Adlinks Dynamics

How Google determine the ad keywords

[koan]

I was wondering how Google determine the keywords to use in their Adlinks ads. They seem to change regularly, in cycle, almost, and some are definitely more successful than others, however, I don't know if they actually track the performance, because one of my site just reverted back to old adlinks keywords that didn't perform as well, while another changed to something that really perform better now.

There was even this one time when they performed incredibly, but it only lasted a week or so before changing back to keywords that didn't work as well.

One would think they keep track of this stuff and give you the best combination, but I'm aware I'm missing a lot of other information, such as conversions, or advertisers bids for certain keywords, that is in play. If anyone had a few hunches, that would be a start.

How come they just don't keep the combination that make the most money for me (and them)?

[netmeg]

For one thing, the ad inventory probably changes on a daily basis. And also - the ad links you see aren't necessarily what the users see. When I look at mine, I see a lot of generic stuff that couldn't possible be worth more than two or three cents a click, but when my users click on them, I get 1.50 and 2.00 clicks. So they MUST be seeing something different than I am. (I get the two and three centers too, of course) And also, I suspect that Google is always rotating things and testing them to see what works and what doesn't. My ad targeting didn't get really effective until at least a year after I put the AdSense in - I can only assume that Google spent that year testing different things to figure out what works and what doesn't - and finally found something that works.