Auto Negative

What keywords are auto negative?

[Kings on steeds]

I added a keyword to my account on phrase matching, now as it was only a one word keyword, phrase acts like broad. So when I did a search for my keyword with the prefix THE it should have been displayed, but it wasn't, which leads to believe that G auto filters the word unless specified in the keyword.

So my question is what are the auto negatives? Has anyone come across others? What is G position on this (AWA?)?

Tnks,
Alan

[RhinoFish]

try the ad diagnostic tool within adwords and it should tell you why your ad isn't showing.

[Kings on steeds]

Ad not shown Ķ Reason: A negative keyword is preventing your ad from showing.

Interesting, As I mentioned I don’t have -the in my account.

[Windslide]

you are totally right.
This particular matter itīs been happening to me for about almost a year now. I remember thinking about starting a thread about this. I never considered a problem, but on all my campaigns all broad matches keywords are really behaving as if they were exact match. I dontīthinks thereīs such a thing as "auto negative", but could be.. Iīm not sure, I thought I was a change on Adwords.
But yes itīs true, broad match itīs not working for me.

Regards.

[Kings on steeds]

My broad matches are still as irational as ever, with apperancies for the most random combination of prefixes and sufixes, this problem only appears to be with phrase.

the "Auto-Negative" makes sence, but why doesn't google tell us, they will auto filter words such as "the" unless listed, this isnt a major thing, it is just another one of those things that baffels me about the system.

[RhinoFish]

so when you look at each of your campaign details, it shows:
"0 campaign negative keyword(s)"?
(this is one place they can be entered, at the campaign level)

and when you look at your keyword lists in your ad groups, none have a negative sign at the front indicating negs are in there?
(they get sorted / listed at the end of your keyword lists)

weird...

[Kings on steeds]

I have campaign negatives, as well as adgroup, but none of them are "the", not even close! so, yer it is wired. The only explanation is that Google "auto-filters" the keywords.

[RhinoFish]

i don't think "the" is some sort of auto-negative.

and yep, understand you have a 1-word keyword, entered as phrase, and so it acts somewhat like broad (but shouldn't see enhanced match this way).

i suspect the one word is either the name of an existing site or is a brand name or trademark type word... so when the "the" is seen, it may be interpreted as someone searching for "the" (pronounced "thee")... i think this because i've seen it in searches and ad behavior.

search for the 1-word name of a large satellite tv company with and without "the" - with "the" it looks like the search when you enter their domain name. maybe it's sensed as an indicator in this case, that the searcher is looking for the brand / mark / site by name and ads aren't shown...

if so, then the ad tool is confusing things for us (which is a sign that my guess here is likely wrong!).

i'd say check with your rep if you see other such cases. if this is the only case, i don't think it's losing you many visitors or worth too much time, just a curious oddity type thing.