Google CPC's Through the Roof....

Google Adwords CPC

[ScrumW9]

I currently have upwards of 50 campaigns in Adwords, and have noticed that the last 5 I have created are now by far the most expensive. CPC's in each of these new Campaigns are 3, 4, even 5 times the average CPC I am paying in each of the remaining Campaigns. I even moved a term from one AdGroup to another, and saw its CPC rise to nearly 5 times what I was paying. Google's explanation for these high click costs was that the playing field is growing, and with more competition the costs will inevitably rise. I'm not buying it. I cannot imagine I have managed to randomly choose 5 widgets in a row that just happen to have the highest CPC's in all of Adwords. In addition, Google's Traffic Estimator predicted costs of about 1/5th of what I am currently paying. Has anyone else experienced CPC increases like this lately? Again, this has only started happening in the last month or so.

[qwik]

i would guess that the reason is this.. before google had this to work with:

Bidder #1 2.00 max - acutal cost 1.66
Bidder #2 1.65 max - actual cost 1.16
Bidder #3 1.15 max - actual cost 0.46
bidder #4 0.45 max - actual cost 0.05

now they have a new rule which is supposed to let advertisers with cheaper adds but high ctr move up higher than more expensive ads with lower ctr.. since google is the only one who knows what the ctr of all the ads are, it shouldnt suprise us to see supposedly bad performing ads in poor positions paying the max click-through.. this way google gets more money.. plus, higher ads get more clicks.. so advertisers spend more money to try and get a better position so they can get enough clicks to get a better position, which they cant get because they dont have a good ctr.. as google laughs all the way to the bank..

of course, i dont have to worry much.. my keywords get disabled almost immediately with the new system.. at least Overture still loves me..

-qwik

[eyeinthesky]

I noticed this too but the CPCs tend to get lower as the ads mature and build up CTR.

The start is always very painful.

[dave741]

Jmez described very similar problem here:
[webmasterworld.com...]

If there are any changes (and it seems, there are), I am sure I am not alone, who wants to know it.

I really wonder, what the AWA answer will be.

[dave741]

This morning, like a switch, our average CPCs took a giant tumble on our new campaigns. We are now paying something like 1/4th of what we have been paying for the last month. This is on multiple keywords in multiple campaigns. Competitors have not changed and no one has dropped out of the bidding.

(posted here: [webmasterworld.com...] )

ScrumW9, is this true for your account, too?

[toddb]

It is true for me. That is why I am reading today as I wanted to know what the change was.

Edit: this refers to the post above ^

[AdWordsAdvisor]

Hi all,

I'm not ignoring this thread, or the other thread referenced above.

I'm now taking a look into this, along with some tech folks, and will post again as soon as I'm able. Thanks for the patience. ;)

AWA

[ddogg]

Something big changed today. Positions are all out of whack for various keywords across multiple sites for me. I didn't change anything from yesterday or the whole week yet positions have dropped (for some keywords).

I don't know what's going on but it's something..

[AdWordsAdvisor]

Hi all,

Ok, I've been running your comments past engineering today, and they'll be looking into the CPC and CTR behavior you've described over the weekend.

In the meantime, if you continue to see this sort of odd behavior in your account, please contact AdWords support by using the 'Contact Us' link from within the account(s) in question.

The more specific and detailed the info you can provide, the better. It's always best to have 'actual examples' and lots of details to work with, when troubleshooting this sort of thing.

Many thanks in advance for both your examples, and your patience.

AWA