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The Great Ideas Letter Forum
Google Adwords Tip #1
Posted By: Dien Rice
Date: Sunday, 24 October 2004, at 3:50 a.m.
Hi,
I thought I'd do a short "series" of tips on using Google Adwords...
For some people, this might be basic... But for others, hopefully it will help make you more successful in profitably advertising with Google.
Quick Intro - What is Google Adwords?
When you do a search on Google http://www.google.com - Google Adwords are the ads that show on the right side of the page with your search results. Also, a number of web sites run Google ads - you can usually recognize those Google ads, because they say "Ads by Goooooogle" in small text in the corner of the box with the ads. Using Google Adwords means running one of those ads yourself. The site to register to run Google Adwords is http://adwords.google.com .
Why should you care about using Google Adwords? Well, it's one form of advertising. However, it can be quite an effective one. You also only pay-per-click - so you only pay for people who click on your ad.
Also, you can now limit your Google ads to show only to certain states or even only certain cities. This means that Google Adwords could also be effective for some local promotions...
Many people have tried using Google Adwords, and have had trouble making profits with it. Anyway, this series should help give you some tips on how to make your Google Adwords ads profitable...
Alright, on to
Tip #1
One thing with Google Adwords is that, you need to keep your "click-through" rate for your ads above 0.5%. If your click-through rate goes below 0.5%, then your ad stops showing.
Some people have trouble getting their Google ads to stay above 0.5%. Personally, I haven't had trouble with this for a long time... There are several reasons, and the following tip is one of the reasons.
Google Adwords is split into two parts. One part is running your ad on the Google search engine web site, at http://www.google.com . The second part is running your ad on other web sites that are showing Google ads.
The important fact is, these two sections have different characteristics. One of the characteristics is that ads on Google searches tend to get much higher click-through rates than ads on other web sites showing Google ads.
It's not hard to see why. When someone uses the Google web site, they're in a "search" mentality. They're looking for something. That makes it more likely that they're going to click on something that looks like it might be what they're looking for.
On the other hand, on other web sites, you don't know their mentality. They might be more in the frame of mind of reading an article, or looking at diagrams, or whatever. However, they're less likely to be in that "search" frame of mind. That means they're less likely to click on one of your ads.
The default setting when you run a Google ad is to have your ad show on BOTH Google's own web site, and other web sites too. Then, when it calculates the click-through rate, it takes ALL the click-throughs, and all the page-views, and uses all the data to calculate your click-through rate. That means that if you're showing your ad on both Google's web site AND other web sites, and if the click-through rate on Google's web site is higher than on other web sites (as it probably will be) - then the other ads are bringing your click-through rate down.
That means that, since you have to keep over a 0.5% click-through rate for your ads to continue showing, there's a greater chance your ads won't make that click-through rate.
What can you do?
Fortunately, Google lets you switch off either of these two types of Google ads.
To do so, show all your campaigns in Google Adwords, then select which campaign you want to modify, then click on "Edit Settings".
When you do that, you'll see a section which says:
5. Where to show my ads
Show ads on Google and the
[] search network
[] content network
Both boxes will probably be checked. What you can do, is UNcheck the box next to "content network". That will stop showing ads to other web sites - so your ads will only be showing when people do searches.Doing this will probably bring your overall click-through rate up - and you'll be more likely to get click-throughs over 0.5%.
That doesn't mean you shouldn't advertise on the "content network" (meaning, web sites other than Google) too. However, you can set it up as a separate "Campaign". That way, any low click-through rates there won't drag down your overall click-through rate to affect whether your ads show on Google's search engine.
Anyway, that's one tip to help keep your click-through rates above 0.5%!
More Google Adwords tips will be coming... :)
- Dien
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