For starters, I didn’t realize how broad the broad keyword match option actually was. They’re not kidding when they say that your ads can show up for a broad number of keywords. I was finding all sorts of random phrases that had very little to do with the original ad group. Remarkably, I still had a decent CTR, but the conversion rate was horrible, which is more a tribute to the ambiguity and persuasiveness of my ad-writing skills, rather than any virtue of my keyword targeting. Guess I should look at rewriting my ads with more specific ad copy. So I can already see optimization tips coming from this data.

Ideally, once you have everything cooking, this report is going to be an invaluable source of new keywords and negative keywords for your accounts. I’m thinking you could create a tester campaign where you throw in a bunch of generic or less-targeted keywords and let it run. Then, once you have a decent amount of data, pull this report for the campaign and dig in. You should be able to find some phrases that perform well and need to be added to your regular accounts and bidded up for better performance, and you’ll probably find some abysmally-performing irrelevant keyword phrases that you didn’t think about when you first built the account that you’ll now be able to ad as negative keywords, thus boosting your CTR.

Technorati Tags: adwords, search qyery report, optimization, seo

In their evil bid to take over the world using illicit funds scammed from innocent web denizens, Google has arrived at new levels of villainy by jacking the minimum bids on high-volume keywords for many of their advertisers. They’re blaming it on a “temporary issue,” but I, for one, think that this “temporary issue” is an attempt to bilk less-knowledgeable advertisers out of their hard-earned cash by getting them to pay $10 for their best keywords. Sure, they may fix it in a day or two, but not before they make a tidy sum, which, of course, will go into their world domination fund.

You can read all about the Google Scam “technical bug” here, here, here, here, and here.

Tags: Adwords, Google, Bug, Minimum Bid

One of my favorite features on Yahoo’s new Panama platform is the import function. They make it possible for their users (most of who, I assume, have ads running on Adwords as well as Yahoo) to import their ads from Adwords so that they can get advertising with you as soon as possible. Sounds like a great plan up to this point, right? Unfortunately, this is where Yahoo’s aversion to making money comes in.

I’ve already migrated a large account over to Panama, and I used the import function to use some Google ads to fill in gaps in the Yahoo campaigns. It was easy and it allowed me to increase my advertising with Yahoo. I just upgraded a smaller account this past week, and when I went to import my (much more extensive) Google ads to the newly upgraded account, lo and behold, the import function wasn’t there.

I contacted YSM tech support, and in the email I was informed that:

After reviewing your account our records indicate your account does not currently qualify for the import tools…

Please note the Import feature is a benefit that is ordinarily extended only to those accounts at the Gold level or higher. Gold advertisers spend at least $6,000 annually with Yahoo! Search Marketing…

Doesn’t it make sense that you would let your smaller advertisers upload their ads so that they could get to $6000 annual ad spend easily? I think that in their desire to incent advertisers to spend more by offering added functionality and service, YSM has shot themselves in the foot on this one.

To their (small) credit, when I pointed this out, I was told that my comments had been forwarded to appropriate department. Hopefully this is not the same as the special filing cabinet for faxes from corporate.

Fortunately, Lee Odden, the friend of search students everywhere, has compiled a gargantuan collection of SEO blogs, from A- to Z-list. There are over 250 of them, so he’s even included an OPML file for easy addition to your feed reader. Check it out!
(And if Lee decided to add JazzcatSEO to the list, that would be OK too…)

technorati tags:blog, list, lee, odden, sem

Whether you’re using PPC, organic SEO, or a combination of both, you need to be sure that you are getting more for your efforts than you’re spending. Costs need to be figured in both dollars spent (of you’re using PPC and CPM advertising) and time taken to create and manage the channel.

From a PPC perspective, what good are cheap clicks if your cost per conversion is greater than your profit?

By the same token, are the terms you are targeting with your SEO campaigns relevant enough, and is there enough volume on those keywords to justify the amount of time you are taking to gain those rankings?

technorati tags:seo, sem, roi, marketing

1. Use existing resources to add content to your site. Some sources: replies to
   customer emails, customer phone calls, asking customers to leave questions.
2. When optimizing your site, prioritize your pages, starting with your home page first. Follow that by your info page (contact info, pictures, etc.), and then your top 5 product pages.
3. Offer free shipping and add text on your site to that effect.
4. Build related links.
5. Last and next links on product pages

1. He was very particular about the difference between internet marketing and “auction marketing,” that is, you’re not just buying converting traffic by outbidding someone else, you’re marketing to someone who has a specific need that they have expressed through the search box.
2. Search companies like Google will try to pull internet marketers into non-search related fields live video and print advertising. Don’t let them do it of you’re not comfortable or experienced in it.
3. The future of search is vertical and social.
4. Danny’s new SearchEngineWatch-like personal site will be SearchEngineLand.com. New posts start next month as he finishes his tenure as the Editor-in-Chief at SearchEngineWatch.
]]> http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006-danny-sullivan-keynote/feed/ 0 http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006-keyword-research-and-analysis/ http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006-keyword-research-and-analysis/#comments Thu, 16 Nov 2006 00:41:39 +0000 Jazzcat http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006-keyword-research-and-analysis/ This was a really interesting presentation topic that is still crucial to internet marketers, whether you do SEO or paid internet advertising.

Gregory Markel – The Holistic Keyword Strategy

Gregory Markel is one of the best CPC gurus in the world. He has done a lot of work for major entertainment campaigns, including Lord of the Rings, Mazda, etc. Basically, he’s incredibly sharp and dynamic. Therefore, I really was interested in what he had to say.

1. Be clear about what your goals are. Know exactly what you want from the campaign. Pick a governing metric.
2. Understand your legal limitations for brands.
3. Use competitive analysis. What works for your competitors?
4. Mine your log data. It’s a valuable source for keywords that users are actually searching for.
5. Use the tools that are available, both public as well as proprietary tools.
6. Make sure when you launch you campaign that you’ve used existing data. That will help you to get a quick launch with positive ROI.
7. Not all keywords perform the same way on all engines. Find out what works where, and try that on other engines, abandon what doesn’t work.
8. Pay attention to any offline advertising and marketing that might affect what people are searching for.

Adam Jewell – Keyword Selections For PPC

Adam has a ton of affiliate experience, and apparently has been extremely successful with PPC channels, making him an extremely valuable presenter. He had some fantastic tips about what to do with your keywords once you get them.

1. Be careful bidding on brands. You’ll have a ton of competition.
2. Make sure you’re adding words to your keyword phrases that indicate someone who is ready to buy.
3. Use matching types. Exact match? Bid high on exact terms. Manufacturer part numbers are great for this. Phrase match? Use specific keywords and bid lower. Broad match is where you try to target people using “ready to buy” phrases.
4. Buy tons of keywords on a specific keyword and bid highly on that.
5. Buy tons of bottom feeder keywords and bid really low.
6. Link as close to the source as possible, hopefully the product page.
7. Buy every mispelling and typo available.
8. Use tons of exact match in Google.
9. Group keywords by length and use Google’s dynamic keyword on the short ad group.
]]> http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006-keyword-research-and-analysis/feed/ 0 http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006-day-one-recap/ http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006-day-one-recap/#comments Wed, 15 Nov 2006 02:33:47 +0000 Jazzcat http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006-day-one-recap/ Guy Kawasaki

Today kicked off with a keynote by startup guru Guy Kawasaki. In his presentation, entitled “The Art of Innovation,” he talked about the necessary elements of successful innovation. I particularly liked what he had to say about defining yourself with a mantra, a two to three word phrase that encapsulates your purpose and reaon for being. I’m a firm believer that you have to know where you’re going if you ever want to get there, and so mch the better if you can actually remember that purpose. Guy spent some quality time making fun of mission statements, and the MBAs who create them, which reenforced his ideas about having a mantra. From a product development standpoint, he really emphasized that the best products are created by people who are trying to create something that they would want to use themselves. Overall, highly entertaining and inspiring.

PPC Ad and Landing Page Optimization

Christine Churchill – PPC Ad Copy

Here’s a breakdown of relevant points

1. Make your ads stand out by providing differentiating information – price, guarantees, service, etc.
2. Provide incentive to click – compelling headlines, etc.
3. Add a sense of urgency – “limited time”
4. Use the keyword in your title – It will be bolded in Google. This is the single biggest factor in CTR.
5. Talk about the benefits to the customer
6. Add a call to action. What do you want them to do?
7. Use brands when possible
8. Avoid self-centered copy
9. Prequalify visitors by providing information to eliminate freebie hunters, etc. Prices, age limits, etc.

Brad Geddes – AdWords Quality Score

I didn’t realize this, but Adwords has different quality scoring guidelines for content and search advertising. Apparently the landing page doesn’t figure in search ranking, only in the minimum bid, whereas with content, there is no minimum bid, but the quality score is important. Also, when inserting dynamic keywords, the quality score is based on the alternative that you provide with the dynamic code.

Tony Wright – PPC Ad Testing

This is an interesting concept I hadn’t really considered before. Tony suggested setting aside a small percentage of your advertising budget strictly for testing, allowing you to test out new areas and strategies with keywords and ads without putting your main budget at risk. One of these days when I work for someone who doesn’t allow AdWords to be self-perpetuating, this will come in handy.

Link Development and Optimization

Rae Hoffman – Managing Your Linkbuilding Team

This was an awesome presentation. She went pretty quick, but there was a ton of good information. She talked a lot about how to outsource your linkbuilding, but along the way, she dropped some important ideas about the things you should look for in links, even if you’re doing it yourself.

1. List the type of links you want to obtain
2. Track competitor backlinks to see where YOU should be linking
3. Decide what you’re looking for in reciprocal partners
4. Be goal-oriented as far as requests and actual links are concerned

Joel Lesser – Reciprocal Linking

Reciprocal linking has kind of become the red-headed stepchild of SEO. It used to work well, but in recent years, its reputation has become tarnished as a completely useless way of building search engine rankings. Joes contends that relevant reciprocal linking is still helpful in search, and he also feels that it’s a good source of traffic as well. I tend to agree that having reciprocal links with related sites probably isn’t going to hurt you in the SERPs, but as to whether its going to help you very much, I’m a little skeptical. I’m going to have to test this myself.

Roger Montti, “Martinibuster” – Alternative Linkbuilding Strategies

Here’s the list:

1. Advertising or Linkbuys – He thinks that CPM is still a valuable hat tip in G, whether it’s an image or text, particularly if the ads are running on relevant sites. He also was very much against PageRank-based inquiries and advertising.
2. Buying websites outside your network. Look for inactive or underperforming sites.
3. Enter your sites into site of the month/day/week directories.
4. Get included in online-archived newsletters. It’s worth the small price.
5. Sponsorships – and if you sponsor a college event, you might even pick up some .edu links.
6. Proxy sites are good. Try leaving insightful comments on blogs, use trackbacks, blogrolls, and DMOZ listings.
7. YouTube and Google Video. Apparently, if you put your URL in the body of the description, YouTube and Google Video will turn it into a real, indexable link.

Copywriting

Ted Ulle – Managing Copywriting Teams

This presentation is obviously geared toward how to manage a whole team of copywriters, but the ideas about process are applicable to one-person operations as well as copywriting teams.

1. Have clarity of purpose. This is your guiding light.
2. Build a pile of content using forums keyword neighborhoods and emails to get a feel for the community.
3. Decide on metrics and goals at the beginning.
4. Build a solid information architecture. if you don’t know about how to do this, you should learn.
5. Build solid menus for your content.
6. Do graphic design last.
7. Now do the final HTML web edit to pull it all together.

Jennifer Slegg – Unique Content

There’s really only one thing to say about this: write unique content. That’s it.

Byron White – 30 Tips For Web Writing

Byron talked a lot about building community. A couple of points I liked:

1. The necessity of a good story. If you have a great story, you have a much easier time getting other people (your readers, most importantly) to believe in your message. There’s something about a great story that grabs people.
2. Related to the last point, part of finding a great story is taking a list of all the things that you’re not but you would like to be, plugging it into the following sentence: “We are not _____,” cross out the negatives, and tell the story of why the new sentence is true.
3. Try to get to your audience.
4. Respect intelligence.
5. Mine data anywhere you can get it. Search boxes, FAQ emails, site question submission forms, etc. are all good sources of data about what your readers are looking for.
]]> http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006-day-one-recap/feed/ 0 http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006/ http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006/#comments Tue, 14 Nov 2006 16:03:52 +0000 Jazzcat http://jazzcatseo.com/pubcon-vegas-2006/ So I’m at PubCon in Vegas this week, which I’m really excited for. This is my first conference, so I’m not entirely sure how this all works, but hopefully I’ll be able to pick up some good information and do a little networking.

I’ll try to post about some of the stuff I’m learning on this blog, so expect to see daily posts for the next few days.

Update: I think I’m only going to blog the stuff that I thought was of particular interest, meaning that some speakers won’t get a mention. Sorry.

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