Tag: search engine advertising

Google Expands “Analyze Competition” AdWords Feature

A couple months ago, Google introduced the "Analyze Competition" feature for AdWords advertisers. This can be found in the "opportunities" tab.

The feature was initially only available to a small number of advertisers using the English language AdWords interface. Today, Google announced that it is expanding. Now the feature is available for all English language accounts.

The feature examines the account’s activity over two weeks, and lists categories that represent the products/services you’re advertising. These are based on search terms and are matched up against your keywords, ad text, and landing page text. For each category associated with the account, users will see a bar graph highlighting individual performance compared to the performance of other advertisers in the category.

Google’s Jason Shafton explains, "In addition to the feature’s core functionality, you can now also see the Google search terms that triggered your ad for each of the most specific sub-categories in your account. Click a category name to see more specific sub-categories. When the category name is no longer a link, you’ll know you’re at the most specific sub-category — this is where you’ll see a "See search terms" link. Seeing the search terms that triggered your ad can serve as inspiration for new keyword ideas or help you understand if your keywords have been miscategorized by our system. If you see that the search terms listed for a given category are not related to the keywords in your ad groups, you may consider making keywords more specific or adding new negative keywords."

Google says it intends to bring more features to Analyze Competition in the future.

August 27, 2010
Microsoft adCenter Expands Negative Keyword Limits

Microsoft announced that it has expanded negative keyword limits in adCenter. This should be of particular interest now that Yahoo and adCenter are coming together.

If you’re not familiar with negative keywords, advertisers can prevent their ads from appearing in response to certain search queries using negative keywords (specific words or phrases that help prevent ads from being displayed to customers who are unlikely to click).

Advertisers can now add thousands of negative keywords t both the campaign and ad group levels. The company notes that you’ll need to delete negative keywords at the keyword level, because the list limit hasn’t been expanded there yet.

"Doing so will also keep your keyword-level negatives from overriding your newly expanded lists at the higher levels," says Microsoft’s Tina Kelleher.

Advertisers need to upload their expanded lists of negative keywords at the campaign or ad group level with the negative keywords migration wizard in the Desktop, then remove keyword-level negatives, the company says.

"Unless, of course, you’re perfectly happy with your campaigns as they are now and don’t need the increased capacity for negatives at the higher levels, then there’s no action you need to take at all," Kelleher adds.

August 19, 2010
Does Google Offer Too Many Ad Formats?

The Wall Street Journal is running a piece discussing how tech companies (like Google, Yahoo, AOL, Groupon, etc.) are touting new online ad formats. Author Jessica E. Vascellaro has some quotes from Google CEO Eric Schmidt about some things the company is thinking about within this realm.

For one, according to this piece, Schmidt says Google is looking at addressing an apparently popular concern from advertisers – that there are too many ad formats to choose from.

So too many choices in how to reach consumers is a problem? Is Google going to reduce the number of options available? Well, I guess we’ll see, but at the same time, Schmidt is also quoted about some new interactive video ads Google has in store. Vascellaro reports, "Such ads, which could appear anywhere on a Web page, not just inside a video, would be like mini-Web pages. That means they could allow Web users to watch a video, leave a comment and see real-time updates within the ads that are more customized to their interests." She adds that Schmidt suggested such ads will become "prevalent", but didn’t comment on specific plans.

Search Engine Land contributing editor Greg Sterling suggests, "I would expect these forthcoming video units to also show up in search at some point, making them perhaps the ultimate combination of search + display."

Google is always experimenting with different ad offerings and strategies, so I find Schmidt’s comments about the "too many formats" issue interesting. Regardless of the amount of format choice Google provides, they’re also increasingly offering more tools and resources for advertisers to better hone their campaigns.

As far as rich media ads are concerned, it looks like we can expect spending on this kind for format to continue to increase.

Would you rather Google offered less choices for ad formats? Share your thoughts.

July 12, 2010
Yahoo on Search and Advertising Post Microsoft Deal

Now that Yahoo and Microsoft have received DoJ and EU approval on their search and advertising deal, Yahoo is doing plenty of talking about what the deal will mean for its search engine and its advertisers.

The two companies have a Search Alliance page set up that gives some insight about what to expect, such as:

When the Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance is implemented, both companies will continue to have differentiated consumer search experiences. However, Microsoft will manage the technology platforms that deliver the algorithmic (powered by Bing) and paid (powered by adCenter) search results.

Yahoo! and Microsoft will each provide customer support to different advertiser segments: Yahoo!’s sales team will exclusively support high volume advertisers, SEO and SEM agencies, and resellers and their clients. Microsoft will support self-service advertisers. In addition, Microsoft adCenter will be the platform for all search campaigns.

For advertisers, Yahoo says they will be able to reach more customers, save time and effort, and benefit from "rapid innovation." According to Yahoo, the "alliance" will help advertisers reach up to 150 million searchers and get about 62% more search volume.

There have been many questions about what would happen to Yahoo Search BOSS and SearchMonkey after the Microsoft-Yahoo deal took effect. There are still questions, but Yahoo has at least addressed the situation again now that the deal has received approval.

"With the implementation of the search alliance, the BOSS team is excited to examine the Microsoft web, image, and video search technologies in more detail," says Yahoo’s Ashim Chhabra. "Yahoo! may continue to offer the BOSS service, which would integrate some Yahoo! services and content with algorithmic results provided by Microsoft. The team is exploring what a future offering could consist of, with some services powered by Microsoft and unique content provided by Yahoo!. As we finalize details for any changes to the BOSS service, we will give developers plenty of notice."

"Also, prior to the announcement of the Yahoo! and Microsoft search alliance, we shared our intention to explore a fee-based structure for BOSS," Chhabra adds. "We continue to explore an appropriate revenue model as we work to define the future of BOSS in the context of our new search alliance. We know BOSS is important to your business, and any conclusions on strategic direction and roadmap for the service will be shared with developers as soon as possible."

Yahoo and Microsoft are also sharing ideas about how to "advance" SearchMonkey. The fact that they say "advance" seems to indicate that it will still have a place in Yahoo’s search strategy.

February 18, 2010
Report Suggests More Revenue, but Less Advertisers for Google

AdGooroo, a competitive intelligence agency, has released a new report, which indicates that there as has been a decrease in active advertisers for Google, despite projected Q4 gains.

"Google experienced a quality purge this quarter and banned what we believe to be more than 30,000 advertisers, accounting for about 5.3 percent of its active advertiser base," said AdGooroo Founder and CEO Rich Stokes. "While this typically signals a negative impact on revenues, AdGooroo also tracked increased competition for ad placement, resulting in higher ad prices for Google and unusually high clickthrough rates. Google seems to be taking advantage of a strong Q4 to make some quality improvements."

The report maintains that ad coverage, which has been steadily climbing for the past 12 months took a sudden dive in December, dropping nearly 10% — from 5.48 ads per keyword in November down to 4.97 in December.

In the report, the firm notes that the fourth quarter has traditionally been strong for Google, and expects this to be the case again this year. "This seasonal improvement has less to do with total search query volume (which historically is about the same as November), and more with increased competition for ad placement (higher ad prices) and unusually high clickthrough rates," says AdGooroo.

Here are some interesting graphs from the report:

Other interesting information in the report includes lists of the top 25 advertisers on Google, Yahoo, and Bing, and the most expensive keywords on each of these search engines. These are based on the total number of recorded first-page ad impressions, and doesn’t necessarily reflect total ad spend. You can check out the report in its entirety here (it’s complimentary).

Related Articles:

> Consumers Expected to Spend $6.2 Billion on Mobile Apps in 2010

> Click Fraud Rate Spikes In Q4

> Bing Makes Out Well In Search Spend Report

January 19, 2010