Seriously considering image ads for some verticals to continue the branding
Definitely true about the massive number of impressions.
pageoneresults, do you disable it completely?
I do on those campaigns that have a "very tight" budget. All we want is the actual Google Search traffic as we feel that is probably the best converting over the Content Network. I feel that the best place to be is at the core of the activity. I also feel that once you get into the Content Network the quality of the click throughs drops which in turn is going to have an overall impact on your campaign. We like to be a bit over conservative, especially when working with minimal budgets.
I also feel that once you get into the Content Network the quality of the click throughs drops which in turn is going to have an overall impact on your campaign.
Interesting, how does that affect the overall campaign?
Google's content network: [adwords.google.com...]
Contextual Targeting: [adwords.google.com...]
Placement Targeting: [adwords.google.com...]
If you are trying to save time by running content and search together, you need to reconsider that strategy because:
1) Content will only look at 50 keywords so if you have more words than that in your adgroups, you need to make adjustments (if you can find a link to that information, let me know - I've been told this by Google multiple times now).
2) Ads for content need to be spicy so you don't need to use the same ads that you use in your regular adgroups.
3) Keyword groupings for content work a little different now than they used to so you'll get better results if you use slightly different keyword sets for search and content.
One Search Campaign
One Content Campaign
The search campaign is my premium campaign. Higher CPC, higher targeting, hundreds of negative keywords from historical account history and plane non matches as discovered through wordtracker and such.
The Content campaign is very broad keywords to get the most impressions. I balance the CPC right at the minimum for broad matches.
I'll also create 3rd campaigns sometimes when i do site targeted traffic. These can be VERY expensive CPC's on some sites however the traffic is very much worth it. You may get a terrible CTR but the branding when matched 100% to a great vertical can bring traffic for months to come.
"weed out from there" is the process of running your click reports and tuning your keywords/negative keywords to make sure you're continually targeting your market.
I've been using wordtracker and the reports to do both. Wordtrack is great because it finds cases where something you sell may be a city name, travel destination, the name of a boat, famous person, yacht or have all sorts of niches you wouldn't care to have and don't want to pay money for and thats how i come up with my lists.
for example "kingston widget" - that has thousands of non matches because its a city, brand, brand with many components and a brand that could have service/repair/warranty/reviews/comparison/benchmarks/reliability and a plethora of queries that wouldn't make sense to target or wouldn't convert at a profitable degree.
Then I have other campaigns where it's just not worth the time and trouble to do all that for Content Network - I don't get any kind of return on it.
So there's no tried and true way of determining whether or not to use it, other than to test it, in very controlled circumstances.
So there's no tried and true way of determining whether or not to use it, other than to test it, in very controlled circumstances.
And with smaller budgets, it usually is not an option. You want to spend your time and money wisely and I feel the Content Network is where the "waste" factor increases. I refer to it as the "throw it up against the wall and see what sticks" network.
As noted above, if you're really into this and have the tools and knowledge available to you, it can work in some instances. I'm sure deeper pockets may prevail. :)
That's what I'm doing, and I'm generally happy with the results.
Rgds
Damon
I used to sell on Buy.com but a tuned content ad / partner ad is much cheaper.. Buy.com wants 6-15% of your sale value, i get plenty of conversions at .50 cents to 1.25 from them ;)
"Weed out" is a continuous job and sometimes you may need to "Weed back in" because everything is a trend and never set in stone like some people like to suggest
Do you specifically target these guys with Google's "site targeting"?
Rgds
Damon
