A Call From Google (Not a Question but the Moderators said to Put this Here)
-
This is not going to be a long post but I wanted to get something out there that a lot of other business owners might not understand. I have several different PPC campaigns that my business partner and I personally run. The campaigns are all doing quite well with a high rate of return.
Never has Google contacted me (other than for surveys, which I did wind up receiving 5 blue gym bags with the Google insignia on them) and never did I think they would. The campaign they called me on wasn’t a particularly large campaign. Right now the PPC spend is around 3000/month. I understand this isn’t a little bit of money, but at the same time it’s not in the millions like most of Google’s top sites.
The thing that concerned me most was the reason for their call. A nice woman introduced herself and said that the campaigns were nicely run except for a few changes. She went on to tell me of a couple of updates in the PPC realm (this happened to me yesterday – Feb 28). She said within the past few months they were rolling out a new way to target their content network and for most people they were able to save 35% (that was a number she mentioned) with the tactics she was going to suggest. My background lies in mathematics and finance (somewhat related) and I tend to know when I am either being sold or being tricked into being sold.
Through the whole list of things she mentioned that would help as she was walking me through she mentioned that it was a good idea to up the bid on the content network. That way we would have more chances of being seen and it would help with out conversions. This by itself seems like decent advice, but our bid for the content network is not cheap. If they are calling every small – medium business and telling them to up their bids, we are going to have a dilemma on our hands. The dilemma being that the AdWords placement is going to cost a heck of a lot more. She said that even if we up our bid, we are not likely to pay the full amount. She wants us to have a repeat conversation on Monday.
One side of me was a little upset after the conversation but all they are doing is simply up-selling. They are raising the rates through what I guess are fair business practices. A lot of business owners might just take the advice of a Google representative and not think twice about it. This means we have thousands to hundreds of thousands of people at this very moment upping the bid on their content network.
If they can even get a small proportion of people to increase their bids - let's say 10% - the other 90% will start getting less shows and eventually increase their bids. Also, the people that have higher bid amounts in but aren't paying the full amount will start getting closer and closer to the amount they put in as their maximum bid.
This wouldn’t be alarming to me but this is the first and only time I have ever heard from a Google representative. I can’t say I didn’t see this coming but at the same time I was definitely taken aback. I am curious to know what the MOZ community has to say.
-
The budget is maxed out for this term - they just wanted us to up the bid (which we are spending .25 of the current bid).
-
We are number 1 btw - that is the average - they just suggested to raise the bids. I should have mentioned that.
-
I have played with it - I know exactly what is going on. That is not the problem. The problem is their suggestions. We spend enough to know about raising budgets. They want us to raise the budget for something specific that is already maxed out - it is set at 500/day and coming in at much less - they didn't even look at it. The problem is they want us to raise the budget as a suggestion without any looking into. This is dangerous.
-
They will keep doing this and eventually it will up the price for all terms (I am sure this has already).
-
cant believe they are still doing this till today.
Thanks for sharing Jacob
-
We have a term that is performing really well and showing to the maximum amount of people on the content network - she wanted us to limit the people it shows to and up the bid.
-
Yeah...seems it's a common problem. There's a Google Partner group Google set up on G+, Lots of complaints and examples of terrible advice.
Good luck!
-
It wasn't great advice and really wasn't applicable. Pretty weird - hopefully it's not driving up the bids which if everyone followed it the advice would.
-
Google AdWords seem to be having a massive push on customer retention at the moment. We've had clients that spend 20-30K and 1K alike per month receiving calls offering "advice" (often VERY bad advice). We (and some other Google Partners) have complained to our account managers at Google and ours in particular mentioned that they have some teams calling advertisers working from prompt sheets (basically offering them all the same advice).
So take it with a pinch of salt, experiment but don't fall into the trap of thinking because it's Google they're 100% correct. Often google uses outside agencies for these types of things - one in the UK is called Capita I believe.
-
I say play with it. If your hunch is true then you'll pay more and get the same results. If your hunch is not then you'll pay the same or slightly more and get better results. PPC campaigns are all about testing, analyzing and improving. Maybe this is one of the ways for that to happen.
-
I have a meeting with our Google Rep weekly. They do enjoy spending your money, however most of the suggestions are worth it in terms of ROI in my experience. Guess it all depends on the size of the marketing campaign. Interesting they are reaching out in this way though.
-
Hi Jacob,
They're definitely upselling, that is just their sales business ;-). I've received a couple of calls over the years as well to incentive me to spend more money with them. I don't have a problem with it personally as any other sales department of any company would do the same probably.
You might want to also have a look at this one: http://webmarketingschool.com/should-you-trust-google/
I must say that she had a point that upping your bid doesn't mean that you will have to fully spend that amount on display advertising. It could also be that she sees that you just have to spend just a bit more to generate more top placements and so on receive more conversions and lower your CPA. But it's a hard guess if that would really be paying off for you.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How Google Search works
I watched this video over the weekend. If you haven't yet, this is a great documentary every SEO client should watch. watch?v=tFq6Q_muwG0
Paid Search Marketing | | WebDaytona0 -
Gap in Google PPC Ads & Organic search results - New test by Google?
Hi All, Just noticed an unusual gap in PPC ads and organic search results in google NZ. while searched the same term in Google AU, it wasn't the same. Did anyone here see something similar? Is this a new test by Google to get more clicks on PPC ads and pushing down organic results? Looking forward to hear from the community. Cheers, Rattan wcB6DL1.jpg
Paid Search Marketing | | FRL0 -
Google certification
Hi Just wondering what everyones thoughts on Google certification? I was wondering if anyone had any experience doing the analytics and adwords tests? Do you feel they give you a benefit or advantage to others in your field? And also what is the cost of the exams? Thanks in advance
Paid Search Marketing | | TheZenAgency0 -
Quick Question: Anchor links on Adwords main URL?
Is it OK to use anchor links on the main URL of an advert on Google Adwords? Example: www.example.com/#example Had a little Google, and not much was returned on the topic. Many Thanks, Alex
Paid Search Marketing | | Whittie0 -
Questions on Paid Directory Links...
Hi Moz Community! We have a client in the manufacturing industry that is listed in Thomasnet.com for a about 75 different terms. For those that might not know, this is a paid directory site that ranks extremely well and has a very high DA at just under 90. These 75 different terms have spanned about 9,000 "dofollow" links on Thomasnet.com around 4 months back, right about the same time as the Penguin 2.0 update. The link profile for this client had around 2,000 links prior to the 9,000 additional links, and our team is unclear if we should be concerned about these paid directory links. The organic rankings have dropped a bit, but that might be because of a more general Penguin update and not be directly tied to this paid directory. I'm looking for some general guidance and recommendations in this paid directory space and help with Thomasnet.com if available. Should these links be requested as changed to "nofollow"?
Paid Search Marketing | | zadro
Will Google see this domain as one major domain link?
What other recommendations/experience with "quality" paid directories can be expected? Thanks much and look forward to your comments and discussion. Dario0 -
Google Analytics Code
I have an ecommerce website and have installed the Google Analytics Code. i am also spending the money for google adwords. i m getting clicks and as well as orders but in google analytics it show that i am getting all the traffic from organic search results whereas my daily budget get exhausted and i do get business for the keywords i bid. i want to ask is there a problem with adwords or anlytics. Or have i placed the wrong code or have placed the code not in a proper format.
Paid Search Marketing | | seosogo0 -
How can i track keywords of Google Product Listing Ads in Google Analytics
I have thousands of products in my feed to Google Shopping (Google Merchant Center). I have also set utm source, medium and campaign in URL. I have integrated my Google Adwords(With Auto Tagging) with my Google Merchant Center. My Question is, I can see campaign in google analytics but inside campaign i am not able to see keywords (From which those click are being received) I wonder to know that does anyone can help me to track Product Listing Ads keywords in Google Analytics. Thanks,
Paid Search Marketing | | CommercePundit0 -
Your Google AdWords account has been permanently suspended for repeated violation of AdWords or Landing Page and Site policies in this or a related account.
My client nor I received any warning. We even had a google adwords team optimize the account and my rep does not yet know the reason for the ban. Not sure if its related but their google organic rankings dropped significantly at the same time. https://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=164786 Any advice here? Do these Questions get indexed by google? I will ask my client if I can disclose the domain. Is there any way around a permanent ban? They were spending 50K per month. Is this enough to have any clout?
Paid Search Marketing | | webbroi0