If you are actively managing PPC campaigns I bet at some point you had to change a percentage rate of several hundred/thousand AdWords keywords, change match types or search for and edit text in hundreds of ad-copies. AdWords Editor options were limited and keyword level management was a slow (and painful) process. Luckily Google made an attempt to make our lives easier and have made e the AdWords interface a little faster and easier to navigate. Here is what Google’s Program Manager said about new changes being introduced: “For us to work on this, that the AdWords system was faster, simpler and has a more attractive appearance, is pure pleasure. Therefore we are pleased that we can advise the introduction of new bulk editing features in the AdWords interface. With the introduction of major changes in the entire account will be faster and easier.” I was monitoring the introduction of new changes. Initially only a couple of accounts in my MCC have been updated with new features, but I think we should all see them implemented across all accounts by now. I have only been using new features ever since and in all honesty – I do not know how I could ever do without them. Here is a review of the changes that are being introduced: Keywords:

• Search and replace text in keywords and target URLs
• Appending text to the keyword or destination URL
• Specify the new rates, (including raising the CPC to appear on the first page and at the top of the first page).
• Increasing and decreasing rates
• Changing the type of keyword matching
• Adding / removing labels

Ad-Copy:

• Search and replace text in the ad or URL
• Appending text to your ad or URL
• Changing the case of text
• Adding / removing labels

Ad Groups:

• Increasing and decreasing rates
• Set new rates
• Add / remove labels

Campaigns:

• Increasing and decreasing budgets
• Setting new budgets
• Adding / removing labels

Another very useful feature, which has previously appeared in automated rules management, is preview of the changes before applying them (if you do a lot of changes, they will be placed in the background). This means that, when you have executed large number of changes, you can leave the site and do other things on your account, and even log out. A progress bar lets you monitor how much time it takes to apply the changes. Once this is done, you can view the changes. All this might seem to be very simple and as the matter of fact it is. The benefit however can be seen from day one you get to know the new options and start using them regularly. It is just so much quicker to implement large scale keyword level changes with no hassle and no time at all! As per usual, more information and reviews are accessible from Google Support Centre, just search for bulk editing.

The Farmer update has shaken the world of SEO in the USA recently and was undoubtedly rolled out with the end user’s benefit in mind – ensuring the most relevant results for any given search. Hurray! Good for Google! Does that then mean that the latest changes to Adwords were rolled out for the benefit of its advertisers? Unquestionably, many of the changes that Google has made to Adwords over the last 18 – 24 months have been to the benefit of its users. As a PPC management company, we know as well as anyone the impact that ad extensions (for example) can have on CTRs and conversion rates; ergo users are finding paid results more and more relevant. However – and call me a cynic – I would argue that Google’s latest changes to Adwords are purely for the benefit of advertisers, and hence to the benefit of Google’s bottom line. So, let me explain my cynicism… Google is making its ads much more similar in appearance to the organic listings. Around 70-80% (depending on your sources) of search engine users ONLY use organic listings, so there is logic in disguising the paid listings as organic to trap the less savvy searchers. But how exactly has Google done it?

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In the second half of 2010, Google began to roll out notable changes to Google Places. Some of these I have touched upon in my previous post and deserve a little deeper consideration. Some changes seem to be purely for the benefit of Google’s users, others seem beneficial to Google Places registered websites and some changes are unclear as to whom they benefit. This is all well and good, but over the last few months I’ve noticed, in many of my PPC accounts, CTRs dropping noticeably from location based keywords that have an average position of below 4. Why is this? Could this be related to the changes to Google Places? Firstly, let’s revisit the changes. To trigger Google places results, a user must search for a location based keyword, a good wintery example being “boiler repair London”.

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A Landing Page, better known as a Micro Site, is a page created essentially for a Pay Per Click campaign. It is this page that a web page visitor reaches on clicking a PPC or a CPC advertisement listed on web search results. A Landing Page is specifically designed for marketing a particular product or service. Alternatively a SEO expert uses a landing page for the purpose of evaluating an advertisement’s effectiveness as also the efficiency of the keywords and keyword phrases incorporated in the search results. A Landing Page is often further categorised into a “reference landing page” and a “transactional landing page”. A reference landing page exhibits all information relevant to a web page visitor in the form of text, images and other web resources. A Landing page’s effectiveness is judged by the revenue value earned by the advertisement. Meanwhile a Transactional landing page is designed with the aim of immediate sale of product and services. A web page visitor performing a desired action is termed as “conversion”. A Landing page’s effectiveness and quality is thus measured in terms of its conversion rate.

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