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Adwords PPC Basics – Keyword Selection

Picture of Honcho Honcho : Dec 14, 2010 8:52:37 AM

Ok so I was asked the other day by a client “is it better to have loads of keywords in an ad-group, or more ad-groups with less keywords in?” It’s not the first time I have been asked that question either so i thought it might be worth writing a PPC Guide about. Ok well I did some research online to gauge some opinion and it’s fairly split but for me the choice is obvious. By having more ad-groups with less keywords in each you are able make your ad-copy a lot more relevant to the particular keywords you are targeting making people more likely to click on your advert. Not only that but I think it is easier to manage, for example if the CTR (click through rate) is down for your ad-group and if there are 200 keywords in the ad-group it could be difficult to work out why and could take a lot of time to change. If you have 10 ad-groups with more relevant, targeted ad-copy, with 20 keywords in each, it is far easier to identify which keywords are performing and which ones aren’t. Another major advantage of having more ad-groups is that you can have several different landing pages meaning that the quality score of your keywords should improve. With an improvement of quality score you should see your average CPC (cost per click) come down and your average position go up. So in essence you could be ranking number 1 for less money than you paid to be ranking number 3 or 4 previously. The only disadvantage I can see from having more ad-groups is that it might take a bit more time and effort to set up. But I would have thought that the time saved when managing your Ad-words account would certainly make up for time you have spent in the beginning. But anyway that wouldn’t be a problem here at the iThinkMedia office where it’s all about hard work!

Here are some examples of what I mean about more relevant targeted ad-groups with more relevant ad-copy, I have searched for “plasma TVs”

As we can see these adverts are an example of a poorly targeted ad-copy as neither of these adverts mention plasma TV’s in any of the txt and the first advert only mentions it in the title. If I were controlling these accounts I would have a specific ad-group for keywords associated with plasma TV’s with ad-copy totally dedicated to plasma TV’s.

These are good examples of targeted relevant ad-copy that have almost certainly been possible by having more targeted ad-groups. As you can see both ads mention “plasma TV’s” in the title, text and in the destination URL’s. For more tips on how to write effective ad-copy or quality score read more PPC Basics Blogs. Did you like the blog or did you have any thoughts or ideas? Please leave a comment. Stay tuned for more PPC Guide blogs.