The broad match modifier is a new keyword targeting option. (The existing match types are broad, exact and phrase.) I’m a firm believer in using exact and phrase match terms in an account, but am very leery of using broad match. Broad match allows Google to show on searches that they think are related to your keywords. I use this example when I’m explaining broad match to clients: you are a fruit seller and all you sell is apples, so you advertise on the keyword apples. Google decides that an apple is a fruit, therefore they could show you on searches for oranges or bananas. Not a good use of your advertising dollars.

A couple other examples from my clients at JumpFly: how about finding out one of your clients ads is showing on the term “nudist camp?” (My client runs a kids summer camp.) Or how about a moving company spending thousands of dollars on what turned out to be the term “movie” because Google was mapping to the word “moving.”

So broad match has not been my favorite match type, unless a client has a large budget and wants huge amounts of traffic.

But with the new broad match modifier, I can try more broad match terms for my clients because it gives me more control. Basically, when I put a plus sign in front of a keyword, Google will know that that particular term has to be in the search or will match on close variants. (Close variants include misspellings, singular/plural forms, abbreviations and acronyms, and rood words, like “floor” and “flooring”.) Here’s an example: if the term is +golf +shoes, your ad will show for “gulf shoes” or “golf sport shoes”.

Broad match modifier just came out of beta testing in the UK and Canada. I’m looking forward to seeing how it works for my clients, as I’m doing my own beta testing for a few clients. If it works, I’ll start adding it to more of my clients accounts. If you are interested in seeing how the broad match modifier might be able to work for your business, contact a professional PPC Management Company.

Google Docs allows me to create and upload documents, spreadsheets, drawings and forms from my desktop, then share them with others, who can also update them. (Go to www.docs.google.com to get started.)
I’ve used it with clients to collaborate on ideas, or to send keywords or ad text. But lately I’ve been using it with my PPC clients to stay current with stock levels. They can update the file when something goes out of stock or comes back into stock and I can make the corresponding changes to their accounts.

Here’s some of the top reasons I like Google Docs so much:

* I can protect it so only the people I invite to access the document can see it. And I can also make it read only.
* It’s real-time.  I can actual see changes being made if I’m in the document at the same time someone is changing something.  No syncing necessary!  No emailing.  No updating the file to make sure you have the most current information.
* I can change my notification settings, so that if someone makes a change, I’ll get an email. Even nicer is that I can be notified for any change, or just changes to a specific sheet, and I can have them emailed immediately or in a daily digest. (This is my favorite)
* It automatically saves. I love the fact that I don’t lose my changes.
* It’s free!

Google Docs is making my job faster and easier, saves my clients money because they are not advertising on something that’s out of stock, gets them more business by making sure I’m advertising something they want to sell, and doesn’t cost me or JumpFly a cent.

URL Changes Impact PPC Advertising

Twice in the last month I’ve had clients change their website URLs without telling me (and one of the other PPC account managers here had it happen to them just yesterday). I either find it because PPC ads start getting declined at Google AdWords or Yahoo, or conversions drop off, or something happens that I go snooping around to check.

There’s very little that’s worse than clicking on a PPC ad and seeing “Server Error: 404 – File or directory not found.” And it’s so easy to prevent it.

If you are changing your URLs, please, at the very least, do a 404 error redirect to your home page or site map. Another better option is to create a Custom 404 page.  Or better yet, do a redirect to the correct new page, so a searcher lands on what they expect to see.

A 404 error redirect will send a person right on to your homepage instead of landing on the dreaded stock 404 page. A custom redirect can even communicate more information like a “personal” message and how they can solve it (By the way, having a custom 404 Error page is a good practice, regardless if you change your URLs or not. In fact, I previously wrote a blog called “404 Errors – Save Those Clicks” ). And the best way of all is redirecting each old URL to the new, correct URL, so that the searcher doesn’t even know there was anything wrong.

And of course, please let your PPC Management Company know – preferably BEFORE the change happens. If we have access to the new site mapping, we can have your change-over ads ready to go when the site change happens. Or at least know that it’s happening so we can fix everything fast instead of spending money on wasted PPC advertising clicks.

A note about why you might not want to only use Google Analytics to report revenue: Google Analytics attributes a conversion to “last touch” while Google AdWords and Yahoo Sponsored Search attribute it to “first touch.” What that means is if someone came to your website on a Monday through a paid ad, and didn’t buy anything, then returned a week later (either through a bookmark and manually typing in your URL) and bought something, Google Analytics would count that conversion as a Direct referral (the last way they came to your site), while AdWords and Sponsored Search would attribute it to PPC (the first way they came to your site).

It’s not a big deal when the vast majority of your visitors order on their first visit, but becomes a big deal when a large percentage of them don’t. I have several clients where over 50% of their visitors don’t buy on that first visit, which makes PPC look like it doesn’t perform that well. Once you factor in those “first touch” conversions, PPC certainly is a much more important piece of the marketing puzzle.

So back to how you track revenue in Yahoo Sponsored Search… I have to give Yahoo credit – they beat Google on this by including revenue right in the normal screens you use to manage your Yahoo Sponsored Search campaigns. Google only reports revenue on their actual reports, which makes it more of a pain to manage; Not impossible, just not as easy to analyze and then make quick changes.

To track Yahoo Sponsored Search revenue, you’ll just need to add one more tiny bit of code to your conversion tracking. Replace where I have ORDER.SUBTOTAL with your dynamically generated Order Subtotal field into this line of your Yahoo Sponsored Search Analytics code (You can also do Order Total, but I recommend doing the Subtotal which excludes tax and shipping, for a more accurate picture of your revenue.):

window.ysm_customData.conversion = “transId=,currency=,amount=ORDER.SUBTOTAL“;

That’s it. Pretty simple and pretty powerful. Now you can actually see what kind of revenue your Yahoo Sponsored Search campaigns are actually generating, and then make better informed decisions about where your PPC advertising dollars should be spent.

A note on this: I attempted to do it for a client that uses a Volusion cart and processes credit cards offline (meaning they don’t actually process the credit card at the time of order, but do it manually at a later time), but this won’t work for them. I’m guessing that this will hold true for any shopping cart; if you don’t process credit cards in real-time, it won’t work. In fact, for this client, it also prevented the number of conversions from tracking.

One last note: Unfortunately, MSN AdCenter does not have the same functionality. Here’s hoping they get that solved before they take over supplying Yahoo’s paid ads.

If you need help getting Yahoo Sponsored Search Revenue Tracking implemented and/or analyzed, contact a reputable PPC management company for assistance.

I’ll have to admit that this is something relatively new to me (and a thank you to Michael Whitaker at Monitus for telling me it was possible). A search through Google AdWords help files comes up with nothing, nor did my Google reps ever explain that it could be done – they always pointed to Analytics as the tool to track revenue. And the answer is really simple – when you add conversion tracking to your thank you page, you can alter the code slightly to capture the revenue generated by an order.

You’ll need to change the YOUR-ORDER$ to be the field name of your order subtotal which can differ by shopping cart.

One note on this: I attempted to do it for a client that uses a Volusion cart and processes credit cards offline (meaning they don’t actually process the credit card at the time of order, but do it manually at a later time), but this won’t work for them. I’m guessing that this will hold true for any shopping cart; if you don’t process credit cards in real-time, it won’t work. In fact, for my client above, it also prevented conversions from tracking.

One more thing to know about tracking Google AdWords revenue: you can’t see results within the Google AdWords interface, you have to run a report to actually get the data. You’ll need to select the field “Sales Conv. Value (many-per-click)” in order to add that data to a report, and then you’ll be able to see revenue by Account, Campaign, AdGroup and even keyword by keyword, and learn how profitable your PPC campaigns really are. If you need help getting Google AdWords Revenue Tracking implemented and/ or analyzed, contact a reputable PPC management company for assistance.

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Google Analytics provides great information, but one issue that can arise is when Google Analytics transaction numbers and the Google AdWords conversion tracking numbers don’t jive. I know that different packages are not going to track exactly the same, but most of the time, they are close enough that it’s not a big deal. However, a big issue arises when you have an e-commerce site and a decent percentage of people don’t order on their first visit, but come back and order at a later date.

Here’s the problem: Google AdWords tracks “first touch” – if someone searches on a term, clicks on your ad and comes to your site, does not order at that moment, but comes back a week later, AdWords will log the conversion back that first date and attribute the sale to AdWords. Analytics on the other hand tracks “last touch.” In our same scenario, if someone were to search, click an ad, visit the site and leave, then come back a week later, Analytics would attribute that search to organic or other, unless they did a search and clicked on an ad again. Not a big deal if a majority of visitors order on the first visit, but if you have a large amount of people who order at a later date, this can be present a huge problem.

I have two clients who have this issue. For one of them, 40% of visitors don’t order on their first visit, and the other is 50%. And you guessed it, there’s a 40% and 50% difference in AdWords conversions and Analytics transactions. They can’t get a true picture of their PPC ROI with Google Analytics because they only see the revenue for anyone who ordered the first time they visited the site.

The big question is why is that? You would think that, both being Google products, they would track the same way, or at least have an option to track that way, but they don’t. Frustrating for both me and my clients!

But, I’ll explain how to get around this dilemma in my next Blog.

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This is especially silly, since any experienced pay-per-click (PPC) advertising manager knows that using the keyword that someone searches on in your ad helps increase CTR. I’ve never understood the fact that a company will allow someone to sell their product, but not allow them to use the product’s name to advertise it, but it happens all the time.

Under the existing Google Trademark Policy, you can contact the BrandX company and get written approval to use the trademark in your ad. But a lot of times it’s a time-consuming process – Google requires very specific language sent in an email to their trademark policy department, you can’t just use a blanket letter from the company or verbal permission. With some companies it was ridiculous in how long it took to get the required email. The bigger the company, the longer it seemed to take. I had one client that it took a month-and-a-half to get approved by legal – a four-line sentence took three lawyers and a month-and-a-half of time.

So I’m very glad to see Google has revisited their trademark policy, and the new policy seems pretty reasonable. There’s some pretty specific guidelines for the trademark use because we wouldn’t want anyone to be able to use any trademark as they saw fit. Here’s the new Google Trademark Policy, in a nut shell:

1. You can use a trademarked term at Google AdWords if you use it in a generic or descriptive way and not in reference to that specific trademark. I’m thinking Kleenex instead of tissue.

2. You can use the trademarked term at Google AdWords if you are a reseller of the trademarked product and your landing page and website clearly demonstrate that you can purchase that trademarked product. Since you are a reseller of BrandX cameras, you could now say that in your ad.

3. You can use the trademarked term at Google AdWords if you are a seller of replacement parts, components or compatible products and your landing page and website clearly demonstrate that you can purchase the trademarked product. If you sold camera bags and lens that were compatible with BrandX cameras, you could say so.

4. You can use the trademarked term at Google AdWords if your site is for “non-competitive and informative details”. The “advertiser may not sell or facilitate the sale” of a competing product of the trademarked term. Basically, you can’t advertise on BrandX, take them to an “informational” site that sings the praises of BrandY versus BrandX and then try to sell them on BrandY.

Some other things to keep in mind. This new trademark policy is for US ads served on Google.com, and US users for Search and Content networks. Google started accepting new ads with trademarked terms on Friday, May 15th, but will not begin running them until June 15th. If you currently have ads with trademarked terms that are disapproved, you’ll need to resubmit them.

I’m really pleased with this new change to the Google AdWords Trademark Policy. I think Google did a fine job of improving the results a search user gets, while still respecting the rights of the trademark owners. We’ll see how it plays out, but I think it will benefit everyone involved.

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When Google initially introduced the new beta version of the AdWords User Interface (UI), I played around with it a few times in my few client accounts that had the option, but it looks like last week the new AdWords User Interface rolled out to a much wider audience and I decided I better get myself familiar with it. I’m not going to review every new part of the Adwords UI, but I will highlight a few new features that I’ve noticed in the past few days.

The Pros of the New Google AdWords Interface:

• The “Tree” Based Visuals: I can get to any campaign or AdGroup using the tree interface, instead of going back out to the campaign summary or AdGroup summary.
• Nice Graphical Representation: in each campaign and AdGroup you can view a graph based on criteria like CTR, Conversions, Impressions, CPC and more, for whatever time period you prefer. I love looking at graphs for trends – is CTR dropping or CPC rising, etc. I used to use this a lot on the account dashboard, but this is even better, and I can choose to hide the graph if I want.
• Query Report Built Into the Keyword Tab: Another new AdWords User Interface feature that I like is the “Show Query Report” button within the keyword tab. I can select a few broad and/or phrase match terms, then hit the Show Query Report button and it will give me a list of the search queries that were triggered by the keywords I selected.One caveat is that it appears you have to have quite a few impressions before it will show you data. A lot of the terms I tested kept giving me the error “Not enough data to show particular queries.” It still seems a bit “buggy”, because a number of times the report would generate partially, but without the search queries, and trying to refresh would cause a bright red error bar to come up. This one is also a Con because once you’ve generated the list, it’s a bit kludge to put the actual terms into the AdGroup, but I’m hoping that will approve.
• One last pro: you can still switch back to the original interface if the new UI gets a bit confusing.

And now on to my new Google AdWords User Interface Con List:

• Ads Showing in the UI May Not Be Active: this one is a big problem for me, because I almost lost a client last week because of it. When you are in the keyword tab of an AdGroup in the new AdWords User Interface, one ad will be showing on the top left, just like in the original UI. Unfortunately, that ad may not be an active ad (in fact, I have YET to see where the ad that shows is going to an Active ad, unless only active ads are in that AdGroup – it almost seems to default to a Paused ad which is terribly annoying). I had a client who went into the new interface and was clicking around. He clicked the ad that was showing and was stunned to see it was going to a dead page of his site. He went through a bunch of the AdGroups and saw the same thing, and then called us, completely irate, because this was a change that had happened in January, and that I had told him was taken care of. He demanded a refund of several thousand dollars and was very close to quitting before I got him calmed down enough to understand what was happening and explain to him that the changes were made, and the only ad that was actually active in those AdGroups were all going to a live page in his site.
• Quick Add Tool is Missing: one of my favorite tools in the original interface is on the keyword tab and it’s the Quick Add link. Click it and Google lets you manually enter your keywords, AND generates a very specific list of keywords that you are missing that are all based around the existing keywords in that AdGroup. I use it a lot to see what keywords I might be missing in an AdGroup AND what negatives I should include. The Keyword Tool just generates too much “noise” to be used effectively in this same manner. And now it’s missing in the new AdWords User Interface, and the Show Query Report is not an effective substitute.
• Show Query Report: it’s on my pro list too, but most of the time it either doesn’t give results because it doesn’t have enough data or it keeps having errors.
• The MCC Drop-Down List is Not Alphabetical: this is a con for PPC management agencies like ourselves who use an MCC to manage our clients – the Drop-Down Client list isn’t alphabetical, so it can be hard to find a client in the list.
• The Next/Previous Links on the AdGroup Level Are Gone: in the original interface, I could sort my AdGroups by some criteria, like Cost or Impressions, and go into the first one, then hit the next link to move to the next one. That link is gone, so I have to keep going back to the Campaign level to see what the next AdGroup is that I need to go into.

Now this certainly isn’t a comprehensive list of Pros and Cons but just the first ones that have come to me over the last four or five days of continually using the new AdWords User interface. I’m sure I’ll have plenty more in the days and weeks to come. There’s no set switch date that I could find when they are moving from Beta to the new UI permanently, but I recommend getting used to it now, when you still have the ability to switch back and forth between the beta and original Google AdWords User Interface.

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Difference 1: Their Names: Yahoo calls their keyword exclusion tool ”excluded words” and Google calls it “negative keywords.”

Difference 2: Where They Are Put in the Account: Yahoo lets you put excluded words on the account level and/or the AdGroup level, while Google allows you to put negative keywords on the Campaign and/or AdGroup (note to Yahoo – Campaign level excluded terms are a must!).

Difference 3: How they actually work: The way the excluded/negative terms work is vastly different at Google and Yahoo, and can be a bit confusing.

First Google: you can enter negative keywords as broad, phrase and/or exact match. Adding a negative keyword as broad match prevents your ad from showing when that term is used anywhere in a search phrase, and exact match negative keywords will prevent that specific term from displaying your ad. Example: the broad negative keyword is bouquet – your ad will not show for any search with the word bouquet in it. For a phrase match example, if the negative keyword is the phrase “balloon bouquet” then your ad will not show for a search for balloon bouquet delivery, or cheap balloon bouquet; and if the negative keyword is [balloon], your ad will not show on any search for just the word balloon, but will show for the search balloons.

Now Yahoo, on the other hand, works very differently. If I was to exclude the word balloon, my ads would not show if someone were to search on just the term balloon or even balloons, UNLESS I was also advertising on the term balloon. If I exclude the term balloon, but advertise on the term helium balloon, my ad WILL show. Another example, if I exclude the term bouquet and am not advertising on any term that has bouquet in it, and someone were to search on balloon bouquet, the PPC ads would not show.

Powerful tools with fundamental differences can trip you up if you don’t know how they work. Using these tools incorrectly can cost you clicks, visitors & sales. Having a PPC management company like JumpFly who understands when to use these tools and how they can impact your account for good or bad is important.

View more JumpFly articles about Negative Match.

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A phone number in the header on every web page is something we highly, highly recommend to every client. It’s not enough to have it buried in the bottom of the page or only on the Contact Us page. We’re talking every page, in the header where it’s immediately visible.

And it’s not because we want you to get more phone calls, but we’ve actually seen a definite correlation between conversion rate improvement and having that phone number on your website. Here’s what we think is the reason why:

1. Having that phone number gives your site a subconscious vote of confidence – it shows you are an actual business. That’s why a toll-free number is great, as it has more legitimacy. However, a local number may work well too for businesses seeking local customers.
2. It lets the visitor know that if they have a problem when ordering, that there’s someone that can help them. And if they have a problem after they order, they know they can reach you too. Even if they never need to use it, they know they can.
3. Some people are still leery of ecommerce and using their credit cards on the Internet. You can miss out on those potential sales if the only way they can order is through your website. Why lose the sale just because you don’t list your number or make it hard to find?

Those clients who we’ve encouraged to add their phone number to their websites have not necessarily seen an increase in phone calls, but they have seen an increase in conversions. The benefits clearly outweigh the possibility of getting a phone call or two. So display it loud, display it proud and put that phone number in your header on every page.

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1. Enhanced Geo-targeting: you now have the ability to pick more than one geo-targeting option. You can pick different geo-targets by AdGroup or campaign, as well as mix-and-match options. You can also chose to do premium bidding for one target area. For example, you advertise to the entire state of California, but you know you do really well in the LA area. You can choose to bid higher (by percentage or dollar amount) in the LA area.
2. Day-Parting (Ad Scheduling): something we’ve been requesting here at JumpFly for awhile is the ability for Yahoo to automatically turn on and off your campaigns based on time of day. This works particularly well for those who receive many phone calls and want to make sure that they have someone available to answer those calls, or to make sure you don’t run out of budget when your target audience is online and searching. Yahoo took it a step further and allows you to schedule your ads based on your account’s time zone OR the searcher’s time zone (which works well for scenario two above). Another nice feature is that you can schedule this on the campaign or AdGroup level. Unfortunately, they chose to do it by the hour level only, so no half or quarter hours, but it’s a start!
3. Demographic Targeting: you can now target your desired audience, whether by age or gender, and premium bid to them. Something to know is that it does not allow you to exclude any demographic audience, except for those 17 and under. But if you know your best target is a female you can premium bid to females, or if you know that the age target is 25 to 29, you can premium bid to them. Keep in mind if your best target is a female age 25 to 29, it will combine the premium bids; if you set your premium bid at $.50 for a female, and $.50 for ages 25 to 29, it will actually bid $1.00 more for a female age 25 to 29.
4. Better Reporting: Yahoo also is rolling out better reporting options so you can run reports on demographics, dayparting and geo-targeting.

It will be great to see how these improvements pan out over the next few weeks, but I’m encouraged by the changes Yahoo has made and hope they continue to improve.

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Can your domain name (your website address or URL) impact your pay-per-click (PPC) advertising? You’ve probably heard that your domain is important when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO) and your natural or organic rankings, but it can affect your pay per click advertising too.

There’s a couple of reasons why:

• Your domain name tells people what you do and what you are about: Consider the following two (made-up) domains: www.BuyBlueWidgets.com or www.BuyBWOnline.com. If you were an ecommerce site that sold blue widgets, which would be the better domain? You probably guessed it, it’s the first one. If someone sees this domain name, they know that they can purchase blue widgets. Do you get that from the second? You know you can buy something, but not what that something is.
• It makes good use of the limited ad real estate that you get: You get a very limited amount of space to get your point across, and your Display URL, if it makes sense based on your keywords, can be an added line to use.
• It can be “bolded” in an ad: if you use your main keyword in your domain, and someone uses it in a search term (i.e. – your domain is www.BuyBlueWidgets.com, and someone searches on “Blue Widgets Sale”), than the words that they used in the search will be “bolded” in your Display URL. The display URL for our above example would look like www.BuyBlueWidgets.com, making it stand out more.

One thing that you do need to keep in mind, when choosing a domain name, is to beware of trademark infringement. If someone owned the trademark to Blue Widgets, and you own the URL www.BlueWidgets.com, it’s very likely that the trademark owner will be able to legally acquire that domain from you. I’m not a trademark attorney, but I’ve seen several instances of clients who have had to give up domains that they’ve owned for years and years to the trademark owner.

Domains are important in how they affect your identity, so think carefully about them. When in doubt, buy several variations and test them out. Domains can be bought for under $10 now, so it’s not a hardship on the pocketbook. When creating your online identity, there are many critical things to consider, but don’t overlook the importance of choosing a domain name that is going to best represent and benefit your business.

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Google uses three different factors to determine when they should show your Google keyword-targeted ads:
1. The Google domain being used (.fr, .au, .de, etc),
2. The actual search query used,
3. The user’s actual physical location, based on IP (Internet Protocol) address.

1. The Google domain being used: if a visitor uses a specific Google domain like google.fr (the Google domain for France), they’ll see ads targeted to France, no matter what country the visitor is in.

2. The actual search query used: if someone uses a search query with a city, county or recognizable region in it, Google will show custom-targeted ads for that region. I could be in Chicago, but search on “New York dry cleaners” and see an ad targeted for New York.

3. The user’s actual physical location, based on IP address: Google will use a visitors IP address, when possible, to help show the most relevant ads. So if someone with a New York area IP address searches on the term “dry cleaner,” Google will show ads targeted to New York, even though New York wasn’t in the search term.

Now the most important part of this statement is the IP address, because this only is as good as the information Google gets. At one time, the JumpFly IP address (we’re in Elgin, a suburb of Chicago) was listed as Atlanta, GA. Even now, we’re listed as Park Ridge, IL. So if I was to do a search for “dry cleaner,” I’d see ads targeted for the Park Ridge area, not Elgin which is a slight problem because Park Ridge is more than 25 miles from Elgin (You can go to http://www.geobytes.com/IpLocator.htm and check out your IP address). Plus, AOL users are all mapped to Reston, VA, regardless of what their physical location is because AOL uses proxy servers.

Roughly speaking, IP addresses are accurate about 75% of the time in the US, give or take a few percentages, but it declines rapidly from there. I’ve read that in Canada, a huge number of people use Bell as their provider, which maps to Toronto even if the user is in Quebec.

The bottom line is that geo-targeting is great, but it’s not perfect. And you can check where and how you show by going to www.google.com/adpreview and selecting different countries, states and cities. For additional information and a brief video about finding your pay-per-click (PPC) advertising ads at Google, you can refer to a previous JumpFly article titled Finding Your Own Ads.

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1. Country Geo Targeting: target a specific country or countries. Please note the default for US accounts was changed recently to US AND Canada. If you only want to target the US, you’ll need to remove Canada.
2. State or Territory Geo Targeting: select a specific state, like California, or states.
3. Metro Area Geo Targeting: target a metropolitan area like Los Angeles or Chicago. Metro areas are “geographical areas defined by Arbitron that generally correspond to the United States Federal Government’s Metropolitan Areas.”
4. City Geo Targeting: just want to target a specific city like Portland or Houston? Google doesn’t list all cities for a geographic area but it lists a decent amount.
5. Radius Geo Targeting: pick a point on a map and specify a radius around that point. You can do any mileage you like, but Google recommends a minimum of 20 miles or 35 kilometers.
6. Custom Area Geo Targeting: if have an odd shaped target area, like along a major highway corridor, you can select specific points on a map to create your own custom shape.

You can also exclude specific areas from your geo targeting at AdWords. Maybe you have multiple locations in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area but not in Dallas itself, and you’ve found that people who live in Dallas won’t travel to your location. You can exclude the city of Dallas, but still target the rest of the metro area.

That covers the different options on Google AdWords Geo Targeting. In another blog I’ll cover the factors that Google uses to determine when and to whom to show your ad.

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Preparation is one of the cornerstones of successful PPC advertising. The effort you put into researching keywords, building the account structure and writing ads is as important as ongoing care and maintenance of the account.

The account managers at JumpFly spend time with the client before they ever do a thing for them, going through the account goals, discussing metrics and explaining the process of what we do. I think many new clients are surprised at the amount of work that we do before an account or new campaign is ever built, but I think they are pleasantly surprised to hear that we’re not going to slap a dozen or so keywords into one AdGroup and call it a day.

It may take us a good three or four days of in-depth keyword research to find a solid list of viable key terms for a client. That list includes all variations of search terms, including plurals and word order. It’s categorized into AdGroups, so like terms are together, and a comprehensive list of negative terms are also included. We then send that list off to the client for approval before we start building their new account or new campaigns. This ensures we’re both on the same page as to where the client’s ads will be shown. Once a build starts, how long it will take to go live depends on the number of AdGroups that we need to create and how varied the ads need to be to make sure that each AdGroup is targeted in the best way. We’ve had builds take an hour and we’ve had builds take days.

The bottom line is that we don’t hurry the process – we’d rather spend time “sharpening the ax” so we do it right and give our clients the best possible service right from the start.

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