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November 7, 2007

Google Adwords Changes Provide More Rounded Package

Duncan Riley

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Google has announced a number of changes to its key Adwords product that will provide a more rounded product offering to Adwords’ advertisers.

Google has tweaked its site targeting feature to give advertisers the ability to run their campaigns not only on the front page of sites, but also on specific pages on each site. The feature now has a new (and appropriate) name: placement targeting.

Advertisers can also now choose the bidding option “that best matches their needs.” Users can now pick between CPM or CPC advertising with placement targeting dependent on the overall goals of each campaign.

Neither change is revolutionary, but it is another step in the evolution of Adwords from its strict CPC one size fits all package to a service that provides a full gauntlet of options to advertisers. Not that Google really has to do much to attract new advertisers, given their dominance of online advertising, but it’s nice to know they are still evolving and listening to customer requests.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 7th, 2007 at 11:04 pm and is filed under Company & Product Profiles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  1. Morgan

    November 7th, 2007 at 11:10 pm

    It’s also a nice reminder of how little advantage even a “monopoly” can take in their respective market. They are aware of how ready anyone else in the world is to take their place and take their revenue. So they can’t afford not to keep improving results for their users, especially in an area like online advertising, where it is so easy to relentlessly measure results.

  2. J.P.

    November 7th, 2007 at 11:27 pm

    Advertaising money should stay on search, there´s where conversions are.

    Everything else is just mumbo jumbo. Sorry, “targeted mumbo jumbo”.

    You know? I read TechCrunch since 2003 (I think) and if I close my eyes right now I can´t tell where adsense is in this page.

    People who clicks en adsense (I´m talking about publishers network here) is people who bounce of the page. So that much for “targeted placement”.

    It´s not like I´m reading about iPhone in TC and I think: “I want one, lets click in this adword”. Nah, if I´m reading about Iphone here and just happen to want one I SEARCH for it.

    For branding it´s ok, but if you´re after conversions search is the answer.

  3. J.P.

    November 7th, 2007 at 11:28 pm

    Sorry, *Advertising money.

  4. Search◊ Engines Web

    November 7th, 2007 at 11:30 pm

    http://blogoscoped.com/forum/114161.html

    It took a very controversial blog post to get them to talk about these changes.

    This is the latest in about 20 changes that Google has instituted as a result of some controversial posts that often resulted in vile insults from other commenters and deletions from the blog owner. :-(

    You have to wonder with all the PHDs and brainiacs who work there - how just ONE BLOG POSTER can trigger so many changes.

    Visit the archives or that blog and read the months of sarcasm by the other commenters including deletions by the blog owner that resulted from various controversial posts.

    Ironically, many of those suggestions ended up being taken? LOL:

    You can imagine what the politics are like there? Few employees would dare risk that to show a company their flaws and insists on wide ranging
    re evaluations, and reforms.

    While a regular commenter - who no one knows anything about - will only receive insulting replies to posts, employees could have their careers compromise and be ostracized as not fitting in or being against the company’s mission.

    Just imagine how different Yahoo’s fate would have been if there was an outlet years ago for this type of interaction from the public.

  5. Charnchon

    November 7th, 2007 at 11:30 pm

    Most traffic from Google Adwords is junk. No quality traffic. I think it’s because people are trying to make money from ruuning AdSense on their web sites.

    I don’t know about others, but I tried AdWords with no success. No matter how hard I tried to customize the campaign (such as changing ad copy, filtering target to U.S. only, etc.), the results were the same.

    If this happens to me, it could happen to others. I stopped using AdWords for now because I don’t know why I should spend money for junk traffic.

  6. Duncan Riley

    November 7th, 2007 at 11:36 pm

    Charnchon
    that’s not my experience, although it is with Microsoft + Yahoo and a ton of minor players. The key is getting the targeting right, and it does take a bit of practice.

  7. Andrew

    November 7th, 2007 at 11:41 pm

    yeah I never got the whole adwords on other people’s sites business. Almost all of the traffic you’ll get is someone clicking the adword by mistake or people who got tricked into it by the site owners.

  8. Terry Whalen

    November 7th, 2007 at 11:50 pm

    Duncan,

    For the record, Site targeted (now called Placement Targeted) campaigns have previously allowed the advertiser to select specific areas within a particular domain for their ads to show. So, this is not new. The CPC option and the name are new.

    You guys are right, ppc does take some practice, and compared to Google, Yahoo is pathetic and AdCenter is almost completely worthless.

  9. wilma

    November 7th, 2007 at 11:52 pm

    What has happened to MS and Yahoo?

    Google does incremental improvements on their Adsense offering but Yahoo can’t get out of the beta (it’s been TWO years now, Yahoo!) for their content ads on partner websites and MS is doing everything else BUT broad based contextual ads on other websites (which bring in 34% of G’s revenue).

  10. www.carversation.com

    November 8th, 2007 at 12:09 am

    about time, i wish other leading sites would do same.

  11. www.WebdesignAndMarketingProjects.com

    November 8th, 2007 at 5:24 am

    Adwords (and similarly MSN and Yahoo PPC) advertising can be very profitable if done right, it takes time to learn and use it to run profitable campaigns, but once you know it, it opens up a lot of opportunities for making $$ .

    Right now advertising in the local sphere is booming, I see numerous niches/industries where small businesses found their way to online advertising with Google , they get their products and services out for their local audience online .

    If you are concerned about the quality of your Adwords traffic, make sure you opt-out of the content network (content network= publishers who display Google ads on their websites) .

    By opting-out you will only receive traffic from Google itself .

    You have to do it right, but it is very common to get a 30%+ monthly ROI on your advertising $$ (thats a very safe estimate, not uncommon a much higher figure )

    Kristian

  12. www.WebdesignAndMarketingProjects.com

    November 8th, 2007 at 5:31 am

    Correction to above: I meant 30%+ monthly profits

  13. Steve Ballmer

    November 8th, 2007 at 5:46 am

    Round packages tend to slip, fall and shatter!

    “Google is not ahead of us, In the area of search specifically, Google would lead.”

    http://fakesteveballmer.blogspot.com

  14. Voices

    November 8th, 2007 at 7:12 am

    Placing ads in Google’s Content Network, despite it being targeted, ruins your overall Click Through Rate. Yes, I know you can break these out into separate campaigns, but for those diligent advertisers it really throws your numbers off, diluting your campaign’s effectiveness.

    I’ve stayed away from the Content Network ( especially banners ) since 2005.

  15. www.verilux.com

    November 8th, 2007 at 7:57 am

    We’ve found the only thing the content network is good for are brand specific mentions. If a page is mentioning your brand, it’s reasonable to have an ad to allow the reader to find your site.

    However, for generic terms the conversion rate is abysmal.

    Overall, AdWords is a great tool but requires constant attention to maximize it’s effectiveness.

  16. chrisco

    November 8th, 2007 at 2:32 pm

    The placement reports should help you boost your AdWords ROI (does for us).

  17. jim

    November 8th, 2007 at 3:22 pm

    The content network is as profitable as you are willing to work with it.

    It does require more baby sitting than Search Ads but your ROI can skyrocket with experience and with the fact that so many are shying away from the content network, leaving room for those players that are able to actually calculate their ROI.

  18. J.P.

    November 9th, 2007 at 8:53 am

    Please Jim, tell us about. How can you skyrocket it?
    And for me the fact that so many are shying away from the content network, only leaves room (because price is low) to members of the “make money online” comunity :)

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