Google takes Pay Per Action Ads out of Beta
June 21, 2007
Google didn’t keep the wraps on their affiliate like Pay Per Action ads for long. Introduced in March, these ads have already come out of beta.
Google announced today the worldwide expansion of its pay-per-action advertising beta. Pay-per-action is a new pricing model that allows advertisers to pay only when a pre-defined action is completed on their site, such as when a user makes a purchase, signs up for a newsletter, or completes any other clearly defined action. Since the initial launch of the pay-per-action advertising beta in March 2007, many advertisers who have used the new pricing model are pleased with the opportunity to have more ways to promote their products and services online.
Source: Google Press Release
Additional Resources:
- For Advertisers: Guide to creating pay per action ads
- For Publishers: Guide to creating pay per action ads (Search Engine Land Article)
AdWords Quietly Rolls Out IP Blocking as a New Feature
June 15, 2007
- Have you ever wanted to block a competitor from being able to see your ad?
- Have you ever seen an IP address in your log files that seems to click your ad over and over?
- Have you ever said ‘I just don’t want people from these IPs to see my ads’?
The wait is over, now advertisers can block specific IPs from viewing their ads.
IP Exclusion
This feature enables you to specify IP addresses where you don’t want your ads to appear.
You can exclude up to 20 IP addresses, or ranges of addresses, per campaign. All ads in the campaign are prevented from showing for users with the IP addresses you specify, so we recommend you choose your list carefully.
An important note about IP address exclusion: Some large Internet Service Providers (ISPs) use a range of IP addresses for all their users. If you exclude an IP address that is a proxy for many users, you could be blocking a large amount of legitimate, and potentially profitable traffic. Google takes no responsibility for this action.
Source, AdWords Help Files.
How to Block IPs
To exclude IP addresses, follow the steps below:
- Sign in to your AdWords account at https://adwords.google.com.
- Click Tools at the top of your Campaign Summary page.
- Click IP Exclusion under ‘Optimize Your Ads.’
- Select a campaign, and click Go.
- Enter the list of IP addresses to be excluded.
- Click Exclude IP Addresses.
Once you’ve excluded IP addresses for a campaign, you can view or edit your list by following these steps:
- Sign in to your AdWords account at https://adwords.google.com.
- Click the campaign you wish to edit.
- The number of existing excluded IP addresses will appear beneath the campaign name and daily budget.
- Click View/edit.
Source, AdWords Help Files.
Wildcards are available
In addition, you can block ranges of IPs using wildcards. The wildcard can only be used for the last 3 digits of the IP address.
- 123.4.5.67
- 123.4.5.*
- 123.45.167.1
Request for Google
The next step in helping advertisers verify their IP blocking would be to add the ability to see ads by IP address in the Ad Preview tool.
A note of caution:
Some hosts don’t assign unique IPs per user. If you block an IP address for a host which gives all of their users the same IP address, you will block that entire user range.
This is an especially important note if you see a lot of visits from Reston, VA and try to block those ranges of IP addresses. It is possible to block all AOL dial up users from seeing your ads.
The tool is very useful for blocking specific IPs, competitors, etc from seeing your ad. However, as with any filtering tool, make sure that you see an account improvements in items like conversion rate and cost per conversion so that the blocking is having the desired effect on your account.
Is AdSense cleaning house before advertisers see all the data?
May 20, 2007
There have been several threads lately about AdSense publishers receiving letters from Google about their accounts being closed on June 1. The most common reason for the dismissal from the AdSense program has been ‘unfit business model’.
The speculation is that these letters are mostly being sent to publishers who are using arbitrage as their business model, which makes sense as the Google AdSense TOS has included provisions that one should not make pages just to serve ads.
I find it very interesting that this is occurring before Google rolls out their new advertiser report which lets advertisers run stats across the content network.
I’m in the beta program which lets me see click through rates, conversion rates, dollars paid, etc to every site in the content network sending me traffic. It’s a fantastic idea, and one many advertisers will applaud. It will also force content sites to send better traffic since advertisers will have this visibility.
It seems the timing of these two items are mysteriously close to each other.
Pay a CPM Rate to Appear on Google.com - Are your old offers still on the web?
May 16, 2007
I was searching for some information on Google’s site today and came across an offer to advertise on Google’s homepage and pay on a CPM basis.
In 2002, there was an advertising program on Google.com which was called AdWords. One could pay Google a CPM rate and have one’s ad appear. Later, Google released AdWords select which is the PPC model we’re familiar with today.
For a while, both AdWords and AdWords Select ads appeared on Google. Later, Google dropped the CPM program and went with just the PPC AdWords Select advertising method.
Very quietly, they dropped the ’select’ and just called it AdWords.
Most people probably don’t remember the days when one could double serve on Google with both a CPM and a PPC ad. However, this page would be a confusing offer to some, and yet an offer others would jump at the chance to take advantage of.
It’s not really available anymore, however, the offer is still on the web.
Do you have old pages still on the web that no longer apply to your business?
A little nostalgia for those of us who used both AdWords and AdWords Select:
Google Launches Ad Preview for Mobile
May 16, 2007
Every wonder what your AdWords mobile ad looks like on a mobile phone? How about on a different carrier? Or in a different country?
Similar to the search preview page, Google launched an ad preview page for mobile (http://www.google.com/m/adpreview).
The really nice part is the on screen segmentation controls. It’s very easy to switch views depending on:
- Country & Carrier
- Spoken language
- Markup language
- Search type
This is a nice tool to be able to see a mobile result to understand what the consumer sees and the advertising competition.
Peak behind the content curtain to learn what AdSense sites are doing for you
May 15, 2007
Google is finally allowing advertisers to see where their ads are shown on the content network.
However, Google even goes further and allows advertisers to see the conversion and click through rates by content site.
Google’s newest beta report allows advertisers to run reports that are specific to the content network. Finally, advertisers can have full visibility into the often hidden world of the content network.
This will finally allow advertisers to learn:
- Where their ads are being shown
- What sites are converting
- Understand if they wish to use site targeting
- Which sites to block from displaying your ads
- What smart pricing is really doing for your costs
This will mean very different things for both publishers and advertisers. Today, the focus is the advertiser.
How to find Content Network Information
In your AdWords account, go to the ‘reports’ tab and find ‘placement reporting. Selecting this button will let you run a content network report.
There are several options for segmenting the data under the ’settings section’.
- Level of detail
- AdGroup
- Campaign
- Account
- Domain or URL
- Time View (summary, daily, etc)
- Date Range
- Which campaigns or AdGroups to include
Next is the good part, customize your columns. You can also view conversions! Finally, advertisers will have the ability to view conversions and clicks by site across the entire content network.
Finally, you can filter, save the report template, etc.
While you’re waiting for the report to run, Google displays the following box:
Placement Performance report tips: This report shows performance metrics (including impressions, clicks, and cost) for content network sites displaying your ads. When you review these metrics:
- Don’t focus on clickthrough rate (CTR): Content network CTR doesn’t affect your ad ranking on the search network. Learn more.
- Think in terms of conversions: You can use Google’s free Conversion Tracking tool to determine whether site performance meets your ROI objectives. Learn more.
- Consider the site targeting feature: You can increase your exposure on top performing sites. Learn more.
- Wait for statistically significant data: For sites without much performance data, wait a while before making a final judgment. Learn more.
Some of the above information is very important to remember. One should never worry about the click through rate for content. It’s not one of the quality score factors.
And then finally the numbers. You will easily be able to compare site targeting to pay per action ads to every site on the content network where your ads are showing.
No longer will advertisers be in the dark about where their ads are showing. You can now have visibility into the network, block non-converting sites, and even target sites directly that are converting.
This is a huge win for advertisers. Many thanks to AdWords for finally introducing this report. Next, because there’s always more that advertisers desire, would be visibility into search partners.
The key to a successful AdWords campaign is account organization, visibility into numbers, and then optimizing based upon that data.
Finally, advertisers have visibility into the content network numbers. It’s time for content network optimization.
AdWords Editor v3.5 is Now Live
May 12, 2007
The newest version of the AdWords editor is now live.
The latest version offers new functionality for:
- Geographic targeting
- Image ads
- Some drag and drop functionality
For those using preferred bidding, you can not change the bidding types through the editor (i.e. switch from max CPC to preferred to budget optimizer). However, if your campaign is using preferred bidding, any bid updates you make to that campaign will function properly (i.e. not cause a conflict and update your preferred bid).
If you use geographic targeting, get the editor - the new interface is quite easy to use and it will save a lot of time from logging into the interface.
Overall, a nice release.
AdWords Bidding Methodologies Compatilibty Chart
May 8, 2007
Google offers four different bidding methodologies. I detailed the advantages and disadvantages in today’s Search Engine Land Paid Search column.
Here’s a quick compatibility chart to see the functionality of each bidding methodology.
| Compatibility | Set Max CPCs (default) | Preferred Cost Bidding | Pay Per Action | Budget Optimizer |
Best for:
|
all features | controlling costs | Pay only when receive conversion | max traffic |
Ad Scheduling:
|
|
|
|
|
| Position preference | yes | no | no | no |
| Location Targeting | yes | yes | no | yes |
| Content CPCs | yes | yes | no | no |
| Language targeting | yes | yes | no | yes |
Networks
|
|
|
|
|
Ad Serving
|
|
|
|
|
| Budget | daily | daily | daily | monthly |
Google mobile ads now support conversion tracking
May 5, 2007
Google recently changed their conversion tracking script so that it is now compatible with mobile ads.
Can I track mobile ad conversions?
Conversion tracking is available for both the PC- or mobile-version of your website.
Learn more about setting up conversion tracking for your mobile website.
Everything You Need to Know about AdWords Preferred Cost Bidding
May 4, 2007
Preferred Cost Bidding allows you to set your bid prices to your average CPC and not your max CPC
You can enable this for both CPC and CPM (site-targeted) campaigns.
This is very useful in three different scenarios:
1. You know your value per keyword. If you have the data that says keyword 1 is worth $4.23, and keyword 2 is worth $3.56, then instead of ‘guessing’ what the max CPC should be, you can set your preferred cost at those actual prices.
2. You want more control over expenditures. When setting max CPC, your click cost can vary widely from day-to-day. With preferred bidding, you have much more control over how much you actually pay for keyword. This makes it so your average spend per keyword should be much more consistent.
3. You don’t want to spend all day reconfiguring bids. Since preferred bidding changes your max CPC behind the scenes to reach your actual bid price, there’s a lot less work in adjusting bids with preferred cost bidding.
How does it actually work?
With preferred cost bidding, you can set your preferred click cost at the keyword or ad group level. Behind the scenes, Google then adjusts what your max CPC should be so that your actual click cost comes out to be in your preferred cost bidding range. (More on quality score and ad rank)
So, the same ad rank formula (ad rank = quality score X max CPC) still applies, just Google is doing an addition algo behind the scenes to determine your max CPC.
Incompatibilities
Since Google needs control over your max CPC in preferred cost bidding, it’s not compatible with a couple of AdWords features:
Ad Scheduling advanced features. Preferred cost bidding works with the normal ad scheduling (which is essentially day parting or showing your ads at specific times of the day and days of the week). However, the advanced version of ad scheduling allows you to automatically change your max CPC at various times by a percentage. This advanced feature is not compatible with preferred cost bidding.
Position Preference. This feature allows you to control which range of positions you wish your ad to show. Since Google is changing the max CPC behind the scenes in position preference to determine your ad rank, this is incompatible with preferred cost bidding which is also trying to change your max CPC.
Will you overpay?
The first negative reactions I heard about this feature is that since you are setting a preferred cost, in times when you could pay less for the top positions, you could easily end up overpaying for ads (i.e. if your bid was $3, and it required you to pay $1 to be in the number one spot, the rumor was Google would charge you $3).
This isn’t true.
Google is still running the ad rank formula for all companies involved in the auction for a single keyword, and the ad discounter still applies as well. Essentially, the ad discounter calculates the values for all companies in the auction process and reduces your actual CPC to the lowest possible CPC you could pay to be in that ad position.
Enabling Preferred Cost Bidding
Preferred cost bidding is another bidding option. In the campaign settings, you’ll first want to ‘view and edit options’ under bidding.
Next, choose from one of the three bidding options:
- Set max limits - default bidding
- Set preferred bids - preferred cost bidding
- Budget optimizer - maximize traffic
Finally, choose how to change your current max CPCs to your preferred cost bids.
Preferred Cost Bidding can be very useful for controlling your ad spend, or for those who really understand the best bid by keyword or ad group.
I’ve been playing with it in a few accounts (it’s still in beta), and have been quite happy with the results so far.
It won’t be for everyone (the advanced ad scheduling being the one incompatibility I hope they fix), however, if you want more control over what you pay per click instead of what you bid per click, then it’s worth taking preferred cost bidding for a spin.
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