Google Ads system - now you see it - now you don't ads.

Adwords customer, "Sponsored Link" results!

[rhyno]

I've been happily using AW for about 9 months now... but recently I've noticed some strange behaviour (which I wrote about in another thread) like disappearing/reappearing ads.

The best is today... I search for a phrase that's _close_ to some of our keywords, and I see our company listed as a Sponsored Link! I refresh and it goes away -- seems to come up every 4th or 5th time.

I'm looking into SLs, but I don't think there's any way we could afford those -- $15K minimum!. (Hope there's not a bill in the mail ;)

Anyone else noticing wacky results with the big G?

[Shak]

we have discussed this a number of times, and its basically a combination of factors, which include:

CTR and CPC, plus other hidden stuff.

here are 2 threads which may help:
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]

good luck and NO bill coming through :)

Shak

[4crests]

Rhyno..

I am with you. I do agree with SHAK that it has to do with "CTR and CPC, plus other hidden stuff"

However, I have also been using Adwords since day one, and SOMETHING HAS DEFINITELY CHANGED RECENTLY!

It goes beyond CTR and CPC. I guess it has to do with the "OTHER HIDDEN STUFF".

It seems they have changed their Algo recently on how Adwords get into the Premium Spot. And, they are now rotating them strangely on some keywords.

I am surprised more people haven't noticed it.

[4crests]

I do have to say that this strange behavior change is only happening on 1 of over 100 keywords I use. Therefore, many people probably aren't noticing it. It is very strange. I can't even get into the Premium Spot on that keyword now. As of yesterday, it won't let me. I can bid $5.00 a click, and it won't go north. It used to go North very easy. However, when I bid #1, it still rotates the 2nd and 3rd adwords up North. Makes no sense. Possibly they are testing something on a small percentage of adwords.

I am #1 in the regular google serps for the Keyword I am having problems with. The other 99 keywords I use are not #1. Maybe it has something to do with that? Maybe Google doesn't want you in the premium spot if you are also the #1 Serp. I really don't know. It's got me stumped.

[TomWaits]

We've seen weird stuff like this too.

Also, they've been lax in deleting phrases that aren't meeting the magic 0.5%. It started, I think, when they beganthe context ad program.

I'm not talking about the context ads, though. Google already said they weren't going to delete phrases if they dip below the 0.5% threshold for context ads. I'm saying that, coincidentally, if you look at the results on the AdWords portion only, we're keeping some phrases that I thought would have been already gone. And that's the first I've seen that.

Maybe it has to do with the phrases showing up for searches and places that we hadn't intended, dunno, and they're trying to make up for it.

[Brett_Tabke]

And, who is to say, that based upon cookies, they are not disallowing multiple page views on the same keyword from the same IP? They did that last year before going cpc.

[4crests]

BRETT, that's a good possibilty. But, would they do it on only certain keywords?

[skibum]

Looks like they just started posting a big notice if the CTR for (everything?) you have running doesn't hit 0.5% then they start showing all ads with a low CTR (even if they've only gotten a few impressions) less frequently.

Seems like if you experiment with one broad frequently searched term and get a really low CTR then the highly targted ads that hardly get any impressions get penalized if they were just launched and haven't had a chance to take hold yet. :( Can't get new ads to show up..

[David_M]

I've also had this happen to high CTR keywords, with low frequency. Seems to be a part of the automated monitoring system. If they get a ** it seems to reset and go back to normal after a day or so, but * is stopped altogether.

The * keywords when moved to a new ad group will show up in the google searches, but not in syndicated.

After asking Adwords about this, they say its because of low performing CTR. Some of these keywords get 1% on google and jump to 2% when syndicated, so the syndicated ads must be doing above 2%. The only reason I can come up with is that on some of the partners, its performing poorly and the others are pulling the % up. Perhaps having more detailed info on impressions/partner/CTR would help.