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View Full Version : Google Improves Ad Relevancy For AdWords Service



Chris
06-30-2004, 04:04 PM
Search engine Google sent customers an email yesterday that outlined changes to their ad relevancy algorithms. These changes are being made in order to improve the targeting of ads and members' ROI.

The motivation behind the algorithm changes is, according to Google, "designed to provide the most relevant, targeted ads possible." By improving relevancy, Google believes this will help users find services that are being search for, and therefore, increase AdWords "stickiness".

Google has set up a page (https://adwords.google.com/select/news/sa_jun04.html) outlining the upcoming changes, while giving an example of what they hope to accomplish:

"An advertiser specializing in Alaskan cruises may have selected cruises (broad-matched) for their campaign. Previously, this keyword may have been disabled due to poor performance on more popular queries such as Hawaiian cruises."

"Instead of disabling all broad match variations of cruises, we will now show this ad for specific query variations that are more relevant to the ad, such as Alaskan cruises."

Changes in AdWords relevancy may cause members to see differences in their ad click rates, with some rising and others falling. Google acknowledges that members may also see a "change in your website traffic and ad performance metrics, such as your clickthrough rate (CTR), cost-per-click, or ad ranking."

If this occurs, Google recommends optimizing your current ad campaigns. They offer a link (https://adwords.google.com/select/tips.html) to an optimization tip page for any further information. Google also states that this will initially affect ads that use "broad-matched keywords."

These changes have caused the SEO forums to light up with the news of Google's changes. A post from "andrewgoodman", a moderator on the SearchEngineWatch forum (http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/forum/showthread.php?t=422), says, "It appears the new treatment of broad matches might be aimed at countering the ‘swamping effect' that causes perfectly good ads to be disabled…"

Aviator
07-09-2004, 08:34 AM
I've been using Adwords since it's inception and run several campaigns for various clients. I'm a bit confused over the recent changes and their effects on some of my more effective programs.

I've seen certain phrase matched keywords drop in impressions by a factor of 10, which of course is having a negative impact on my total clicks from the campaign.

For instance, "organize favorites" is a popular keyphrase that has dropped in total impressions by a large factor.

How can I improve the relevancy of this and other keyword phrases to get my impressions back to where they were in light of the new Adwords algorithm?

Do I need to completly redesign my campaigns because of the recent changes?

fasteddie
07-10-2004, 08:16 PM
Hi Aviator

As far as I'm aware the new changes are only supposed to be affecting broad matches, not phrase matches or exact matches.

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