Google's Average Position is way off

anyone else here find this?

[Gmorgan]

One of my favourite keywords is being displayed by Google as having an average position of 6.6, yet when I perform a search it doesn't display until the bottom of page three!

Has anyone else found that their 'measurements' are far better than the actual results?

[swiftshot]

I'm still working on the measurements part, but I agree G has trouble with showing an accurate average position. Usually, when I enter keywords, put in a CPC and "estimate traffic", G tells me I've got the #1 spot. Not true. And even for keywords already in existence, there's a discrepancy between what they say I should have and what I'm seeing in the serps.

Moral of the story: believe what you see. ;)

[archie goodwin]

Is your keyword a phrase match? If it is, that could explain it. Perhaps for "green widgets" you are coming up on the 3rd page, but for many other searches such as "super cool green widgets" you're showing up much higher, balancing out your avg. position. This could also be true if your keyword is broad matching. Hope this helps!

AG

[AW_Learner]

I notice it too. Almost nothing about Google's "Estimator" is accurate or even close to it. There traffic estimation is way off too. When it tells me that my position is an average of like 4.2 or something that usually means I'm on the bottom of page 4! Other times it will say the position is 2.4 or something but everytime I check it it is number 1. Even though I bid a few dollars less then what it shows for it's top bid for #1.

They do this even on exact matching.

The most difficult thing about this is that I usually use hundreds of keywords is always checking these by hand one by one. And then constantly re-adjusting the bids which take a while to effect the position and re-checking hundreds or thousands of keywords by hand. So instead I only check the highest searched keywords. Most of my keywords don't get any impressions. But maybe it's not because they are not searched but because they are on page 100 even though it tells me they are position 9. Frustrating.

[Robsp]

Also look at the geo's you are targetting. We are in Europe and always see our ads higher than what google reports (use world wide targetting). Until I search with the &gl=us option and I see our competition in the US and we are way down.

The traffic estimator is not reliable but in my experience the reported average is. You cannot judge the average position just by what you see.

[AdWordsAdvisor]

I just want to weigh in with a clarification regarding Average Position as shown in your account statistics, and the Average Position estimates that are shown in the Traffic Estimator.

In this thread I think we may be mixing up the two things - and it's important to know that they are in fact very different.

The Average Position shown in your account stats is a factual accounting of your average position, as it actually occured over the date range you are looking at, and in all countries in which your ad has appeared.

On the other hand, the Average Position estimates that are shown in the Traffic Estimator are simply that: they are estimates of position, meant to give you an idea of the current competitive landscape in a system in which things change rather rapidly.

So, you can rely on the Average Postion in your stats to be an accurate reporting of the average of all your actual positions, for all of your impressions, for the stated date range.

But think of the estimates of Average Position as a way to get a ball-park idea of what might occur when you set keywords running in your account with a particular Max CPC. Then monitor your actual stats to see what happens in the real world, and make adjustments as needed.

BTW, in my opinion your actual Average Position is not a reliable way to tell your actual position in a given moment, and in a particular country. Robsp brings this up in post #5, and is quite correct.)

As an example, I've looked at ads targeted globally, in which a given keyword in a given moment might show the ad as number one in Italy, and as number 14 in the US. It is simply a matter of how much competition the advertiser faces in each place.

Hope this make sense. ;)

AWA