In fact, my own name, in my account, going to my website, is running a QS of 3 right now and the ad isn't even showing very often due to low QS. That's one of those situations where you know something is wrong as usually this is a 9-10 (and should be).
Anyone one else seeing odd proper name QS things going on?
On others they are seeing some mixed results.
(eWhisper and I share the same last name, although as far as we know, we're not related.)
It was a good source of cheap traffic for them, and a good business for the service that consolidated this data and offered a good service to these name holders.
Pls advise if this policy changes or if Google states anything officially (or non-officially) about this.
I only add the (if true)qualification to continue to give Google the benefit of the doubt.
I indeed trust that Brad and Meg are both highly trustworthy about matters such as these.
It always surprises me when a client says "I want to bid on the keyword John Smith". "Why?" I ask. "Because John Smith (sometimes the client's name) is known for [insert product here]". Yeah, maybe so, but you are not selling John Smith. You are selling [insert product here]. No relevancy.
Anyone one else seeing odd proper name QS things going on?
Yes, noticing it with brands that are proper names. Match type doesn't seem to matter. CTR is stellar (5-10% range). These are keywords with former 10/10 QS scores.
I think we're in the middle of something, FWIW. Seeing some changes in the last hour or so. I'm getting a "poor keyword performance" in ad diagnostics for a keyword with an absurdly high CTR and conversion rate. :)
I'm also noticing strange singular/plural behavior.
I go and read the dynamics for how QS is calculated and I read things like "It looks at a variety of factors to measure how relevant your keyword is to your ad text and to a user's search query" and then when you drill down you read stuff that has to be human evaluated, but I simply can't fathom that due the sheet volume of Ads that are getting put through the mill (but I'm not suggesting that's what happens)
For example the advice on navigability such as, "Provide a short and easy path for users to purchase or receive the product or offer in your ad. " - how can that be calculated as a factor for QS, if Google is not tracking the speed at which a user transacts and using GA data to inform the process.
Please someone tell me that they have an amazing quality score and don't have any GA on their website and I can stop my thinking like this!.
Can some expert here please explain Quality Score to me, because I've always seen it as something quite unsettling what a webmaster is being asked to "Trust" in terms of their QS rating.
2Clean.
I agree with you 2dean, to a certain point. Yes, Adwords people have gone QS mad. Google has done a good job in implanting that into advertisers' minds. But with fairly good reason. QS is the backbone of how you are ranked and how much you pay. Problem is, people have the wrong idea of what QS is and concentrate on trying to improve the wrong thing, trying to get from a decent 7 to 10.
Getting a low QS (my definition is lower than 7) is not a good thing and you do want to get it higher. Myself, I'll try to get it up higher, a 10 if possible, but I'm not going to pull my hair out if it's not. It's also about the ROI and given a choice, if my ROI is better with an ad with QS7 vs QS9, I'll go with the QS7 ad.
[edited by: bakedjake at 2:29 pm (utc) on July 30, 2009]
[edit reason] TOS 13 [/edit]
Is anyone seeing this QS problem with a landing page URL that exactly matches the proper name? For example, "john doe" and "johndoe.com" as the landing page URL?
Ours are not domain driven, but the term is usually in the URL, more like for keyword "john doe" the landing page would be:
example.com/content/john-doe
And for those that don't bid on proper names and could care less, don't be surprised when you get hit on your keywords some day. Because Google can completely manipulate the prices to whatever they want you to charge, and that's exactly what they do. The days of the honest auction are long over. I think it's time for some regulation, and I hate the government so this is pretty crazy for me to even say that, but Google has WAY too much power.
Microsoft was NEVER this bad, sure they put a few companies out of business here and there but they never turned a dial and wiped out traffic for hundreds of businesses. Google does that all the time, claiming 'quality score adjustments', when it's just 'increase the prices these suckers pay'.
Yes, I'm slightly bitter at the moment.
