New AdWords Advertisers: Don’t be fooled by Google’s recommended settings
25 Mar
After setting up countless new AdWords accounts, I am still amazed by Google’s recommended settings. More often than not, when I have spoken to AdWords novices they all say the same thing; “I’ve tried Google AdWords but it was too expensive and it didn’t generate any business.”
This comes as no surprise as Google recommended you target “All available sites” in their Network:
For those who know the AdWords system, “All available sites” include Google’s Content Network. The content network is a great way to gain brand exposure across Google’s community of websites, but certainly not recommended if you have a limited budget and want to run a very targeted campaign.
Instead of choosing “All available sites” – select “Let me choose…” and then tick the boxes “Google Search” and “Search Partners”. Leave the content network box unticked.
The above settings will ensure your adverts only appear on the Google.co.uk domain and their partner websites.
Google must make a lot of money from new advertisers unwittingly burning money very quickly on the content network. If Google were a little more transparent when making their recommendations it would no doubt be better for the new advertiser and more likely they would continue using AdWords instead of writing it off as unsuccessful.
Coming Soon: Choosing the best Keywords and Match Types.
Good tip Sam, I always tend to go with just Google search for new campaigns before branching out to the content network.
I always untick ‘Search Partners’ on new campaigns too, as that’s the Google powered search on other sites isn’t it? Figured it would push the CTR down as people are more likely to be looking for specific pages/content on the site they’ve searched on, rather than looking at the served ads? Can’t say as though I’ve experimented with that theory though!
A very valid point, Sam. Certainly one that I see a lot of less experienced clients ‘falling for’. I think the real problem for a lot of novice and intermediate users, is that the Content Network tagetting settings in AdWords make it easy to appear on a lot of less-relevant sites if you don’t dig into the settings a bit.
The other point that is worth taking into account is that a Content Network campaign will often perform very differently to a campaign on just the search or search and partner network – It isn’t always possible or sensible to apply the same optimisation techniques and learnings on the Content network that may have worked effectively on the Search network.
Hi Greg, it’s interesting that you switch off search partners for new campaigns. I can’t say I’ve ever tested this either but to be totally honest it’s always performed very well for my campaigns. I suppose if the CTR was significantly lower I might consider turning this off.