Average position 1 to 2

Yet Below first page bid?

[vanderbolt]

I have an old account that has pulled in lots of traffic from adwords over the years. Now I am baffled on how hundreds of good kws have an average position from 1 to 2, yet they are being held back with "Below first page bid". Can anyone shed some light on this for me please.

[AussieWebmaster]

Could it be the push for holiday spending? Is the space something that has seasonal intruders? Are there new advertisers who are newbies going really high with their bids?

[vanderbolt]

AussieWebmaster....the product is not seasonal nor related to holiday spending.

I should have mentioned earlier that there are very few bidders for these kws (not more than 2 or 3). It really baffles me.

[netmeg]

How are your quality scores?

[LucidSW]

I believe this is because the system calculates your FPBE from all advertisers, no matter where they advertise. Or when.

For example, you advertise locally. Your FPBE is based on data for the same keyword from ALL advertisers, many of which themselves may advertise only locally. This skews the calculation. Also, I believe the system does not take into account inactive advertisers which can further skew the calculation.

In short, if you show on the first page, especially in a high position as you do but the system says your bid will place you below the first page, don't worry about it. Trust the data you see, not what the system says you should do.

[vanderbolt]

Nutmeg...my qs have taken a dive of about 4 to 5 points.

[netmeg]

(netmeg)

Then I'd work on bringing them up. Start by refining your ads; make sure every single ad is 100% relevant to every single keyword in the ad group. If there are any marginals, take 'em out for now.

[dlinid]

On other posts I have seen a mention that a bug in the Q/S is back. Go to the google forums to learn more about the nose dive of scores.