Let’s say you are a B2B company selling computer software and your desired conversion is for visitors to download a whitepaper.  Your landing page contains a short description of the whitepaper, an image, and a form.  The headline above the form reads Download this Whitepaper, while the button to submit your information says Submit.  Upon filling out the form, visitors are taken to a thank you page with a link to the whitepaper.   Overall, this conversion process is straightforward, but how will you write your PPC text ads to entice visitors to download this whitepaper?  Take a look at these 3 ads, all pointing to the same landing page, but each using a different call to action.

Read the Free Whitepaper

I anticipate being taken to a page that contains the whitepaper.  I realize I will have to click another link to bring the whitepaper up, but my expectation is that I will immediately read the document that the ad has stated.  When I get to the page and see that I have to fill out a form to read the whitepaper I get frustrated and leave.  Though the call to action did not lie to me, it left out a part of the conversion process. That’s a weak link in your conversion path.

Download Free Whitepaper

This call to action is very similar to the previous one, however, it is slightly more accurate as the headline repeats the call to action in the ad.  The same issue exists, though, as my impression is I will be able to download the whitepaper without having to fill out a form.  Unfortunately, I do have to fill out the form so again, there’s a disconnect between expectation and reality, and another potential lost connection.

Sign Up for a Whitepaper

I click this ad knowing I will need to submit personal information in order to read this whitepaper.  The call to action and the subsequent landing page are in line with each other and there is no form of trickery.  I fill out the form and proceed to read the whitepaper.

Other Considerations

Several other factors could sway me for or against signing up for the whitepaper.  Perhaps I don’t mind filling out a form to download the whitepaper because the description on the landing page whets my appetite.  Or the form has too many fields, prompting me to leave the site, even though I knew I would have had to provide personal information.

As a PPC specialist, ad click-thru-rate (CTR) comes into play as well.  I would have to see if a certain call to action is showing me a higher or lower CTR than another; generally the higher the CTR the less you are going to have to pay per click.

Conclusion

The call to action should not only tell visitors what to do, but it should also be accurate.  If you want visitors to sign up to read a whitepaper, tell them so in your ad.  Remember that visitors want to know exactly what they are supposed to do.  As an advertiser, you are weeding out irrelevant clicks by making the call to action that much more specific.  Not only will you gain more conversions, you’ll save money on irrelevant clicks.

The call to action is your chance to tell potential visitors what you want them to do.  Make sure you are making an accurate statement.

The Conundrum

After using Sitelinks for about a month, I realized that this extension would offer greater utility at the ad group rather than campaign level.  For example, say I have a campaign around men’s outerwear with 3 ad groups:

Ideally, I want Sitelinks for each ad group.  So if users type in “men’s sweatshirts,” they would see links specific to that term:

Men’s Hooded Sweatshirts
Men’s Fleece Sweatshirts
Men’s V Neck Sweatshirts
Men’s Embroidered Sweatshirts

Unfortunately, with Sitelinks only available at the campaign level I can’t guarantee the particular sitelink will match the query.  A user typing in “men’s winter gloves” has the potential to see one of the sweatshirt Sitelinks, which could do more harm than good because the link has nothing to do with the query.  If I want to use Sitelinks for this campaign I would have to make the links applicable to each ad group.

The Solution

I have emailed my Google rep about this matter and have received the stock answer “We’re looking into it,” thus; I have taken matters into my own hands.  Over the last couple of weeks I have been creating several new campaigns in order to utilize Sitelinks appropriately.  Taking the example from above, instead of 1 campaign solely around men’s outwear, I would create 4 campaigns:

Men’s Outerwear
Men’s Jackets
Men’s Sweatshirts
Men’s Gloves

Each of these campaigns would only have 1 – 2 ad groups, while providing users with highly relevant Sitelinks to complement their search queries.  In the early going I have seen some good results with click-thru-rates (CTRs) increasing and some cost-per-acquisitions (CPAs) decreasing.  However, I do not have enough data to make an accurate claim that this technique is working.

Yes, it takes more work to create individual campaigns for each keyword theme.  Not only do you have to set up Sitelinks for each campaign, but you must make sure your settings are configured correctly (geo targeting, day parting, etc).  With 20 campaigns vs. only 4 there is a greater chance of missing something due to the added volume of work — with Google’s authorization, you can have up to 100 campaigns in your account.  For the time being, however, I find this tactic worthwhile in order to provide users with the most relevant ads.

How are you utilizing Sitelinks?

Along with CTR, other factors come into play in creating higher quality scores, but in general, the more relevant Google deems the process to be from search query to landing page the better your quality scores will be.  So why do keywords still have poor quality scores, even when advertisers adhere to Google’s guidelines?

Simply put, without historical CTR data Google does not deem certain keywords relevant enough and will not show your ads:

Or your ads will still show, but your average cost-per-clicks (CPCs) are going to be higher because of the poor quality scores.  The higher your CPCs are the fewer clicks you will get for your budget.

Niche keywords mean poor quality scores

Advertisers in niche industries are often assigned poor quality scores because the keywords are too specific.  Since there aren’t many searches for these niche terms Google doesn’t deem them relevant and will penalize you with poor quality scores.

As my Google rep told me, a solution is to start bidding on broader terms.  For example, say your company sells a product that automates the payroll process in organizations with 100 or more employees.  The product isn’t cost effective for smaller organizations so you only want to target larger enterprises.  You may bid on keywords such as: enterprise payroll automation and payroll solutions for large organizations.  Since these terms are very specific and have low search volumes, Google is assigning them poor quality scores.  A broader keyword (supposedly with a better quality score) would be payroll automation programs.  Granted this term would probably bring you some qualified traffic, but it would most likely also bring you traffic that you don’t want.

I have a big problem with this mentality.  The whole point of bidding on highly specific keywords is to weed out irrelevant traffic.  You shouldn’t be punished with higher CPCs or less ad exposure because your keywords are too niche-focused.

What can you do?

In speaking with industry colleagues, David Szetela and Jo Stumpner, both agree that this issue is a flaw in the quality score algorithm.  Szetela says that niche keywords receive low quality scores initially, but will improve after enough historical CTR data is collected.  Unfortunately, it can take months for enough data to be collected.  Some companies cannot afford to wait this long.  Stumpner recommends changing your approach if your keywords aren’t working for you, such as delving into the Display Network.  This approach has worked for me in the past as I was able to put ads on highly niche sites.

It’s frustrating that being too niche-focused can actually hurt your campaign, but as my favorite football coach (Bill Belichick of the New England Patriots, of course) always says, “It is what it is”.  You must dig deeper and find other ways for your campaign to succeed.

How do you combat poor quality scores?

I emailed my Google rep about the new format and this is the response I received:

“Just heard back from our Product team, and this is part of an experimental beta! It’s so new that you can’t even sign up for it. Google is continuously experimenting with new ad visualizations and features, so this time your client* is lucky to participate so early on!”

*Dick’s Sporting Goods isn’t my client.  I used this screen shot as an example.

So there you have it.  A new AdWords format is being tested.  I like the concept of showing products with their prices (like the products extension), however, the format looks disorganized.

What do you think?

Anyone ever seen this AdWords format before?

Usually you add negative keywords to a PPC account as a reactive measure.  In other words, viewing a search query report or data from your analytics is causing you to add the negative keywords.   The damage is already done since you have already paid for the irrelevant clicks.  What if you could add negative keywords to your campaign as a proactive measure?

More and more I am finding that keyword research is not just about finding the right terms to bid on.  It is also about being proactive and finding those terms that will negatively affect your campaign and eliminating them before they can do damage.  Unfortunately, you are never going to complete your list of negative keywords because no matter how refined your campaign, searches that you never expected will come through.   However, by utilizing the same keyword research tools you use to find relevant keywords, you will also find negative keywords.

Let’s say I sell Boston Red Sox apparel.  My keywords will focus around Red Sox shirts, hats, and other clothing.  When I do a search in Google for “boston red sox apparel” I see these suggestions:

These are good suggestions as all keywords relate to my business.  However, a search for “boston red sox” shows me these suggestions:

Automatically I see six negative keywords I am going to add to my campaign:

schedule
roster
tickets
“seating chart”
jobs
radio

Clicking on “Related searches” in Google’s left hand navigation menu shows me these results:

I find four more negative keywords:

celtics
bruins
espn
“stub hub”

In doing a wonder wheel search (also in the left hand navigation menu) I get these results:

Automatically I see another negative keyword: weather.

As an aside, some of the researched terms may seem appropriate to add as negative keywords, however, I only want to include terms that I know do not make sense to my business.  If, for example, I see many searches with “history” in the query that do not convert I will make this term a negative keyword.

In fifteen minutes I was able to research eleven negative keywords.  If I spent another fifteen minutes I probably could have found ten more.  By being proactive I am saving myself irrelevant clicks and budget down the line.  The better the traffic the more effective my campaign is going to be.