Multiple words in a Negative Keyword

[rwilson]

I have a product that has two capabilities, for example a male connector and a female connector however the way the product is used it can never connect "male to female" but if someone searches "male female connector" the search would be relevant.

This may sound confusing without sharing what the product is but basically I want people searching both "male female" but not "male to female"

If I made "male to female" as a negative would it block searches for "male female"?

[alexsel]

If I made "male to female" as a negative would it block searches for "male female"?

That is a very granular request but the answer is no, assuming you use exact match negative keyword, [male to female]

Important to make sure that you include the brackets around the keyword, otherwise it will be a broad matched negative keyword.

[RhinoFish]

for: -[male to female]
if you do use neg exact match, it will ONLY block the exact search 'male to female'

you want to do something else. there are several ways to do this, it depends on the other words involved.

one way is to mine the searches, adding exact and phrase negs to block specific searches...

one such phrase neg is: -"male to female"
there will be other variants you'll want to block

here's a good starting place (read the entire thread):
[webmasterworld.com...]

[alexsel]

Also don't make the assumption that the user always know what they're searching for. Adding negative matched keywords for something so closely related to your desired keywords may lose you business. At the end of the day you have to look at what converts and what doesn't.

If you pull a search query report, look at a statistically significant amount of data, start excluding terms that simply don't perform. Don't exclude terms that you THINK are not going to work. I'm amazed at how profitable some of the terms we bid on are when they seem to be garbage keywords.

[rwilson]

Thank you RhinoFish that is a good thread, although it looked like the Adwords rep only mentioned broad match negative keywords, unless I missed it.

Also don't make the assumption that the user always know what they're searching for.

This is a great point, but in this specific case pairing the words together like that creates a need for an entirely different product. This may be a good time for me to address my ad text also. Make sure that it is more clear as to what I'm offering.

[RhinoFish]

did you check page 2?

[rwilson]

did you check page 2?

Apparently not close enough. I see it now, thanks!

[RhinoFish]

:-)

[areyougellin]

Stick to exact and phrase matched negatives that you KNOW would not be relevant for your ads. Broad, as you said, is going to block queries that you actually want.

Then after running for a week, run a Search Query report and see if there's anything further that you can exclude.

[RhinoFish]

i disagree with the above advice, broad negs are very important and useful and commonly apply (more so than exact and phrase).

but it is very true that you should consider the other neg match types to cure specific matching issues for your particular ppc.

[rwilson]

Phrase and exact would work in this case but generally I use broad match negatives

[areyougellin]

> i disagree with the above advice, broad negs are very important and
> useful and commonly apply (more so than exact and phrase).

I think broad match negatives would block legitimate traffic in this case.

[RhinoFish]

we both recommended phrase and exacts for the specific issue, i'm just saying the OP will very likely still need broad negs to be used.