Yesterday, I brought this concern to the Adwords chat, and the rep emailed me to say that she has found my ad (and sent a screenshot to boot) -- not in the 11.9 position, but get this, on page 22! Which means that my ad's average position is 220 - a far cry from 11. No wonder I can never see the ad as I never venture further from page 10.
So my next question is, why am I getting so many clicks (the highest in my entire campaign) from this particular keyword when my ad is on page 22! Who actually goes through 22 pages of SERPs only to click on my ad? The rep said she will refer the matter to the engineers but has not emailed me yet.
Does this situation seem normal to you guys or something's amiss? Thanks
Average Position - How accurate?
Alika, a couple of quick notes before I run to another task. This topic can actually get rather involved, but I'll try to keep it short.
* Most importantly, average position in your statistics is not an estimate. It's simply a factual reporting of an exact average of ad position, measured over the number of impressions you're looking at. Since is pure math, it's entirely accurate.
* Example: Let's say in four impressions your ad has appeared in positions 1, 3, 6, and 5. 1+3+6+5 = 15. 15 divided by 4 impressions equals an average postion of 3.7.
* Your ad position is likely to vary from one impression to the next, depending on the competitive landscape in the moment of the impression. It is not unusual for it to vary quite a bit, in fact.
When you report your ad shows on page 22, but your average position shows you in position 11.9 it makes me think that your campaign is probably targeted to many countries which have very different levels of competition.
To use an oversimplified example, the keyword 'soccer tickets' might be highly competitive in Europe (putting your ad very low in the results), and not competitive at all in the United States (putting your very ad high in the results).
Lets say in Europe the position was #23 due to a high level of competition, and #2 in the US due to low competition. 23+2 = 25, and 25 divided by 2 impression equals an Average Position of 12.5.
So, if you are in Europe, you'd see your ad very low. If you're in the US, you'd see your ad very high. But the factual average over both impression is different than either actual postion.
Another thing to keep in mind is that it's important to be looking at appreciate date ranges. If you're looking at the date range of 'all time', you'll probably see a very different average position than for the date range of 'today'. So if you're comparing your actual position 'today', be sure to have the date range set to 'today' also, before you compare your actual postion with your average postion stats.
Hope that helps to shed a little light on it.
AWA
PS - I should mention to the Forum at large that I'll be out of the office on Monday, and not able to read/post. Back Tuesday!
