Cant get any traction

Max bids high, CTR high, but Google is not showing our ads

[WillWill]

HI,

TIA to anyone who replies.

This is the 1st time we have tried PPC. Overture is totally understandable and is working great. Google AdWords is not working for us at all, even tho our max bids are high and Google reports that for the few times they have shown our ads, the CTR's are high, but they are not really showing our ads.

Every now and then we show up.

We started a week ago. Does it take Google AdWords that long to get a new site into the rotation?

We asked to be listed only on the Google Sites network and we put all our keywords into [brackets] and we have 20 Ad Groups.

Any help would be so welcome, publicly or privately

Thanks,
Will

[edited by: Shak at 8:51 am (utc) on Aug. 9, 2004]
[edit reason] no specifics please [/edit]

[chrisnrae]

A new site should be in rotation right away. Are you sure your daily spend is set high enough to keep you in constant rotation? Also, remember the brackets mean an exact match. So if you bid on [widget case] and someone types in cheap widget case, you're listings won't come up.

[BriGuy20]

Will:

First, I'd advise against specifics on here. Just say you sell widgets.

Second, I'm sure the field your in is EXTREMELY crowded (I can think of about 5 big-ticket entrants in the field off the top of my head). You MAY not get on the front page with your ads. All the more reason to make them as targeted and focused as possible, because higher response rate means you're either charged less (for the same spot) or you're charged the same but you get a higher ranking (which usually means more clicks).

Third, be patient, your ads may need to be manually reviewed before they can be added into the rotation.

Fourth, try different ad copies and see what response you get. If you can get high-CTR ads (give the ads time to generate a large enough sample), you may want to delete underperforming ads to leave only the best-performing ones. If there isn't a big difference, I'd keep all the ads. Remember not to take old ads out at the same time you put new ads in, this could lead to a situation where your ads don't show while the new ads are being approved. To test, you may want to turn off automatic ad optimization so you can get even showings of each ad.

[GuitarZan]

Hey,

What Chrisnrae said. If your ad is showing sporatically, it could very well be that your daily spend is not up enough.

All the Best,

C.K.

[WillWill]

THANKS to all 3 of you who replied right away to my post.

The "daily spend not set high enough" is a good thought, but not correct b/c we have it set at $100/day and we havent come close to that any day. (Our total daily spend is about $50 even tho' Google recommended $120/day for the levels of the max bids that we have set.)

Yes, it is true that there are some heavyweights competing for fantasy football terms, but according to Google's Estimation our max bids should put us no lower than #3 position for any of our terms and #1 or #2 for most.

I am aware of the effect of the brackets, but we have a couple hundred permutations of [fantasy football this] and [fantasy football that] ALL in brackets.

IF you can scratch your heads to think of something else I am really grateful

Thanks, Will.

[edited by: Shak at 8:51 am (utc) on Aug. 9, 2004]

[GuitarZan]

Hey,

I wonder if Google is not showing your ads completely because you didn't set it at or higher than their suggested daily limit. Even though you are not getting anywhere near what they suggested, it may be another one of those AdWords "quirks".

C.K.

[WillWill]

GuitarZan, that is a good idea. Surely worth a try and easy enough to prove. I will put the daily spend to their recommended level right now.

Thanks! Will.

[WillWill]

Hi Again,

I went to Google to raise the Campaign Daily Budget, which I had set at $100 and checked Google's 'Recommended Daily Budget' which turned out to be $180, so that was Quite a Difference. That might have been the quirky reason that Google isnt showing our ads very often.

Also, i UNchecked 'Automatically optimize ad serving for my ads' Not sure about that one, but I did it anyway.

Thanks! Will.

[chrisnrae]

Yep, if Google says you're daily spend should be 100 and you put it at 90, it can cause issues. I've had it happen with previous campaigns. Good luck - hope it works out now that you've upped the max bid to their "suggestion" ;).

[AdWordsAdvisor]

Just wanted to confirm (and expand on) a few things that I've seen mentioned in this thread.

In my experience with thousands of advertisers over the past two years, when an ad doesn't show 24/7 then 95% of the time it is a daily budget issue.

And, if you see that your 'Recommended Budget' on the 'Edit Campaign Settings' page is higher than your actual budget, then it is a virtual guarantee that your ad will not be showing all the time.

When your recommended budget is higher than your actual budget and you want your ad to show all the time, then there are at least three general courses of action:

* Raise your daily budget, and/or

* Reduce the number of keywords you have, since that budget must support all your keywords. (Hint: As a rule, very general keywords will require a higher budget than very specific keywords to show all the time. So get rid of overly general keywords if you wish for your ads to show more often.) And/or

* Reduce your Max CPC for words that aren't that important to you. Why? The less you pay per click, the farther your budget will go towards showing your ad all the time.

(BTW, there are lots of recent threads on this Forum that talk about daily budget, should you want more detail.)

AWA

[WillWill]

Thank you AdWords Advisor,

Your post was perfectly clear and understandable. I've got it now.

This was my first try on WebmasterWorld.com and it turned out to be a '10'. I am grateful for the help.

Thanks to all, Will.
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