Dear AdWords,
Thank you for this cost per click (CPC) recommendation:
This might seem reasonable to you at the moment, but we will check back later to see if you have another suggestion. (Maybe you are sleepy?)
Love,
Us
Helpful AdWords Resources
March 22, 2011 by
Google AdWords account maintenance is not an easy-breezy task, and sometimes it can be downright difficult if you run into an issue or you don’t have time to stay on top of the latest news, tips, and insight.
Here are a few quick links to help you find answers to issues that might be plaguing you and resources that can provide you with more advanced knowledge of the intricacies of Google AdWords and managing your account.
AdWords specific resources include:
- Find formal help documents written by Google or search through their help forum and find a variety of answers to issues that other AdWords advertisers have encountered.
- If you can’t find something in the AdWords Help Center, try searching the Help Forum using a variety of search phrases. This can be time intensive, but you might find your answer with some
digging. Look for replies to posts from actual Google Employees if possible.
- Find out about AdWords updates, new features, tips, tools and articles.
- RSS Feed this to get news and updates as they post.
- Review free online training videos and tutorials.
- This is a great resource if you prefer visual assistance to document style instructions.
If you would like third-party advice that isn’t Google cookie-cutter, here are some great additional resources:
AdWords Performance Averages from 101 Lodging Websites
March 15, 2011 by
Google AdWords is used by a majority of lodging operators to promote their website in search engines.
A hotel is constantly optimizing its AdWords account to maximize ROI. A tough question asked by many hotel marketers is not just “what is my ROI?” and “How do I compare to the market? ” but, “Are others spending more or less?”
In an effort to try to answer some of those questions, we looked at Google Analytics for 101 lodging websites. 59 of those websites had AdWords data. The 59 include hotels, vacation rentals, resorts and inns.
We found that the average lodging website got 6,825 AdWords clicks during February, 2011:
- That is down from about 10,000 clicks a year ago.
- For those sites that used AdWords, AdWords accounted for 12% of their visits during February 2011.
- The average per-click price was $1.24.
Of those 59 lodging website, 45 of them had their e-commerce tracking turned on and setup. Because this smaller group was tracking $ revenue, we were able to generate a few other interesting averages:
- The average revenue generated in February, 2011 from AdWords was $33,478.
- The average ROI was 16 (for every $1 spent, $16 in revenue was generated
How does your AdWords performance compare to those averages?
Increase Your CTR with AdWords Sitelinks
March 10, 2011 by
In a September, 2010 AdWords article by Trent Blizzard, he showed you a cool new AdWords feature that improves your click-through-rates (CTR) called Ad Sitelinks.
Did any of you put this info to good use and apply it to your AdWords campaigns?
If the answer is no, you are missing out!
Here is a quick snapshot of five random Blizzard Internet clients’ data from the last 30 days:
Client Search CTR Sitelink CTR A 7.55% 19.29% B 9.66% 13% C 7.67% 25.34% D 7.26% 9.87% E 7.06% 17.12% Average 7.84% 16.924%
You can see that on average, these 5 clients saw that their Ad Sitelink CTR’s were almost a full 10% (or double) higher than their Search CTR’s.
That should be enough proof to get you motivated and add Sitelinks to your campaigns today!
Here is an example of Ad Sitelinks:
Did you know that we are Google AdWords Certified Partner Company? We are!
Contact us today if you need AdWords assistance; we offer both a-la-care AdWords plans as well as comprehensive online strategies.
Google Ad Extensions – How and When to Use Them
March 9, 2011 by
Google’s Ad Extensions are a great way to target links from your AdWords campaign and to drive visitors deeper into your site.
Learn how to use Ad Extensions in Carrie Hill’s article: How To and When To Use Google Ad Extensions: Phone and Local Extensions on SearchEngineLand.com.
Ad Extensions are just one of several new updates AdWords has implemented in the last several months; check out our list of other updates you need to know about.
March is Google AdWords Month at Blizzard
March 8, 2011 by
Blizzard will be celebrating Google AdWords during the month of March!
This month we will discuss more of the major changes you should know about AdWords including tips to get the most out of your paid advertising budget and the time managing your campaign.
Let’s start off with an info-graphic. Thanks to Patrick Gavin from the DIYSEOBlog for this great illustration on the value of SEO vs PPC:
The Ever Evolving AdWords Platform – Are you Keeping Up?
February 25, 2011 by
It seems like every week there are new features and formats appearing in our AdWords accounts.
The innovation and ease of use is astounding – IF – you have the time to keep up and keep tweaking your campaigns. Just in the last 14 months we’ve seen approximately 39 new features posts at the Google AdWords blog – that’s a crazy amount of changes to keep up with – 2.75 changes per month!
New features aside, just making sure the basics are set up right can sometimes be challenging. The next month will see 2 new posts coming from me over at Search Engine Land. Part 1 of a 2-part series posts today about taking advantage of Ad Extensions available to all advertisers. Ad extensions were just ONE of the 39 new features mentioned above.
Here are just a few of the bigger developments that came with AdWords recently – are you taking advantage?
- Probably the most significant and game changing update came in March of 2010 and has steadily become more and more effective for all advertisers. Remarketing is becoming the new darling of the SEM world. I advise EVERYONE to give it a try. You can learn more about Remarketing for Everyone with Google AdWords or sign up and receive a new eBook: Using Remarketing to Increase Display Ad Results I collaborated on from SearchMarketingNow and Aquisio. It offers a step by step setup guide that is a must-have for anyone new to remarketing.
- Manage your AdWords campaign from your mobile phone - live and direct to you anywhere in the world with a cell signal since April 2010.
- June, 2010 also brought us the ability to add Ad Sitelinks into all campaigns and adgroups. This gives the user 4-5 links to click inside every ad. [Read more...]
