#1 Know Your REAL Keywords
If you only look at one report in Google Adwords I would suggest the Search Query Performance report. Recently Google has made it easier to see this data without the hassle of running a report.
Simply navigate to a Campaign or Ad Group and select the Keywords tab. Once selected click “See search terms” and select ALL.
This will show you the actual keywords your Ad is being shown for, their CTR (click through rate) and even conversion rates. For example, if you are bidding on the keyword phrase “Gas Grills” Google will show your CTR and conversions, but unless you actually run this report you won’t see all the variations that keyword is actually showing for.
I see this problem all the time as an SEO. Someone will tell me that they make money on the keyword “Blue Widget” on Adwords and they want to rank for it organically. I then have them run this report to be sure and they find that “Blue Widget” was set to broad match and their actual conversions were coming from more specific variants of their main keyword.
You typically have to wait 1 day for data to show up but run this report on the last 30 days and you should have plenty of data to review per Ad Group.
#2 Turn a Negative into a Positive
After you run your report, scan the keyword list it gives you for phrases that don’t match your product or business. Add those keywords as a negative search term for that Ad Group or Campaign. Take the time to run your Search Query Performance report at least once a week and sift through it for keywords you can eliminate.
A large list of negative keywords is essential to running a successful Adwords campaign. Keywords set to Broad Match on Google are notorious for showing horribly unrelated searches. By eliminating these you can raise your CTR which will lower your overall cost and stop you from wasting money on customers who will never buy.
Google will not allow some long search phrases to be added as a negative. When this happens try to make some of the most important core words of the search phrase negative and leave the rest out.
While most negative keywords should be inserted at the Ad Group level you can add them at the Campaign level if it makes sense. For example, if you sell high end products Cheap or Free may be a good global negative for you. If you do not want to target customers in the research phrase of the buying cycle you might eliminate review and reviews etc.
#3 Use Tightly Themed Ad Groups
When you start a new Ad Group Do Not Overload it with Keywords! This is a major mistake that many people make. You need to keep your Ad Groups very targeted.
- Charcoal Grills
- Gas Grills
- Electric Grills
Those should be 3 unique Ad Groups. Resist the urge to pile them into one Ad Group because they are all grills.
#4 Divide Important Keywords by Match Type
Let’s say you want to sell Gas Grills. Start an Ad Group with only two keywords, “Gas Grills” & “Gas Grill” both set to phrase match. Go ahead and input at least 10 or 20 negative keywords then let it run for a day or two.
While you are adding negative keywords add [Gas Grills] & [Gas Grill] as negative terms as well. This may seem counter intuitive at first but by doing this your ads will only display for actual phrase searches that use Gas Grills in them versus showing for the exact match keyword.
You can then setup an exact match keyword Ad Group for [Gas Grills] & [Gas Grill]. Once this is done you will be able to truly see how your exact match keywords are performing and how your phrase match keywords are performing. You can use this same type of technique for broad match as well.
#5 Use Broad and Phrase Match to Mine Keyword Gold
Now that your Ad Groups are setup to truly show phrase or exact match terms you can use the phrase and broad matches to find great keywords.
In our case you might find something like this in your “Gas Grills” keyword report.
- Natural Gas Grills
- Weber Gas Grills
- Best Gas Grills
- Cheap Gas Grills
- Built in Gas Grills
- Consumer Reports Gas Grills
The idea here is to ditch the bad stuff and move the good stuff into individual Ad Groups. For instance, you probably don’t sell built in gas grills so why waste the traffic, make it a negative. However, if you do sell Weber grills make Weber gas grills a negative keyword for this Ad group and go create a new Ad group just for Weber grills.
Your phrase match will no longer show for weber gas grills but your new highly targeted ad group will. The keyword phrase “Consumer Reports Gas Grills” could inspire you to research the grills that consumer reports are currently recommending as best buys. Make the keyword a negative and place it in its own Ad Group with a landing page touting the grills you sell that are all so recommended by consumer reports.
You do not have to do this for every keyword, but try it and it’s a great way to eliminate bad keywords and create highly targeted Ad Groups that you can dominate for profitable keywords.
#6 Quality Score Can Destroy Your Campaign
If you do not have Quality Score enabled, click on the Keywords tab and select Columns. Make sure the Quality Score is checked. Try to get 7/10 and above for all your keywords. Try to improve any score lower than a 7 and anything lower than a 5 is a serious issue.
Usually Quality Scores can be improved simply by doing a better job of grouping your keywords and writing ads with the specific keyword appearing in the ad at least twice.
If you are doing that and still getting a low score it could be that your CTR is too low or your landing page needs to be more relevant for that keyword. As a last resort simply delete the problem keyword. This is much easier to do if it is a low traffic keyword to begin with.
Sometimes Google will give you a low Quality Score for seemingly no reason at all. You may think you are doing just about everything right and still get a lower Quality Score. In these cases you may want to use a high Quality Score broad match or phrase match keyword combined with a HUGE list of negative terms to get Google to mainly only show your ad for the keyword you’re having issues with. Hopefully you will not have to go to that extreme.
#7 Split Testing May Be Hurting You
Don’t get me wrong, you need to be split testing ads against one another. Every Ad Group you have should be running at least two variations of an ad at all times in an effort to find a better performing ad.
However, after you have been split testing ads for a while you will find it harder and harder to beat your best ad. This is where split testing can actually hurt you because 50% of your clicks will be going to an underperforming ad.
The solution is to duplicate your best ad 3 times (or more) and run it against 1 copy of your new ad. This will keep your CTR steady while you test. You can play with the mix to get a percentage you are comfortable with.
Remember to go into your campaign settings and set your ads to rotate more evenly so you can get an accurate split test.
#8 A Simple Way to Write Effective Ad Copy
Headline – Use your main keyword
Line 1 – Use line one to promote a benefit
Line 2 – Use line two to show your USP (unique selling point)
Display URL – Use Capitalization in your domain & add your keyword after the /. You can also remove the www from the Display URL if you need the extra room.
An ad like this should do well because it uses the target keyword “Gas Grills” in the headline and multiple times throughout the ad. It also touts the benefit of free shipping and 50% off combined with the unique selling point on line two of a large selection and fast shipping.
There really is no silver bullet when it comes to writing ad copy. The best thing to do is continuously test. However, if you follow this simplistic formula you will already be ahead of most of your competition.
#9 Optimize Your Campaign Settings.
Make sure you are set to the right countries or states that you wish to market in. If you don’t ship to Canada make sure you’re not advertising there.
However, the settings with the biggest impact are in the Networks and Devices section.
In general I would advise you turn off the search partners, display network and iphones/smart phones. I start almost every campaign with these three options disabled. Once I get the campaign running smoothly I will create a new campaign that just targets the display network.
The display network is a whole different animal and you need to know your market before even trying it. Also, it is much easier to view your data with Search and Display in their own unique campaigns.
Unless you are selling pizza or ringtones I would stay away from advertising on smart phones unless you have a very specific plan of attack.
By eliminating these networks until you are ready to expand into them you can save a ton of wasted money early on.
#10 Google Instant Will Change Search Behaviors
As more people get used to Google instant search it will start to change their search habits. Make sure you are prepared. Go to Google and type in your main money making keywords. See what Google starts suggesting. Make sure you have compelling ads for each of the relevant phrases that Google suggest.
If you do this now you can position yourself with high CTR and Quality Score in anticipation of your customers search behavior.
Closing Thought
Adwords can be a major source of frustration for beginners and even pros. However, if you take the time to set your campaign up the right way and monitor it closely you will limit the headaches and most importantly stop wasting money.
Please feel free to post your favorite Adwords tip in the comments!
According to some estimates, about 75% of all online shopping carts are ditched before the sale is closed. Is shopping cart abandonment costing your business money? Do you wish you could stop hemorrhaging customers?
The first step to reducing shopping cart abandonment is understanding why your customers aren’t completing their purchases. Here are the 6 most common reasons for shopping cart abandonment.
- Forced registration—Online customers don’t like being asked to register for an account before making their purchase. It’s time-consuming, and to put it plainly, it’s pretty annoying. So, if you make customers register on your website, you can bet you’re losing out on a lot of sales. The solution? Let them buy without registering. It’s really not that complicated.
- Shipping prices are too high—High shipping prices are actually cited as the most common reason for shopping cart abandonment. Customers factor in shipping rates in the overall cost, so if your shipping rates are too high, they may take their business elsewhere or just buy the product locally. One thing you can do is to offer multiple shipping options so shoppers can find the rate that best fits their budget.
- No guarantee—I hate to break it to you, but customers just don’t trust you. When people shop online, they’re always on alert to make sure they aren’t being ripped off. For you, this means you need to find ways to eliminate risk for customers. Offering a money-back guarantee puts shoppers at ease because they know if the product doesn’t meet their expectations, they’ll get their money back.
- Really long checkout process—Your customers are in a hurry. They don’t want to spend 15 minutes trying to buy your product. Try to minimize the number of steps required to complete the transaction. You should also put a progress bar at the top of the page to let customers know how close they are to finishing checkout.
- It’s out of stock—Is there anything more frustrating than getting to the end of checkout only to find out the product is out of stock? Ugh! Either let the customer know up front that it’s out of stock or hide the product until you replenish your inventory.
- What’s next?—Pretend your customers are all aliens who aren’t familiar with the internet. Never just assume they know how to checkout. You need to make it very clear what steps they need to take to complete their purchase. Put a big “Next” button at the bottom of each page to guide them along.
What are some other reasons customers ditch shopping carts? Share your experiences by leaving a comment!
Eric Brantner offers freelance copywriting services that have helped hundreds of clients achieve online success. Beyond writing for the web, he also provides brochure copywriting and other print copywriting services.
How Does Your E-Store Compare?
Like many operators of online stores, I am constantly looking at our conversion rate. How did our sales this week affect our conversion rate for the month?
Did our site updates make a difference in our conversion rates? It is the figure that is always being analyzed.
My first encounter with conversion rates happened way before I become involved with e-commerce. I had just started working at a popular clothing store, and I was told by my manager on duty to make sure that I walked around the ‘head sensor’ when coming in and out of the store. Intrigued by all the employees walking sideways out the front door, I asked why it was so important that we all looked silly walking in and out of the store. I was told that little head counter was the source of my manager’s quarter bonus. She explained to me that the number of sales we have per day are divided by the number of heads that head counter detects, which equals our daily conversion rate.
When I started working with e-commerce sites, my first question was, ‘what should our conversion rate be?’ I think every person working with an e-commerce site has that thought, followed by ‘who has the best conversion rate?’
What should our conversion rate be?
Conversion rates are broken down by the industry in which you categorize site. To help see where you should be, Fireclick offers a great breakdown of industry conversion rates by Global, First Time Visitors and Repeat Visitors. They have industries broken down by Fashion and Apparel, Electronics, Catalog, Specialty, Outdoor and Sports, and finally Software. You can compare what the conversion rates are for this week, last week and see any % changes, along with a graph chart shown by week, month, or yearly.
Who is on top?
The Nielson Company collects data on the top ranking e-commerce sites by conversion rates. These conversion rates can be a little shocking when you are currently working to improve your conversion rate from 2.5% to 3%. Typically, these high ranking sites are catalog and subscription sites, and have abnormally high conversion rates.
Top 10 Online Retailers Based on Conversion Rate – Jan. 2010 (Min 500K Unique Visitors)
| eCommerce Site | Industry | Conversion Rate (%) |
| Schwan’s | Food | 45.80 |
| Amway Global | Beauty / Bath & Body / For The Home | 27.80 |
| Keurig | Coffee | 27.10 |
| vitacost.com | Vitamins & Supplements | 24.40 |
| 1800petmeds.com | Pet Medicine | 24.20 |
| Roamans | Woman’s Plus Size Clothing | 20.60 |
| DrsFosterSmith.com | Pet Medicine | 20.50 |
| Woman Within | Woman’s Plus Size Clothing | 19.10 |
| ProFlowers | Florist | 18.90 |
| Snapfish | Digital Photo Printing / Sharing Service | 17.40 |
Fireclick offers weekly average conversion rates that are an average of all industries, and will typically be more consistant with rates of non-subscription and catalog sites. These averages can be very helpful while comparing your conversion rates to averages. You can take your comparison one step further and look at the average conversion for keywords, emails and affiliates.
| Conversion Rates | This Week | Last Week |
| Global | 4.30% | 4.10% |
| First Time Visitors | 5.50% | 5.50% |
| Repeat Visitors | 3.00% | 2.80% |
| Marketing Conversion Rates | This Week | Last Week |
| Keywords | 3.30% | 3.20% |
| Emails | 3.70% | 3.40% |
| Affiliates | 7.60% | 7.80% |
Now that you have an idea what your industry average conversion rates are and who is on top, make sure your conversion rate is accurate, and compare your site!
