SMX (Search Marketing Expo) Advanced was one of the best conferences I’ve ever attended. Although I attended some great SEO sessions at the conference, today I’m going to review my favorite topics from the Paid Search Track.
Tallie Merritt, FSC Interactive’s Director of Search Goes to SMX Advanced in Seattle.
Creating Paid Search Ads In Google
Creating paid search ads is something we have all done a million times. You ask yourself, what are the keywords I am bidding on, who is searching for this product and what wording will make them click on my ad, maintaining relevance of course. According to Google, from the Learn with Google room at SMX Advanced, here are some things they’d like us to know from their data.
If the keyword searched is in the URL, you could see an 8% increase in clicks. If the keyword searched is in the headline, you could see a 15% increase. Using title case could increase your clicks by 62%. But best of all…if the keyword is in the headline and the first line of the ad, you could see a 68% increase in clicks!
Some other best practices mentioned at the conference — use shorter site links. They are proven to have a better CTR (click through rate). Use all relevant ad extensions. With the launch of Hummingbird, our brand has a better opportunity to dominate the page. Ad extensions are one way to achieve said domination.
Lastly, when running remarketing campaigns, use the Google Analytics tags to create your lists instead of AdWords. Google Analytics will allow you to apply your segments to AdWords, improving your reporting and targeting.
Ad Testing – The Right Way
After we create our ads, the testing begins. And believe me, I love testing! I heard from Brad Geddes from Certified Knowledge and Maria Corcoran from Adobe at SMX about how they test their creative. Here are some highlights:
Plan. Plan the test. Plan for failure. Plan to change your plan. Plan to adapt.
So what goes into planning?
- At the start, define the core elements like ad copy and extensions. Then look at the cost benefits of what you could test. Lastly make sure the requirements make sense.
- Establish a hypothesis and be aware of the complications or side effects. Sure, your CTR might increase, but you might have a short term loss in revenue as a result. Be aware.
- Build variations and of course keep a control.
- Validate the measurement. Is your tracking in place? Are you scheduling your test and taking into account seasonality or events?
- Adapt iterations. As you test and learn, document and test what you’ve learned.
Quality Score – Straight From Google
Oh the dreaded quality score. Do I love it or hate it? I just can’t decide. Well, again in the Learn from Google room at SMX Advanced, I got the scoop on what matters and what doesn’t. Let’s start with what matters.
First, Quality Score is only meant to tell you something is wrong with your campaign. Like a tornado siren, if the alarm is sounding, a tornado is coming. Likely the culprits are your CTR, ad relevance or landing pages. Additionally, similar to organic search, Google cares about the user’s experience. If you do not, you will see the results in a low quality score.
Now to the surprising part — what doesn’t matter when it comes to your Google Quality Score? Ad extensions do not affect Quality Score positively or negatively. Whether you use them or don’t, whether they are quality or not, it doesn’t matter when specifically focusing on your Quality Score.
Quality score does not take into account geo-graphic targeting or the keyword combo’s you use in your bids, ads and landing pages. They care about relevance, but not specifically how you use your keywords or the combinations they take on. Lastly, your account structure or ad placement will not change your Quality Score for the better or worse. So set up your structure and bidding however best suits your goals.
Stay tuned for more tips and tricks from SMX Advanced in Seattle! Next time we’ll talk about structured data and SEO.