I don’t know about you, but this new one from the big G, makes me so happy, I had to stand up and applaud. Finally!! After years of asking for transparency in search network metrics versus Google.com, Google listened. This rocks! I’ve already turned off Search Network for two campaigns. Look at your campaign metrics, I bet you’ll find a few too.
If you don’t know what I’m all excited about… read more below

From Inside AdWords:

We’re happy to let you know that we’ve changed the way your Campaign Summary and Ad Group Summary pages present statistics in order to give you additional level of detail into your campaign performance. Previously, these pages divided statistics into two categories: search, which included Google and search partners, and the content network.

Now, we show one set of statistics for Google and another set aggregating search partner performance. Search partners include AOL, Ask.com, and many other search sites around the web. You can view ad group or campaign performance at a summary level, or broken down by different combinations of Google, our search partners, and our content network. Additionally, separate Google and aggregate search partner statistics will soon be available in the Report Center.

(Click the image for a full-size version)

Read the rest…

New tweaks by Google are on the way to “improve” the quality score metric to help with relevency. It’s being rolled out in phases so you should see the results in your search campaign shortly. Read the rest…

Keeping up with the new tools Google launches can be a full time job, but this tool seems worth looking into. It gives advertisers insight into user keyword behavior by verticals, geographic locations and time periods.

http://www.adotas.com/2008/08/google-launches-search-insight-tool-for-advertisers/

 This may be interesting: My guess is if you set a CPA target similar to what you are getting from Google Adwords, your going to get less volume. There may also be an issue of Affiliate Fraud to be cognizant of; from my experience with other affiliate networks. JL.

As part of Google’s integration of DoubleClick, the DoubleClick Performics Affiliate network is now part of Google. To consolidate our offerings, we will be phasing out the AdWords pay-per-action beta in the last week of August 2008. The Google Affiliate Network, previously known as DoubleClick Performics Affiliate, has been in operation since 1998. Through the network, advertisers can open their ads to all publishers in the network, or select specific publishers that match their criteria. You can set a CPA for your entire campaign or establish custom payment schedules for specific publishers — such as a higher CPA for a particularly optimal placement. The Google Affiliate Network is currently a separate product from AdWords and AdSense. As with AdSense, publishers must apply and be accepted into the network.If you’re interested in learning more about the Google Affiliate Network, please visit our website.Posted by Trevor Claiborne, Inside AdWords crew

Here’s the low down from one of our Google reps. Now we wait and see if it passes muster and the feds:

Thanks for asking about this deal with Yahoo. Yesterday, we announced a
non-exclusive advertising agreement that give Yahoo! the ability to use
Google’s search and contextual advertising technology through its AdSense
for Search and AdSense for Content advertising programs.  Under the
agreement, Yahoo! has the option to display Google ads alongside its own
natural search results in the U.S. and Canada.  In addition, Yahoo! can
serve contextually targeted ads on its U.S. and Canadian web properties as
well as on its current publisher partner sites.

If you’d like to learn more information, please feel free to check out our
official press release at
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/06/our-agreement-to-provide-ad-technology.html.

As for what this means to our advertisers, this deal will not change the
way Google’s ad auctions will run. Google doesn’t set the prices manually
for ads; rather, advertisers themselves determine prices through an
ongoing competitive auction.

Also, advertisers will not be able to target Yahoo searches. Yahoo will
simply be treated as a part of Google’s partner network, and advertisers
will only be able to decide whether their ads should only be served on
Google web properties or also appear on partner websites.

Hot off the Press:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2004473897_webyahoogoogle12.html

The AdWords system doesn’t recognize most symbols (i.e., non-letter characters) when they appear in keywords. The two exceptions are ampersands and accent marks. 

I. Valid Symbols

 Our system recognizes two kinds of symbols in keywords: ampersands (&) and accent marks (e.g., á).

 The following terms would be treated as different keywords:

 ’bed and breakfast’ is distinct from ‘bed & breakfast’

’sidewalk cafe’ is distinct from ’sidewalk café’

 II. Ignored Symbols

 You can add keywords containing periods or dashes to your account, but the punctuation will be ignored. For example, our system would treat the following keywords as identical:

 ’T-rex’ is equivalent to ‘T rex’

‘Fifth Ave’. is equivalent to ‘Fifth Ave’

 If your account contains more than one equivalent keyword, such as in the examples above, only one of the keywords will be allowed to trigger an ad per search query. Learn more at http://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=66292&hl=en_US.

 We recommend deleting keyword duplicates to make your ad groups more manageable. Learn how at http://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=6271&hl=en_US.

 III. Invalid Symbols

 You’ll see an error message if you try to add keywords containing the following symbols to your account:

 ! @ % ^ * () = {} ; ~ ` <> , ? \ |

 IV. Capitalization

 Finally, please know that the system does not consider differences in capitalization when delivering your ads.

In case you were wondering how to count the ways, or more specifically conversions, check out the options from Google. Thanks to Dave for this contribution:

 Can I track more than one kind of conversions?

Yes. You can create up to 30 different kinds of actions to track, each with a unique name.

You can also track different kinds of conversions using a customized performance report through the AdWords Report Center.

To create a conversion report:

1. Log in to your AdWords account at https://adwords.google.com.
2. Click the Reports tab at the top of the page and then on the Create Report link.
3. Choose your Report Type, View, Date Range, and which Campaigns and Ad Groups you want included (where relevant).
4. In the ‘Advanced Options’ section, click ‘Add or Remove Columns’ and then, under the ‘Conversion Columns’ section, select the types of conversion data you want included in your report. The report column display will change to reflect your selections. To further refine your results, you can set up to four data filters to screen out irrelevant statistics.
5. Schedule your report, save it as a template if you want to re-use it, and provide an email address and file format if you want it sent via email.
6. Click Create Report.

Your report will begin running based on your specifications and will be emailed (if you selected that option) as well as saved to your Report Center as one of your most recent five reports.

For more information

I listened to this Search Marketing Now webinar sponsored by Marin Software. David Szetala (Clix Marketing) was the speaker. I think a few others listened too and maybe they’ll share what they learned in this blog.

Actually I didn’t learn that much, but basically it reinforced that we know what we are doing plus a whole lot more, when managing large campaigns. The Q&A was the best part. Like us,sounded like lots of people are using Excel docs for reporting, analysis, and campaign management notes, but he did try to say how tools such as those by the sponsor help. Had to do some promotion of course. I did jot some notes down of some reminders or things I may test.

· He did say how much really tight (10-15 or less keywords) ad groups have dramatically helped with Quality Score/bids if vary ad copy to the group. Ad copy to kw relevancy can help QS.

· Also said on top KWs to isolate match types in diff groups to test copy, because big difference in user motivation betw match types. Interesting idea to test.

· Content keywords should reflect the page type where you want your ad to appear, rather than typical user-perspective keywords.

Anyone else listen or have anything to add?

Haven’t seen it in action yet, but I believe this will really help us understand cause and effect of the optimizations we perform:

Change History tool enhancement: Charting
In the coming weeks, we will be updating the My Change History Tool to include a helpful new addition: Google Finance-like graphs that map change events to account performance metrics such as impressions and clicks. These graphs will give you greater visibility into event causality and arm you with insight into how the changes you make impact your account’s performance.

Just thought you guys should see what this looks like.  By the way, what client’s do we have that would want to advertise on “sexually suggestitive content”? None, right?