Adwords Confusion - Where are these clicks coming from?
-
Ok, I posted two images showing that my Google Adwords search settings are to receive clicks only from google's search engine, as we are doing testing on keyword behavior with a few specific keywords.
The second image will show that we have somehow 7 total search clicks, but not for any of our specific keywords.
I'm confused. . . and hungry. . . I'm 'confungry'. jk any thoughts are welcomed.
-
Thanks for all the help everyone! It appears that those supposed 'phantom clicks' are a result of our product listings being added to the campaigns, and those don't get tracked as individual keyword clicks. Here is the exact response I got back from Google for future reference:
"Having reviewed your account, we can see that you have successfully setup
product listing ads for your campaigns. So, the missing clicks are from
the product listing ads. Please note that the keywords do not record any
clicks for product listing ads.Instead, to view the statistics of the product listing ads, please select
desired campaign and click on 'Auto Targets' tab found beside Ad
Extensions in the central menu bar. This will give you performance
statistics for your product ads." -
Just another thought, have you tried seeing what your search term report tells you in Adwords as this might show you search terms that have clicks against them that are not showing on the main overiew panel.
Go to the Dimensions tab and change the view to Search Terms and drag that out to Excel.
The other possiblity is that Google has just gone crazy....... had to happen some time
-
We get that sometimes also -it shows up as "other keywords" i just go into analytics and find them that way.
-
Yeah, it could be. Thanks for the response. We are now up to 32 phantom clicks for a total cost of $26
-
This test campaign is for all states outside of the one we reside in, so we have not attached this specific campaign to our places account.
-
Also another possibility is that they have been free clicks. I think I have seen this mentioned somewhere in adwords reports, I think it has something to do with when linking your google places account with your campaign - have you done this?
-
I find that sometimes there can be a lag in how things are reported in Adwords. So, perhaps by tomorrow you will see the data as to where those clicks came from?
-
Thanks Mark, good thoughts. However, I haven't made any changes to the keywords, match types or the ads of this campaign. I did edit the campaign settings late last night, which if tracked by East coast time, it may have been search results from Google's search network maybe, but I still think the keywords would have been identified regarding which ones brought in the clicks.
The clicks are now up to 9 clicks, but still no credited clicks to the keyword phrases. However, I don't know how new this is, but I just noticed that the clicks are now 'accredited by the Media Rating Council', which could mean clicks are coming through, they are just not being considered legitimate and 'chargeable', so maybe that's why they are not being shown or deducted from ad spend. Article is here: https://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/answer.py?hl=en&ctx=tltp&answer=153707
-
A couple of thoughts. 1) these are unlikely to have come from the display network as they would not show Under the search total, so safe to say your campaign settings are fine. 2) have you deleted any keywords or edited the keywords in any way (even the match type)? If so adwords won't show the clicks against the original keyword, it will clear the stats for the updated keyword and just keep them in the total at the bottom. E.g you had 2 clicks on "blue widget" and you edited the keyword to [blue widget], adwords will clear the 2 clicks alongside the keyword but keep them in the total below. Mark
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
-
Can a third-party advertising agency lock me out of Adwords?
Hey all, I've just started at a new company. We spend quite a bit on Adwords and I'm tasked with seeing how that is going and assessing that spend. The problem is, Adwords and Youtube ads have been given to a third-party advertising agency. They are only willing to share the number of clicks, cost and conversions, stuff like that. They refuse to give us access to the account. Is this legal? I mostly want to get in there to look at keyword history, see what we have bid on, how often it was searched, stuff like that. But they won't let us in and I'm wondering if they are required to let us look at our account as I would think they are. Please help!
Paid Search Marketing | | DanDeceuster2 -
AdWords Device-Level Bid Adjustments for Tablet not working for me
Yesterday Wordstream announced that AdWords rolled out device-level bid adjustments for tablet for everyone, but when I go into my campaign settings, it's the way it's always been, with no ability to adjust for tablet. I'm wondering if anyone else is experiencing this, or is there perhaps some kind of setting I have to turn on? http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2016/07/26/device-level-bid-adjustments I am so excited about this change, seeing as our cost-per-conversion on tablets is always twice what it is on desktop, and not having control over it was maddening.
Paid Search Marketing | | UnderRugSwept0 -
Can Adwords Increase Organic Traffic?
Hello, A friend of mine has noticed an increase in organic traffic since they started using AdWords. Has anyone had similar results or could this be coincidence? Thanks in advance!
Paid Search Marketing | | Mike.Bean0 -
Why you should never use Google Adwords To Conduct Key Word Research
Buongiorno from 22 degrees C too damn humid Wetherby UK, The other day a client wanted to know how much a ppc campaign would cost with a specific bank of keywords. So off i went and loaded in the key words and set the ads thinking it was not live.... A week later i get a tap on the shoulder asking why weve been invoiced for £xxxx oh dio mio!! The damn campaign went to live. So ive got two questions: 1. Do Google adwords automatically go to Live once youve loaded up phrases and ads, i really thought it would have made it more obvious, A " Would you like your campaign to go live" prompt would have been appreciated. 2. As a safety measure is configuring a Google Alert in Analytics to ping when paid traffic is picked up not a bad idea just so ive got a warning sytem set up so to speak. Grazie tanto,
Paid Search Marketing | | Nightwing
David1 -
Potential problems with multiple users of an adwords MCC
Morning all, I have had a query regarding granting access to an MCC account for people using various platforms. Now this a pretty specific query for an area outside my expertise, and conveniently both our PPC guys are on holiday so thought i would reach out to the community. Full request is this: "On the mcc I am slightly concerned about that, from experience I have run into problems especially with granting access for usage of API’s on an account, so if for example we wanted to use marin they would need access then another wanted to use adobe they would need another and if they are all sat under the SSM teams mcc that could be problematic or we would have to set up another." Any help would be appreciated. Thanks, Tom.
Paid Search Marketing | | Sarbs0 -
Adwords Keyword Research - Simplifying Process
So far here's my algorithm: I will make an excel spreadsheet with all of our currently optimized keywords (about 300 I believe) I will grab all the keywords possible out of the adwords keyword tool I will merge the adwords keyword tool keywords with the 300 on the excel spreadsheet and erase the duplicates. I'll drop what's left over in exact match into a google adwords campaign I'll then use the + modifier with brand names and with two word keywords such as +brand +keywords +here Will this algorithm find all of the keywords, or am I missing something?
Paid Search Marketing | | BobGW0 -
Graph ad groups by cost in Adwords
Easy one for someone I'm sure, but I can't figure it out. In Adwords under campaigns "Widget" I have ad groups "Blue", "Green" and "Red" each with 3 ads in them. How can I produce a compared report on cost per day of each ad group. So I want something that looks like 1st 2nd 3rd ...
Paid Search Marketing | | StalkerB
Blue £12 £14 £9 ...
Green £8 £11 £5 ...
Red £9 £22 £16 ... Possible?0 -
Adwords budget for different days of the week
We operate a Google Adwords campaign that clearly performs better conversion wise on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesdays ... What is the best way to stack a higher daily budget on specifc days in Adwords - There doesn't appear to be any formal way of doing this and the advice online is mixed...
Paid Search Marketing | | digitalarts0