
It's been noted in the past that if you delete a word everywhere in your account, that essentially you've 'killed' the history for that KW. I'm working off the assumption that this is still true.
Actually this is not correct, eWhisper, and I'm sorry if I haven't been clear about the reason behind deleting disabled keywords wherever they occur.
* Deleting a disabled keyword in every place it occurs, before re-using that word, is important not because it 'kills' the keyword's history (which it does not do), but because, if you don't, the keyword is still disabled. And a currently disabled keyword can't be re-used.
* So, again, deleting a keyword every place it occurs does not 'kill' it's history. And re-using a disabled/deleted keyword in the same Ad Group will burden the keyword with it's entire past history, and not allow it a fresh start. (FromRocky was correct on this point, in post #15).
* However, re-using a disabled/deleted keyword in a new Ad Group will give the keyword a fresh 1000 impressions to prove itself. After this 1000 impressions, the entire past history will be folded in - with the most recent 1000 impressions being weighted more heavily. (BTW, it is best to put a very troublesome keyword in a new Ad Group all by itself, with a very carefully written ad, and with the keyword in the headline if at all possible.)
Is it possible to delete all the KWs from an adgroup, leaving all the ads still in place, save the changes, thus the KWs are currently nowhere in your account (history gone). Then just add those same KWs back into that adgroup, thus restarting the exact same adgroup with those same KWs, yet with no history...
So no, as mentioned above, this is not possible - because the history still rides with those keywords.
So now, the new bid changes will help you out more than if you just increased your bids?
This wouldn't really be true either, as CTR is always being normalized for position by an algo running under the hood. In other words, if you simply left your Ad Group as it was with keywords intact, and raised the Max CPC enough to improve your position, then the CTR would automatically be normalized for your new position. This process of normalization for postion is occuring 24/7, every single time your position changes.
Hope that makes sense.
AWA
I think the entire confusion arose out of CTR being past 1000 impressions, and deleting KWs to delete its history, not just to make sure it was reenabled.
Cline has a very good point. Many of us 'rescue' troubled accounts, so how much of the past history will haunt us in efforts to make the campaign more profitable?
Is the last 1000 impressions weighted as equally as its entire past history, or does a KW with 1+ million impressions really have a history thats going to be set for some time?
Is the last 1000 impressions weighted as equally as its entire past history, or does a KW with 1+ million impressions really have a history thats going to be set for some time?
I'll see what details I can scare up, eWhisper. Stay tuned.
AWA, thank you for an exceptionally useful post!
Thanks cline, my pleasure!
AWA
Is the last 1000 impressions weighted as equally as its entire past history, or does a KW with 1+ million impressions really have a history thats going to be set for some time?
eWhisper (and others who were wondering), this is one of those cases that someone - I think it was nyet - alluded to, in which I can't get really specific about the algo.
But I did go to an expert source and asked this very blunt question:
"If a new account manager takes over an existing account which has a long and truly miserable history, can they 'recover' the keywords (and account) by creating new, very targeted Ad Groups which get a great CTR?
His answer was an immediate and confident "Yes".
I hope that helps. And sorry about the lack of specifics. ;)
AWA
"If a new account manager takes over an existing account which has a long and truly miserable history, can they 'recover' the keywords (and account) by creating new, very targeted Ad Groups which get a great CTR?"
I should have said:
"If a new account manager takes over an existing account which has a long and truly miserable history, can they 'recover' the keywords (and account) by creating new, very targeted Ad Groups within the existing account, which get a great CTR?"
Sometimes it is so hard to be clear...
AWA
