Avg. Pos 54.0

[Mike_Mackin]

So I try to be a little more specific and drill down into more KW phrases. I bid $0.50 on a 5 word phrase and pull a position of # 54.

Those stats are %$&*ed. What can we tell our clients?

I'm getting good sales BUT the stats are of no value. :(

You would think that PhDs would value stats......

[vibgyor79]

Never had a problem with the avg position - it is generally correct.

You should probably run a search for the keyword, take a screenshot and send to across to your client. Ask your client to run a search for the keyword too. Just warn your client not to overdo it - Tell him/her the account will self-destruct if Google finds out ;)

Tell your client that (s)he shouldn't be worried about the stats - as long as the ads are accruing clicks at a good CTR.

[figment88]

With the way Google works having more words in your keyword phrase will increase competition instead of decrease.

For example, say you have strong red california widgets as your phrase. You then compete with all the 1-word, 2-word, and 3-word combinations:
red california
strong widgets
california widgets

Many of these sub-combinations wthout the modifying words might have nothing to do with your target, but you compete against them anyway.

[chiyo]

figment is absolutely correct and his examples are very clear. Adding a word does not target better as it does in Overture for non bracketed or apostrophed phrases. Your competition gets more, not less.

Adding a keyword also does not reduce the cost as it does in OV. Sometimes it increases the cost.

This is my main problem with Adwords - while claiming it can niche better, in reality it does not using the default format with no brackets or quotes. Using brackets and (sometimes) quotes helps but they have their own issues. For example it can reduce the impressions to almost nothing.

[webdiversity]

Mr. Mackin,

Generally speaking the average position is there or thereabouts. To be honest we don't check it, as it affects the CTR if you do an impression without a click.

As you know the true test will be the sales volume. Tell your client how great the sales results are. Period. They won't care if they are 1st or 54th.

In actual fact the stats are of immense value. Because of their inaccuracy many advertisers will be lulled into thinking that they have campaigns set up sweetly, when the reality will be the opposite.

In the absence of advertisers or historical data, Google default to <0.1 on keywords, this tends to make a lot of advertisers go look harder, when often they don't need to.

Eventually, the data will be accurate, and when that day comes the game will be well and truly on, at the moment the competition is thin on the ground, often the other advertisers bidding against you are there by mistake (they are not using phrase or exact match and get shown for searches that on the face of it seem relevant but in reality are not).