Keywords

need to understnad this.

[Boesman]

I have a keyword, let's say "horse". Let's say that I sell horses, any horses.

My main keyword will be "horse", cause I know that people looking for horses will probably search for horses.

They may also search for "Quarter Horses" or "Horses for sale".

Question:

Over and above negative keywords, is there any benefit in using a phrase such as "Quarter Horses". Surely if I have "horses" then it will pick up "Quarter Horses" or any derivative or "horses" as well?

[mack]

If you bid on an exact phrase your ad will be shown above a site that has broad matching turned on. Sometimes broad matching is enough, but sometimes I do use an exact phrase bid.

Mack.

[Kings on steeds]

it is all about relervance, if you have the keyword horses on broad match then your ad mite appear from quater horses, but to be in any good position your would be paying say 60p a click, and this is determined by how relervant the keyword is and the amount of compertishon, so if you had the keyword [quater horses] it is more targeted and there much more likely to cost less.

we have a client that has hotels and insted of adding in the broad match hotels we have added in ever post code ever town name in england with 40 suffex's meaning we are only paying about 6p a click insted of the £4 we would be with just hotels and also as it is exactly what they typed and nothing else we know it is targted traffic

[eWhisper]

One of the main reasons to use the keywords you want to show for is that if a broad match keyword doens't do well, it might act like an exact or phrase match:

More info in this thread:
[webmasterworld.com...]

[CernyM]

You will pick up the traffic with just "horse", but there are several reasons why it may be beneficial to split it:

* You can write more targeted ads.
* You can bid each variant at a different level
* You can construct more targeted landing pages

A lot depends on the amount of traffic the root keyword pulls. If its not much, its probably not worth splitting.

Its worth noting that the more you segment your keywords, the more attention you have to pay to the overall structure of the account. If you don't have a good set of naming conventions, you can easily find the account becomes impossible for a human being to manage.

[netmeg]

I have no way of proving this of course, but what SEEMS to me to be happening is that if someone else has the full phrase, and I just have the partial, they'll rank above me or I won't show up at all (somewhat related to what someone said above)

for example:

I have a bid for horse. I SHOULD show up for quarter horse, and if nobody else has quarter horse (as a phrase) I will rank as well as I have bid for it. However, if someone else DOES have quarter horse (and I can't be sure they do - it just seems likely from the ad and limited tests I've run) they will invariably rank above me, or knock me out entirely.

[Israel]

If you bid on an exact phrase your ad will be shown above a site that has broad matching turned on.

Mack,

Do we need to qualify that by saying that "your ad will be shown above" the broad matching site if all other conditions are equal between you and the other site? CTR, Max CPC, Ad Quality CTR, etc.

I'd gather that to be so since you see the deep pocketed entities always showing high for all searches based on broad widget when its highly unlikely they've managed to have an exact match on the searched term - [red and white widget].

Especially when their site may not even supply the "red and white widgets" as is often the case. Their high bids and high CTR for widgets likely qualified them for every expanded broad match there is for widget.

It would be nice though if the exact always trumped the broad...

Israel

[Israel]

Over and above negative keywords, is there any benefit in using a phrase such as "Quarter Horses". Surely if I have "horses" then it will pick up "Quarter Horses" or any derivative or "horses" as well?

Boesman,

As the other posters and the thread eWhisper pointed you to have indicated, there is no guarantee that the broad "horses" will automatically show for "quarter horses", etc.

Google will decide what other matches your "horses" may show for based on its prior performance in your account as well as the behaviour of other showings for "horses". Do you want to rely on that?

As AWA has said time and again, if you want to ensure you're seen for a particular variant, include it in your keyword list.

There was a time when "horses" would have shown for even "horses asdf", but that's difficult to achieve since around late 2003, I believe.

Israel