1 ad result for my keyword, but google won't display my ad

below first page bid estimate

[davathar]

I have a campaign that is for a very niche product and there are almost zero competitors advertising with my keywords.

The search term "chuck hawks recoil" should show my ad. But google says "Below first page bid First page bid estimate: $0.80" Google says that about almost all of my search terms.

I have the keyword set to 0.05 because there are ZERO competing ads for that search term! Yet the ad won't show.

The ad will show for other terms where I have one or two competitors and am bidding a little higher like 0.20. My position is around 1.2 in those cases. Yet Google still flags the keyword as "Below first page bid First page bid estimate: $1.25" I don't care to be in first position. I want to be in third or fourth. But if I bid lower, the ad simply won't show.

What's going on here? If I'm willing to be 3rd of 3, why can't I bid .01 and still show up?

[davathar]

While waiting for a reply I thought of some more ways to search for answers on this topic.

It's pretty well explained here [adwords.google.com...]

Basically, if yours is the only ad that would display for a keyword, the cost to show it will be based entirely on the "Quality Score" assigned. And that's based on many factors like CTR history for the ad, the account, the keyword, and even the quality of the landing page (however that's measured...)

So, despite having zero competition for a keyword, Google will insist on a significant bid to show the ad at all.

The only way to reduce that amount is to improve the quality score.

[HRoth]

I had a similar experience, but where Google was actually showing no ads whatsoever for a particular keyword. I had an entire page dedicated to the keyword. The quality score was determined to be 6/10, because I had just put it together. They wanted something ridiculous, like the 1.25 you have been quoted, to show an ad. I wrote to them and asked them why, if they have no ads for that keyword, were they insisting on a high price. They said that was what they had determined the slot was worth.

That was a couple years ago. In all that time, there has never been any ad at all showing for that keyword. So they would rather make nothing than take less than what they determine something is worth. Crazy.

[Staffa]

that was what they had determined the slot was worth

That was my first impression when reading the OP in that it's not what you want to bid but what we want to make out of it.

So G is not a SE with ads anymore it's a paid links directory and those sites who do not pay get listed wherever is an empty spot and in whatever order to maintain their reputation of the biggest index in the world.

No surprise