A Guide to AdWords Settings.
- July 6, 2010
- by Andrew Harris
Adwords has a number of settings, all of which can be used to ensure your AdWords campaign is targeted and refined in order to generate the best possible return for your budget.
This blog highlights the Adwords settings available plus the pros and cons of using each function.
Understanding the consequences of each setting when applied to your AdWords strategy will help you to make the correct decisions when setting up and managing your AdWords campaigns.
Geo Targeting
This setting enables you to select a specific area for your adverts to appear.
Pros - This setting is great for local small business as it will allow them to make generic (and expensive) terms more targeted.
Cons – This setting relies on matching local targeting against the searchers IP (internet protocol) address. Unfortunately the IP accuracy within the UK is questionable. Please answer the survey below so that we can investigate this factor in more detail together.
If you want to test your IP (amongst other things) this is a great website.
From my experience, most searchers from home will have accurate IP’s. However searchers at work (on their lunch of course) may have inaccurate IP’s, as proxy servers may be used.
The success of geo targeted campaigns are hugely dependant on IP accuracy as IP is used as its base for deciding who sees your adverts and who doesn’t.
Position Preference
This will ensure your adverts are only shown in certain positions.
Pros - this is great if you have analysis that certain positions convert well for you. Best practise is to use a fairly large position range. For example 2nd to 6th rather than a small range such as 2nd to 4th.
Cons – If your bid isn’t high enough to allow your advert to appear within the range you have specified, your advert will not be shown. Therefore you could lose exposure and conversions.
To use this setting correctly you must ensure you have completed the correct analysis. Do not introduce it on a hunch. Use Google analytics to analyse keyword performance in different positions. Select a wide range of position and ensure your bid is high enough to avoid the drop in exposure.
Bidding Options
Manual bidding requires a MAX CPC bid at either adgroup or keyword level. The adwords discounter will then calculate your actual CPC every that keyword is served. The actual CPC is based on competition, max CPC bid, history and quality score
Pros – you have full control. You can decide what bid you are willing to pay for each individual keyword based on performance and return. This bidding preference is the preferred choice for search marketers.
Cons – it needs constant management and monitoring. Leaving your bids static will negatively impact your ROI over a long period. Bid management tasks should be completed regularly taking into account your budget, keyword performance, quality score and return on investment
Automatic bidding will aim to generate the maximum number of clicks for your specified daily budget. A CPC limit is used to ensure the automated tool does not bid more than what you are willing to pay for a single click.
Pros - this is a good option if you have limited time to manage your campaign. CPC’s will be adjusted automatically and indiscriminately
Cons – the tool will not take into account the type of keyword. It will not understand if the keyword is generic or long tail. It also will not take into account your marketing goals and conversion rate per keyword.
CPA bidding, which is also known as Conversion Optimiser. It will adjust your bids at keyword level based on their conversion rate. It will attempt to generate conversions under your desired cost per action requirement
Pros – is this is good option if you need to hit targets to justify marketing budgets. However historical data is needed before this option can be activated.
Cons – in principle, conversion volume over time will be lower as the code behind the tool will not appreciate the buying cycle. Generic terms which have a high CPA will automatically reduced. If bids were managed manually, you could investigate the impact generic terms have on long tail and brand conversions and then make an educated decision accordingly. The automated tool will not do this. It will treat each keyword separately based on their individual merit and therefore conversion volume could reduce overtime.
Ad Delivery
Optimised advert delivery will take your group of adverts within a adgroup and will serve the best advert more frequently.
Pros – This automatic setting will ensure you get the best possible CTR% which is a huge factor of quality score. This is the preferred choice for search marketers
Cons – If new adverts are added into an established adgroup, they may struggle to gain exposure and therefore complete against an advert with a good CTR%.
A major negative is that this system does not take into account conversions. For example one advert may have a great CTR% however its conversion rate may be poor. A separate advert may have a lower CTR% however it may qualify the click and therefore generate an improved website engagement statistics.
Therefore in the scenario above, it is a trade off between quality score/CTR which works for a long term strategy against immediate return.
Rotate ad delivery setting will simply rotate each advert equally regardless of CTR performance.
Pros – this is great option for new campaigns. It will allow all adverts to gain enough traffic equally, allowing search marketers to make educated decisions on which adverts to run with going forward.
Cons – if this setting is used for a long period, you may be hindering your quality score as perhaps a better CTR% could be achieved if the Optimised setting is used instead.
Ad scheduling
This setting will turn your campaign on and off automatically based on a specified schedule. You can also use the advance option within the setting to reduce and push bids during certain periods by specify the % increase/decrease.
Pros – this is great for businesses which have opening times and do not wish to spend their PPC budget when they are closed. With correct analysis, it can also be used to improve your campaigns ROI.
Cons –If you are seeking to use ad scheduling to optimise your ROI, you must analyse your PPC campaign performance and website engagement stats correctly. Before you introduce ad scheduling, you must fully understand the relationship between generic and long tail/brand conversions. You must understand the lag between first click and conversions. The reports found within the search funnel section within Adwords are idea for analysing the above trends and therefore what ad scheduling should be used, if any.
If you introduce ad scheduling incorrectly, it may hinder your campaigns growth and therefore ROI over a long period.
I hope you find this blog useful. If you have any questions regarding your PPC campaign and you would like to discuss the above, feel free to contract the team here
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