Message:
We've simplified our keyword status system.
Your keywords will now either be active (triggering ads) or inactive (not triggering ads). Quality remains the most important factor in your keywords' performance. Each keyword will now have a minimum bid that is based on the quality of your keyword and ad text. If your maximum CPC doesn't meet this minimum bid, your keyword will be listed as inactive.
What you should do differently:
If a keyword is listed as inactive, improve its quality through optimization, delete it, or raise that keyword's maximum CPC to the minimum bid indicated. (Raising the bid will re-activate the keyword.) If your keyword is active, you don't need to do anything.
The only thing I can complain is, that there was no e-mail as AWA promised.
But I am very satisfied with the rest:
1. No need to go up with the bids for the main clients I run PPC campaigns for.
2. In some campaigns and adgroups with good CTR was no problem to lower my bids to 0.02 USD
3. I am even able to add new words for 0.02. So it is not true, that it starts on 0.10. It might be different in totaly new account, of course.
4. I was very curious how will one my small favourite project (1200 AdWords clicks this months) work. The result is that I have some phrases for 0.01 USD on premium position :-)
[edited by: dave741 at 9:45 pm (utc) on Aug. 16, 2005]
Standard operation---said they'd let us know ahead of time but they lie.
I have to go through all my accounts to see how this is going to affect me overall. Having the system tell me I have to raise my bid when I am getting good CTR and am in 5th position is idiotic to say the least. I am not grasping how this is going to increase revenue for Google. You were making 5 cents a click, now you are making 0. I'm not raising the damn bid, I bid what I can afford to bid to make profit. Increasing my bid by a factor of 20 is going to kind of ruin the ole' ROI don't you think?
I have seen ads that were performing well being flagged as inactive.
Please can you explain the following:
I have an ad with a 7.1% CTR and CPC of 5c (although Max is set at 20c). It's now saying raise the bid to 30c, why, the average CPC is 5c and you are earning the eqivalent of $3.55 per thousand impressions for a term that no-one else seems bothered about.
When can we expect this to settle down. Also, when will there be proper documentation?
I am anout to launch a major campaign for a client and this is very worrying as we had many 5c terms in mind (incidentally we have a smaller scale trial which is running at 5.1% CTR for similar 5c terms).
I know that there must be some good reasoning behind this, we'd just like to be told how this new system truly works and why it's better than the old one.
how are these minimum bids determined? based on what?
So far I am happy with the new system. I have had many words that were disabled in the past, be able to be re-enabled for relatively modest premiums (20 cents instead the previous 18 cent bid in one instance). This is better for me than being disabled altogehter. Plus now that is is re-enabled I have an opporunity to play with the ad text, and negative keywords to hopefully drive the CTR up and cost per click down. Before once disabled I was just hosed.
Just one voice. But happy so far.
The good thing is I have ads that my competitors were ok for but I was not allowed... at least that was a good fix.. I used the same basic wording but under the old system once you were disabled you were toast for that keyword.
Why do I get the feeling this will get worse as time goes on.
min CPC is _fully_ based on the conversion data for the specific keyword.
They are damn smart and know that the majority will continue to bid anyway.
Hopefully Google days are numbered until release of Longhorn with
integrated MSN search so they try to make as much money as possible until then.
[edited by: skibum at 2:46 pm (utc) on Aug. 17, 2005]
That said, I do think it might be best to give it more than an hour or two before deciding that the system does or does not work. ;) I'd suggest living with it a bit, and some advantages may begin to emerge.
Before I go any further, I wanted to provide a brief overview as to why these changes were made, and then I'll do my best to answer your questions over the next few days.
These changes were made:
* in response to ongoing requests (from this Forum perhaps most of all) to end 'in-trial', 'on-hold', and 'disabled' keyword states. (These states are now gone, and advertisers may decide which keywords to run or not run, dependent upon how valuable their keywords are to them, within the context of their own ROI.)
* in response to ongoing requests to provide a way to re-enable keywords that were disabled. (Keywords will no longer be disabled - and keywords which are currently disabled may now be deleted and re-entered, so long as ones's Max CPC is greater than the min CPC required to run.)
* in response to ongoing requests to do away with account 'slowing' and subsequent re-activation. (Accounts will no longer be slowed, and re-activation is also a thing of the past.)
In overview, the system is designed to give advertisers more control over what keywords they choose to show their ads - by providing a very real financial incentive to advertise using very targeted keywords and ads, while also allowing them to decide for themselves exactly how valuable their less relevant keywords are.
I will, of course, be keeping my eye on this thread, and will continue to forward your feedback to the appropriate teams here at AdWords - who are already paying close attention to what is being said here.
AWA
This is what i am going to do - give this a day or two before bi*tching in the board :)
[edited by: gopi at 11:39 pm (utc) on Aug. 16, 2005]
Most of them reappear as "Active" which is very cool, but some of them stay disabled no matter how many times I try.. any ideas? anyone seeing the same thing?
[edited by: bendee at 11:52 pm (utc) on Aug. 16, 2005]
However 1 thing I can say.
Since day 1, each time Google makes a change, there is always a way to be smarter and make more ROI than your competition.
I remember when they stopped premium listings, and I thought the world had ended! It dint'T
breathe in, breathe out ...
Shak
I just read all 11 pages of this post, and there are only 3-4 posts by people who are seeing goodness to their ROI from the changes, and 90%+ who are seeing badness. The WebmasterWorld community is clearly filled with the people most likely to be able to ace the ppc competition thing, so I'm going to venture that faith in Google giving people a way to make a living (compared to previous 'livings') is not the best course to take. I suggest people think really, really, really hard about what they can do to actively, meaninfully, move the online marketing community to a point where the only* ones monetizing the searcher are
a)the searcher; and
b)the marketer
*SEM firms excepted, of course...
In fact, the few keywords where I had to up my bids will be most likely be offset by some of the sub-.05 CPC's I am now getting.
My biggest concern is that the new system will force my competitors to improve their ads. My biggest advantage has been having ads optimized much better than my competitors. I'm pretty sure I've been getting lots more clicks at lower CPC's than just about anyone bidding of my terms. Now Google is really underscoring benefits of better optimized ads, so I think my advantage will lessen.
I personally welcome the new changes. As Shak said, there *IS* opportunity with change ;o)
1) i still like it a LOT more than overture's slow and ridiculous process
2) no other competitor even comes close
but it is way more expensive as far as i can see...
From my best guess.. this minimum CPC is based heavily on clickthrough rate rather than conversion rate (as had been suggested.) If so, what Google is trying to do is force an increase in clickthrough rates through better written ad copy.
first off i would like to say that AWA, you are EASILY the most helpful google person i have had the privelage of dealing with, so hopefully this will find its way back to some of the higher ups.
you said:
by providing a very real financial incentive to advertise using very targeted keywords and ads
which is not exactly true at all awa. i have bid on keywords that are variations of my company name, for example, hypothetically if my company name was
Joe-Bobs Widget Emporium, i bid on
all the variations of that, like [joebobs blah blah] [joe-bobs bla bla] etc, however some of these are costing me 30 cents a click.....30 cents! no advertisers, not too many searches, and yet, 30 cents a click! i just would like a response on this particular case if you would.
Thanks.
-Inferno
It's all quiet in the UK and I'm setting up my largest campaign yet. I suppose I'll find out if there are any major differences when the traffic hits tomorrow.
As for adding new terms, the system has been pretty fair with just the occasional odd request for a higher than 5c bid. Having added around 4,000 of the terms I'd say around 1-2% are asking for more than 5c.
It does seem that more targetted phrases are the way forward but that kind of upsets Google's wish to keep keyword numbers down to keep system resources in check.
I'm waiting to see if/when it maxes me out, I'll let you all know.
credit card: needs 3p bid to activate
loan: 11p
afsdsdfas: 3p
testing: 55p
Hmm... should have realised I 'aint getting no 1p clicks with that fiercely fought over keyword 'testing'.
looks like it's still early doors. chill everyone and wait and see.
is there a quick way to see all the inactive ads that need higher bids? like with the disapproved ads tool?
You can run a keyword report to only show the Inactive Keywords.
...So far I am happy with the new system. I have had many words that were disabled in the past, be able to be re-enabled for relatively modest premiums (20 cents instead the previous 18 cent bid in one instance). This is better for me than being disabled altogehter.... Just one voice. But happy so far.
I'm another happy voice. If you think Yahoo is better... you haven't read much about their new matching algo for "Advanced Match" - that now matches very specific keywords to the broadest of queries in a blatant revenue boosting move... at the expense of traffic quality.
I now have control over previously disabled and slowed terms - a very good thing, IMHO. I also got the email notice that AWA promised...
