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Then I largely got out of that game with Overture and just stuck with AdWords for the last year or so.
Recently, I've been assisting a friend get his small business-oriented terms listed on Overture. And it's been a NIGHTMARE! :(
1) He has several thousand keywords over 22 campaigns. I had to enter a few hundred in at a time. And I couldn't specify a category or match-type for them when submitting!
2) While impressed that Overture reviewed (auto or otherwise) all of the terms within three days, I am peeved to note that they declined at least 20% of them... in some cases, entire campaigns. For instance, they nixed almost all phrases that include a common (and certainly not-vulgar!) misspelling of a term popular term in my friend's market area (e.g., they nixed all terms with "widgits"... like "buy widgit utilities").
And, just to rant a bit and get this out of my (rather frustrated and bleary-eyed) system:
3) With the remaining keywords, I couldn't simply set all of them to broad match. I couldn't even set 200 of them at a time to broad match because their server (NOT my browser) would simply hang every time I tried. Likewise, I couldn't set categories in groups of 200, either. 100's the max, apparently.
So here I have nearly 5,000 terms, and have spent the past MANY (and very boring) hours searching on URLs, adding categories, and setting them to broad match 100 at a time. Charming.
Of course, I had earlier assumed that the CS folks at Overture would help me -- a former somewhat-big-spender -- out with this. Nope. Nothing they could do.
* * *
So now I plan on calling them Tuesday to get them to reconsider their seemingly willy-nilly declines on reasonable keyword / ad pairings. Any advice?
- Adam, really really wishing he had charged his friend by the hour rather than on a project basis... but then again, why should my friend be penalized for Overture's bullheadedness?
P.S. -- You can bet that -- after all this -- I'll be highly unlikely to recommend Overture for other friends or future clients. I've had (and shared) gripes about AdWords, true, but wrestling with Overture these past weeks has really put things in perspective for me!
Usually what happens is something is promised in the descritpion, or a mention made to another specific keyword, and they don't feel the landing page is appropriate to that additional word - and then they'll decline it.
They don't like telephone numbers in the descriptions, and some other odd things.
The other reason that I've seen for that exact decline listing is misspellings or improper grammar.
Most working musicians would know what a "fake book" was ...
She was constantly having to look stuff up, and also asked her supervisor for clarifications. When I asked to speak to her supervisor directly, I was told, "[giggle] No, that was just a quick ask-y... sorry."
One of the most stunning comments she made was that thousands of my terms were rejected because I didn't use the search phrase in BOTH the title and description. Excuse me?!
I know I can't give specific examples here, but let me try to offer a sort-of-general example.
The title: "Buy Widget Memory Management Software"
The description: "Stop your widget from crashing by using this handy utility..."
One of the phrases rejected: "Purple Widget memory manager"
Apparently, I need to have "Purple Widget memory manager" included in both the title AND description.
Am I alone in thinking this is ridiculous? And at risk of being a bit petulant, does anyone have any suggestions for having someone with just a TINY bit of Widget knowledge re-evaluating my listing request?
Maybe I just need to take a nap or a drink, but I still can't believe some of what he says Overture has a right to object to.
My favorite example: "Car care" as a term isn't okay, because the title only has "Auto care" in it.
I just can't believe this stupidity.
1. Ask the rep to resubmit your listings to a senior editor.
2. Resubmit the words yourself and hope the editor that gets your words this time isn't as strict when it comes to their guidelines.
I also feel that you are submitting too many keywords at once. You won't be able to do the "keyword in the title" routine. Add your campaign keywords over a period of 1 or 2 months. Meanwhile, you tweak the accepted keywords to improve CTR etc, create "CATEGORIES" (similar to AdGroups) and increase/decrease bid prices keeping the conversion rate in mind.
How much are you spending on this account?
Well, I WAS spending about $8,000 monthly a few years back. But even if I were spending that much now, it wouldn't matter; my friend has not spent much on Overture (he didn't know what to do with it). So Overture won't grant him any special favors (or, apparently, a knowledgeable account rep).
I also feel that you are submitting too many keywords at once.
Meanwhile, you tweak the accepted keywords to improve CTR etc, create "CATEGORIES" (similar to AdGroups) and increase/decrease bid prices keeping the conversion rate in mind.
The latest is that the 2nd person I spoke to today by phone at Overture agreed to send the entire submission back for review. I hope this time someone with a bit more skill and common sense looks at it ;)
Anyway, thank you for the suggestions. I appreciate it!
