Why not use Negative Keyword Lists?

I was actually going to do that until I started the process and realised there were serious problems with it.

Then I found that these do not take into account Phrase and Exact Match negative keywords, only Broad Match.

All three match types are important in these negative keywords, over 2,000 of them for every campaign (over 400 and growing) in the account.

I could have downloaded the list into excel from Editor, and tediously wrapped all the keywords with the needed punctuation since Editor exports them as

• keyword | Campaign Negative Exact Match, and not 
• -[keyword]

Then I would have needed to paste those into the negative keyword list and added all the campaigns to it.

Instead I just let AdWords Editor do all the work for me and leave it for a couple of hours to process and post, flawlessly.

I hadn't tried something on this scale before (nearly a million keywords to post) but I was confident all would be well – and it was (click to see full size images).

Why AdWords Training Masterclasses in – Bracknell? (and the Thames Valley, Berkshire).

I've been working with AdWords since 2005, and yet even today I never stop getting surprising new insights from it based on all sorts of things I see in client accounts (this week for example – we deleted keywords from a client campaign, and impressions and clicks *rose* steeply while CPC fell – huh? Perhaps Hal Varian is right after all …)

And of course Google continually sneak new things out without even telling us …

I've been training AdWords clients on and off since 2007, but usually remotely over a period of weeks (my corporate background also has quite a bit of training preparation and delivery in it).

In late 2009 I started working very intensively with a client for who the AdWords Conversion Optimizer seemed a good fit.

The results were truly startling and gave me a profound (and probably unique at that time, outside of Google themselves) insight into what lay under the hood of the system which so many of us had been working with, and believed we understood, since 2003 or so.

As I tested new things, and deliberately broke all the rules to see what would happen, I made strange new discoveries that defied all the logic and best practices we had evolved up to that point in time.

But they also answered many questions and dispelled many myths (why do all new campaigns default to all networks? and what's the best way to set ad rotation?)

By then I had attended several System Seminars in Chicago and had established relationships with some of our top Industry publishers, so I started sharing my findings with my good friend Bryan Todd at Perry Marshall and Associates. 

As I got more data, they became increasingly interested in having me share it at their first upcoming AdWords Elite Masters Summit on Maui, (April 2010).

When I mentioned it to Ken McCarthy, he invited me to share it at the System Seminar Chicago 2010, and then so did Howie Jacobson at Camp Checkmate too.

I'd never stood up and presented to hundreds of people before (not since I gave my Groom Wedding Speech anyway in 1996!) so it was pretty terrifying – but hugely rewarding.

Since then (and attending Maui 2, and System New York 2011) I've come to realise that what gives me the greatest satisfaction is being able to share my experience with others.

So starting off in my local area which is easily reachable, I have decided to see if anyone might be interested in what I have to share, and believe me I can talk for *hours* about this stuff, it's just so fascinating.

If you'd like to join me at my home office, or a local conference center, I am now offering AdWords Training in Bracknell, Reading, Slough, Basingstoke, Fleet, Windsor, Newbury, Swindon and Oxford, UK.

What you learn could transform your AdWords campaigns …

I've had a standard approach in all that time, and started off using an excel template and "traffic light" indicators.

But there's more to understanding an AdWords account than just the campaign data  - that's just the *Traffic* part.

To be successful you also have to audit the *Conversion* part ("clickthrough for show, Conversion for dough" as I always say).

And the final piece of the Trinity – ECONOMICS

Setting aside the branding activities and deep pockets of larger Corporates, the average small to medium AdWords advertiser should only really have one question: "Am I earning more from AdWords than I am spending?"

The economic value of a click – even for the same keyword – is potentially completely different between advertisers buying the same traffic, but converting it on their website at different rates, and having different sales processes and economic overheads and metrics.

Larry Kim (CEO) may recall consulting with me for some hours a couple of years ago, and recently, Wordstream released their "Grader" tool – so how good is it?

I believe Wordstream's "Grader" to be missing some essential data and quite misrepresentative of other.

(click to enlarge)

For the most part, I agree with their approach, as we are all looking at the same data within an AdWords account.

But, the interpretation of that can vary …

Before now, only by using Google Analytics could you see how your ads were performing differently in the Top and Side positions.

It's pretty commonly accepted that top position ads "do better" than side position – and many advertisers go after these slots above all else even if they don't realise what it actually translates to in terms of conversions and profits.

The new segmentation report dispels this myth forever, and now at last you can make decisions based on data.

(Richard Stokes of AdGooroo shared some very interesting data about top vs side position ads and costs earlier this year at the Perry Marshall AdWords Elite Masters Summit in Maui)

And this important new source of data can allow you to test entirely different bidding strategies

• "Lurk" – hang out in side positions and lower cost, but at the penalty of reduced conversions (sometimes drastically or even totally)
• "Go for Broke" – bet the ranch and go for maximum visibility and test whether your site conversion rates and Economics make it viable

I have one client where "Lurking" failed, and "Go for Broke" is working just great.

But you'll only know by testing.

The other related dimensions to this are Ad Extensions, Headline Promotion, and Domain Promotion, which only come into play in the top positions – we've seen these do good things for CTR and consequently Quality Score, and of course, Quality Scores and bid prices are the key to this.

And I have some interesting experience relating to "Demographics" that ties into this very well (these are general principles only and market exceptions will apply):

• the smaller the demographic, the higher the need for "Going for Broke" and
  • high Quality Scores
  • occupying top spots
  • high site conversion rates
  • high sales prices
  • narrow focus
• the larger the demographic, the better the chances of "Lurking" and
  • lower Quality Scores
  • lower and side positions (even page 2)
  • lower site conversion rate
  • lower sales or lead prices
  • casting a wide net

(click image for full size)

Read the full post at the Inside AdWords blog

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The Faster Times and Joshua M. Brown issue a warning and an excellent article at

http://thefastertimes.com/wallstreet/2011/07/10/can-groupon-hold-off-living-social-and-google-offers/

The article lists 10 important points and finishes with 

the “offers space” is going to witness the ugliest brawl in all of social media

Note point (8) where payment is discussed, and (my italics)

unless of course the original Groupon offer was unprofitable (another issue for the offers business).

This is the true issue: How do you know if it works?

When your Yellow Pages rep calls and says "Do you want to pay us again this year?" how do you decide?

If you know it's profitable it's an easy decision.

So how will you know your Offer was profitable?

When we start to see Offers ad extensions roll out online, getting clicks and incurring costs, the participating Merchant has to be able to track online spend to offline sales transactions, and Google has all the infrastructure coming along to close the feedback loop:

• see an offer on your pc (or phone) and click
• download to your phone
• carry phone to Offer
• redeem Offer
• pay with wallet in phone
• online Offer records Offline sale
• we just got paid

This is going to be interesting …

Now there's plenty to choose from. Which is the best one?

In my opinion a lot of the same things are still being said about management services and how to choose between them after several years, and they are mostly "features" not "benefits", e.g

• split testing ads
• small groups of well-related keywords with themed ads
• keywords in the ads
• negative keywords
• and other best working practices …

Yes, of course…

But if you're paying someone to do this right, you should care a lot less about *how* they do it, and a lot *more* about the results they deliver.

Management by Outcome, not by Procedure.

So how do you define "results"?

Impressions? Clicks? CTR? CPC? Conversions? Conversion Rate? Cost per Conversion? Profit? Phone calls? Emails?

What is "the best adwords management service"? And what result would it give you?

I believe it to be whatever is best for YOU.

If I provided you "the perfect AdWords campaign"

• What would it look like? (feature)
• What do you want it to do? (feature)
• What would its value be – to you? (benefit)

So for any AdWords management service to be the best one for you – be certain you know what you want to get from it and can measure the result.

I think the answer is "Follow the Money" – what do you spend, and what do you get in return?

As has been said by others, there's no "one size fits all" AdWords management solution for every business.

An AdWords campaign goes through a life-cycle, which we call Discover/Optimize/Expand.

What it looks like and what its doing is different at each phase. It's only working properly when it's fully mature, which we've found can take up to 3 months.

But the investment in time and money is worth it because it can then behave very consistently and controllably – to your economic requirements.

You see, economics (hat tip Perry Marshall) is often the truly missing piece of the equation …

If I created the "perfect" AdWords campaign and gave it to you and other business owners, it's very possible it could behave totally differently in terms of economics.

For you it could be making some money. For another it could be losing money. For yet another, it could be wildly profitable.

How come?

Because, I don't control your business – you do.

And every business has different factors and costs, outside of my control, like

• website conversion performance
• quality control
• cost price
• margins
• supply chain
• fulfillment
• staff costs
• premises
• returns
• development
• utilities
• infrastructure
• and many others …

So (although I'm biased) I think the best AdWords Management service will "Follow the Money" - YOUR money.

And give you back more than you spend.

It really is that simple.

What could we do for your AdWords campaigns?  Apply for an audit and find out. »

Jerry Maguire: "Show me the money!"

Tom Cruise suffers an attack of conscience and loses everything, including his highly successful and lucrative career, because of it.

During his moral rebirth he retains a single client who judges him purely on his results:

Jerry Maguire: Show me the money!
Rod Tidwell: I need to feel you, Jerry!
Jerry Maguire: Show me the money!
Rod Tidwell: Jerry, you got to yell!
Jerry Maguire: [screaming] Show me the money! Show me the money! [courtesy: IMDB]

Although we won't be screaming it down the telephone to you, our Commission-Only AdWords Management service is designed, above all, to "Show me the money!"

Because if you aren't earning from it, neither are we …

Hint: It's something every Corporate network user does every day without even thinking about it …

Answer: the humble Login.

Most Google Search users are conditioned that they can use Google whenever and wherever they want, without the need to login.

Corporate network users and Social network users know they have to log in to be able to use their services and get done what they need to get done.

So Google's Social Mission is to make it imperative that users have a Google Profile, and login to be able to use their stuff.

So they've got to come up with innovative ways to make it irresistible to login for killer social toys.

Have they done that with Google+ , Circles, Sparks, Hangouts and more …?

We shall see!

And what do you get at the end of the journey?

It depends on how efficiently you use it:

• flat out acceleration, or a slow, steady speed (ad delivery)
• size of your engine and how much it guzzles (CPC)