What is going on here?

[wedouglas]

Ok, there are 4 ads showing like so:

ad 1
me - paying .01 cpc
ad 3
ad 4

When I change my display URL to the same as ad 1 (i am an affiliate) it looks like this:

me - paying .17 cpc instantly...
ad 3
ad 4

Why is my cpc sky rocketing? This doesn't make any sense. I only show my ad in US, Canada, and UK and I have checked all ads in each country. Nothing new.

[wedouglas]

bump for help.

I awoke this morning paying .15 cpc in spot 1 above those two same ads, yet when I changed the display url and let the ad1 outrank me, I was able to lower my cpc to .10 and still get the same rank.

Does it seem right that I am able to outrank competition and pay two different prices based on my max cpc? Shouldn't I pay the same whether or not I bid $100 or $.05 as long as I am outranking the same ads below me?

My stats for the ad that was in spot one show avg cpc of .18. My stats for the ad that is in spot two is .02. Yet in both cases, they same competition is below me...

[ronmcd]

If you are split testing two ads in one adgroup then probably one ad has a better "quality" score than the other (for whatever reason, historical performance etc). If you are running different ads in different ad groups then the ads and the ad groups will have different "quality" scores, so its more difficult to compare.

Obviously if google thinks your two ads are of different quality, maybe even caused by the url itself (has one got keywords in it?), then the price could be hugely different.

[werty]

I think you are directly competing with the merchants ad, thus increasing your CPC price to one cent above theirs.

I think this would only apply directly to you when you are battling for one spot (merchants current spot), versus competing for a 1-8 (now 12?) position when you have a unique url.

[wedouglas]

well the thing is, my cpc should always be just one cent above the next competitor, so shouldn't i be paying the same price no matter what I bid, as long as I am above the same people?

[wedouglas]

strange thing is, if it is in fact a quality score issue, I dont see how a new ad with no history could be better than an old one with much more history. both ads contain the same text.

[dave741]

"affiliate rule" is in the game:
Only one affiliate is shown for one URL - the one with best bid x QS.

So, if your competitor bids 0.16, he is not seen, but he drives the price up for you. If you go down with the price (and keep the same URL as he), you will disappear and he will be shown.

[wedouglas]

ok problem solved. for some reason it wont show me all the ads in the us... I have to ad gl=us or whatever on the end of the search.

I am in the US, why cant I see these ads without using that? Is there anyway to make it so I can see all ads?

[anand84]

<quote>Obviously if google thinks your two ads are of different quality, maybe even caused by the url itself (has one got keywords in it?), then the price could be hugely different.</unquote>

If this is true, could I choose a domainname that does not make any sense;so that my cpc is kept low. I plan to advertise my site primarily through the adwords.

[ronmcd]

I dont know if the words in the url are used in the quality calculation, but if they are I dont think its as important as the rest of the ad copy.

If url does count towards quality then in theory having keywords IN the url would be best, and clickthrough rates will probably be better anyway.