Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Multiple keyword match types - same ad group, or separate ad groups?
-
Hi guys,
Looking at an account that has historically used broad matching, and i'd now like to take some of the better performing keywords and duplicate as phrase and/or exact match to increase the quality of traffic to the landing pages.
I know I can add red shoes, "red shoes" and [red shoes] to the same ad group, however I've also read that people are creating separate groups for each match type.
Other than easy of management (same group), or more granular targeting of ads (separate groups), should I go with either approach, or a blend of the two?
My key objective in this restructure is to drop the currently high bounce rate on the landing pages by improving the relevance of the incoming traffic.
Cheers, Jez
-
Hey Guys,
I think this post is going to help me out a lot! I've been paying out the nose for my advertising on Google over the year with as you can well imagine a certain sense of frustration. I got the inkling this was what I needed to do as I can see now my structure has been way to careful on my campaigns.
Thanks,
Scott
-
That's correct. The more freedom you give the engines to match your keywords to "related" queries, the less relevant your average click will be, which will drive down conversion rate and thus revenue per click. So, in summary, the more broad the keyword the less you should be paying per click (99% of the time).
This reminds me of a funny blog post I read today that shows how ridiculous some of the matches can be when using broad match -- http://www.ppchero.com/wtq-do-the-creep/
-
Thanks fidelityim & KTaylor, I'll consider both approaches against the time the longer term owners of this Adwords account are willing to put in to managing it
So, the exact > phrase > broad approach is the most cost effective, even though we're putting forward our highest bid price first, based on the theory that higher qualified click through traffic is more valuable to the site owner - is that correct?
I want to confirm, as to a SEM aspirant it seems counter intuitive to pay more for exact matches, though as you mentioned fidelityim, i realise that the CPC does not necessarily equal the tiered bid prices.
Cheers, Jez
-
fidelityim makes a good suggestion. You should definitely bid according to performance of your keywords match types. In all but the most rare cases advertisers' performance will match the tiers fidelityim has mentioned exact > phrase > broad (not including the near exact, near phrase, and broad modified match types Google has added).
There is one point that fidelityim made that I don't agree with... I think it's worthwhile to create separate ad groups and even campaigns for different match types. The main reasons being that it allows you to:
1. View performance by match type at a glance in the absence of sophisticated tools like Kenshoo or Marin Software. This performance will vary by a huge margin so making it easy to see your winning buckets is very helpful given that everyone's time is limited.
2. You can budget your match types based on performance. By analyzing your search query reports, broad and phrase matched queries can be great feeders for your exact match campaigns, so you'll probably want to limit your spend on those terms until you are sure about the performance at a query level. This can only be achieved by separating these match types into their own campaigns.
Cheers,
KT
-
What I'd recommend is a 'tiered bidding' approach. Don't use different ad groups for different match types.
With tiered bidding you're setting different bid amounts for different match types - specifically, your exact match is the highest bid, followed by phrase and then broad. So it would be something like this:
[red shoes] - $1
"red shoes" - $0.75 (3/4 the price of the exact match)
red shoes - $0.50 (1/2 the price of the exact match)
This strategy helps ensure that you're paying a fair value for all different types of search queries that are bringing traffic to your site.
Assuming that in this example, you're an e-commerce site selling red shoes, we'll argue the term 'red shoes' is the most qualified search query available. As such, you're paying top dollar for that keyword - $1. (I know your actual CPC isn't your bid price, I'm just saying - for illustrative purposes). If a user searches for, say, 'shiny red shoes', your phrase match keyword will be triggered, and you'll pay $0.75. You're paying a little bit less because, let's say, your shoes aren't exactly shiny, but there's still a chance that user will convert. Lastly, if the user types in 'what are red shoes', your classic informational type of search query, your ads won't be triggered by the exact or phrase match version of the keyword, but they will be triggered by the broad match, and you'll pay $0.50. You pay the least amount for this search query because this doesn't represent a very qualified visitor for your red shoe, e-commerce website.
Hope that helps.
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
-
"Duplicate without user-selected canonical” - impact to Google Ads costs
Hello, we are facing some issues on our project and we would like to get some advice. Scenario
Paid Search Marketing | | Alex_Pisa
We run several websites (www.brandName.com, www.brandName.be, www.brandName.ch, etc..) all in French language . All sites have nearly the same content & structure, only minor text (some headings and phone numbers due to different countries are different). There are many good quality pages, but again they are the same over all domains. Current solution
Currently we don’t use canonicals, instead we use rel="alternate" hreflang="x-default": <link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-BE" href="https://www.brandName.be/" /> <link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-CA" href="https://www.brandName.ca/" /> <link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-CH" href="https://www.brandName.ch/" /> <link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-FR" href="https://www.brandName.fr/" /> <link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr-LU" href="https://www.brandName.lu/" /> <link rel="alternate" hreflang="x-default" href="https://www.brandName.com/" /> Naturally this si reflected in ""Duplicate without user-selected canonical” . Issue
We create the same ad in Google Ads for 2 domains. So the content is mostly identical, ads are identical, target URLs differ only in domain. Yet Google Ads “Quality score” is different (10/10 vs. 6/10) and “Landing page experience” is very different (Above average vs. Average). Some members of our team think lower “Landing page experience” increases the Google Ads costs, which I personally don't believe, but I want to double check. Question: Can “Duplicate without user-selected canonical” issue decrease the “Landing page experience” rating and as result can it cause higher Google ads costs? Any suggestions/ideas appreciated, thanks. Regards.0 -
304 "If Modified Header" Triggers Error in Google Ads?
We have a client who is launch some Google Ads campaigns, and they recently asked us to fix 304 "Errors" on their website as per this feedback: "When we inspected the website we came across a number of 304 status errors. In order to get the ads running, we will need all of the website domain status codes converted to 200. “ Of course, all of their website pages return a 200 Status, it's just the HTTP headers that additionally clarify with a 304 Response (not an error). Has anyone else ever run into this issue with Google Ads? IMHO it makes no sense to remove this functionality. Google has even recommended in the past to use this it: https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2008/11/date-with-googlebot-part-ii-http-status.html Thanks for any tips or feedback!
Paid Search Marketing | | mirabile0 -
Are there free tools that would tell me the cpc for my keywords?
If not what tools do you recommend to use to get an accurate cpc $ for estimating budget?
Paid Search Marketing | | lina_digital0 -
How to deal with the InCorrect Price Issue for the Google Shopping Product Listing Ads?
Hello All, Yesterday when i was checking with the one of the search term for "canvas prints"..i come to know that one of the advertiser EasyCanvasPrints.com is showing Incorrect price. On Search result they guys are showing $7.46 incorrect price for the PLA - Product listing ads. Go to below links: https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&site=webhp&tbs=vw:l,mr:1,seller:8521978&tbm=shop&q=canvas+prints&sa=X&ved=0CJkGELMrahUKEwjmj-PSgfzIAhUHBY4KHc0VBBQ https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=canvas+prints&tbm=shop https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=canvas+prints&start=0 But when we click on it then i can not this price $7.46 http://www.easycanvasprints.com/single-canvas?singlecanvas=1&height=19&width=14&pcode=5345334C6B74647246774137536C786768544B5458776C35644F747855796D39&utm_source=google_base&utm_medium=data_feed I have done various claim and send to Google support about this misguiding price for the Easy Canvas Prints but they not taking any actions on it. Guy Can u please help me how can i pass this message to Google to take actions for this advertiser? Waiting for your reply Regards Dinesh
Paid Search Marketing | | CommercePundit0 -
Can I dynamically add city name to my PPC ad text and URL based on the user's search?
I have looked into DKI (Dynamic Keyword Insertion), but have not found a solution and thought that some excellent Mozzer might be able to help. Here is the idea: We have landing pages for hundreds of cities. The local content on each of these cities changes page to page, however the keywords that we are going after are the same. So, I am trying to create a dynamic ad group that looks something like this: Headline: {City Name} {Keyword} Description: We cover {City Name} {Keyword}, get more info now! URL: http://www.website.com/{City Name} Please let me know if you can assist with this, B
Paid Search Marketing | | Reis_Inc.0 -
Keyword Domains for PPC
I have a client who wants to buy a lot of long domains with keywords in them, for example, thesandiegopetstore.com (this is fictional) and then set up a PPC landing page for each. They think that when someone types in "san diego pet store" that their domain will be listed high and then they will get a lot of traffic. My concern is that they will own a lot of domains for their company and I thought Google is getting pretty adamant about companies not having a lot of domains, and I thought that keyword domains are not as effective as they used to be -- that branding is more important now. Also, I think the domains they've picked target very competitive keywords and that perhaps they will get a lot unqualified traffic and will still have to pay for the clicks. What do you think? What is the best way to set up PPC landing pages?
Paid Search Marketing | | klkirby0 -
Does anyone know of an excel template for creating keyword combinations?
I am looking for an Excel template with Macros that would allow me to drop a column of keywords next to a column of modifiers and it would build out thousands of keywords with a Macro. Can anyone drop their best SEO/SEM Excel template spreadsheet links in the comments?
Paid Search Marketing | | eli-hgm0 -
Keyword tool for Yahoo ads?
Hi guys, Anyone knows a good keywords tool for Yahoo Ads and Bing Advertising? - We are interested to see the search volumes for these 2 search engines (all tough they are together now, people still have searching preferences and usualy only use one of them. - We need to see global search volumes as well as geo-specific data (country level) Thanks in advance
Paid Search Marketing | | tolik10