Just now I created a new ad group to go to my car stereos page at example.com/car-stereos. The content is relevant and targeted and I even have an adsense ad on the page that pulls relevant ads, so google definitely knows the theme of the page. The ad is targeted and points to this page.
So I add this new group, ad and 1374 keywords and put in my bid, 5 cents. As google has been doing for months to me, they say "increase bid or quality". Fine, "capacitor car digital in install stereo" (thank you overture) is worth more than 5 cents. Google's wanting $5 to activate! ON AVERAGE THEY WANT OVER $5 FOR THESE KEYWORDS, SOME OF WHICH ARE QUITE LOUSY. This ain't Mesothelioma! So all 1374 keywords are labeled inactive and they only produce a little traffic from the "content network" (not google).
Anyone know what's going on? I've emailed google a few times and they won't tell me anything helpful. Any help would be appreciated.
Limit your keywords to those that your site provides user value for and maybe this will help.
Is Google seeking more money from AdWords advertisers? If the answer is NO (and that's what I always thought) then how to explain that strictly-increasing min bid issue many AdWords advertisers are facing?
In other words: Is it a matter of quality or money that makes min bids for so much keywords increasing to unreasonable limits?
Also in other words ;) What would possibly cause the min bid for some keyword to keep increasing?
I hope we hear from AWA about this soon!
You will be lucky if that happens. . AWA has not responded to any threads on any QS issue in this forum.
and I even have an adsense ad on the page
Try taking the adsense ad off. Adwords may be classing your page as an MFA.
Here's the problem - Google can't afford the computing resources to check for every crazy keyword some advertiser dreams-up. The first time some advertiser adds a keyword, Google has NO statistics to know whether the keyword is going to get traffic or not. They have to set up a "bin" to count statistics. Every bin costs them money in computing resources. So, any new keyword - REGARDLESS - gets a high bid - because they just have no stats and no way to judge.
More-specific keywords tend to have lower minimum bids than more-general keywords - TO A POINT. That point is the one at which Google has no statistics available and so no prior knowledge about the keyword.
I also agree with the other comment regarding the Adsense ads. That makes your site look like an MFA site (even if you may also have unique content.) Take them off.
Finally, if you are not an actual retailer of car stereo equipment - but are an affiliate - fergitaboutit! Just about your only hope is to duke it out sending traffic directly to the seller, rather than to your affiliate website.
Most of the keywords are very relevant to the landing page and the rest are mostly relevant.
1374 keywords are relevant (or mostly relevant) to one page? This may be part of your problem too.
If you used Overture's keyword tool to compile your list of terms, they'll work okay in Overture itself but Overture keyword baskets do NOT translate well to other PPC engines.
The reason is that Overture lumps all sorts of variations together and reports them as one term. Variations such as singular searches, plurals, phrases with or without hyphens, misspellings, different word order, and so on, all get lumped together as one, and the order of multi-word searches is rearranged in the reports as well.
It's highly likely that a search such as "capacitor car digital in install stereo" is purely fictional and no one has ever, ever searched for that phrase in that form.
Highly recommended: do your keyword research with tools that show you phrases and variants in the form that searchers actually used.
Without assuming to know the quality of your site or ad targetting, I will just suggest a few tips that may be useful to you.
For what it's worth;
Your kwords should feature in your landing page copy - long tail kword targetting, I guess, is seen as a method mostly utilised by affiliates and is being punished. Make no mistake about it Google isn't real wrapped in affiliates IMHO.
I agree with jtara re. losing the adsense ads. Many in these forums have expressed similar opinions.
Don't have to many aff. links per page. Consider - if you haven't already - building some pages with unique articles that don't contain any aff. links at all - I know it sounds crazy, but you need to be seen to be offering a quality experience on your site not simply acting as a conduit to a mother site.
Give some consideration as to whether the sites your linking to already feature prominently in the adwords results.
Just my two bob's worth, hope it's food for thought. If all else fails, get drunk, always works for me.
Cheers.
Anyone know what's going on? I've emailed google a few times and they won't tell me anything helpful. Any help would be appreciated.
There has been alot of discusion on this topic the last few months.
[webmasterworld.com ]
[webmasterworld.com ]
[webmasterworld.com ]
I also agree with the other comment regarding the Adsense ads. That makes your site look like an MFA site (even if you may also have unique content.) Take them off.Finally, if you are not an actual retailer of car stereo equipment - but are an affiliate - fergitaboutit! Just about your only hope is to duke it out sending traffic directly to the seller, rather than to your affiliate website.
I started with adwords 2-3 months ago and seem to have avoided the $5-$10 min bids. My landing pages contain many affiliate links and have adsense on them. So i don't think that linking to affiliate sites or adsense is the main reason.
I have about 1000 keywords with some pretty obscure phrases, so i doubt that is the problem also.
i don't think anyone really knows what criteria is for the high min bids but i have a theory as to why i havent been hit with them.
All of the pages on my site have very visible links to my privacy policy and a contact page. All the landing pages also have links to other pages in site and are listed on the sitemap. Most also link out to "authority" sites related to the affiliate products.
The landing pages do not contain much unique content, maybe a short paragraph, the rest is standard text that every affiliate has to show with the product.
My guess is that it isn't related to affilate links or adsense, but they are looking for other onsite things that fit a certain profile. Possibly stand alone pages that are not linked to other related pages or attempts to mislead the consumer by hiding your identity or not clearly stating your privacy policy. And/or only providing one way off the page - via your affiliate link.
This is only my theory as to why i haven't been hit with the high min bids, even though it would seem i fit the profile(lots of affiliate links and adsense on landing pages.)
I hope this helps a little bit..
Randy
Thanks.
My guess is that it isn't related to affilate links or adsense, but they are looking for other onsite things that fit a certain profile. Possibly stand alone pages that are not linked to other related pages or attempts to mislead the consumer by hiding your identity or not clearly stating your privacy policy. And/or only providing one way off the page - via your affiliate link.
My anecodtal experience would not support that. I have a couple of stand-alone affiliate-based landing pages that are not hit with the quality score issue.
i am wondering if there is a very strong correlation between the ad text, the site and what kind of QS people are seeing.
My anecodtal experience would not support that. I have a couple of stand-alone affiliate-based landing pages that are not hit with the quality score issue.
I started with adwords just before the changes in QS went in effect, as a new user i was concerned about the high Min bids and was relieved to see that i was not effected.
This was only a theory based on my limited experience and reading the threads by people who were effected.
i am wondering if there is a very strong correlation between the ad text, the site and what kind of QS people are seeing.
I am not sure how strong this correlation would be, i will admit that my ads were not the best, i have been trying to improve the ad text and provide more relevant landing pages. These poorly written ads did see an increase in Min bids but they were no where near the $5-$10 min, more like $.30-$40 from $.o5. A few weeks after changing ad text and landing page they went back down to the $.05 to $.10 min range.
carrucha,
Has google decided to affect the QS of your landing pages according to regular ranking algorithms? There aren't a lot of links coming in, low PR, site only 1yr old, etc (although this wasn't any kind of problem a few months ago.)
My site is a pr1, nowhere to be found in google search for the main keywords, and has very few backlinks. It was exactly 1 year old when i started with adwords.
So in my case it does not seem to be related to regular ranking algos. as i haven't been effected
