How Important Is The Keyword In Paid Search? via @sejournal, @navahf

The keyword is both dying and thriving right now.

They are instrumental in providing direction for our strategies.

Additionally, they are a core component of how the most popular form of digital marketing (search) functions.

However, their mechanics have undeniably changed over the years.

Visual content is rising in popularity, and audiences are pushing ahead as a major targeting source.

This post will explore the history of the keyword, its current state, and whether it will retain its relevance or gradually fade into obscurity.

It will not pass judgment on how keywords are used in today’s marketing strategies.

However, we will explore aspects that folks continue to use in spite of depreciating utility.

A Look Back: The Journey Of Keywords

Historical Mechanics Of Keywords

In the past, keywords had a very specific role. Each keyword represented a unique idea, corresponding to specific user queries.

For example, the phrases “dog walker,” “dog walking,” and “walk the dog” would all be treated as different ideas. This allowed us to bid on how people think and search.

Traditionally, keywords behave as our representatives in the auction every time a user enters a query.

Based on the bid and quality score, we receive an ad rank, which determines where the ad will appear on the search engine results page (SERP).

In the old days, match types highly impacted keyword theory due to their distinct properties:

• Broad: So long as any part of the core idea matched, the keyword would enter the auction.
• Modified Broad (RIP): Each word in the keyword had to be present but could be in any order, and there could be terms before and after.
• Phrase: The keyword phrase could not be interrupted, but there could be terms before and after.
• Exact: Only the exact keyword would trigger the auction.

These keyword match-types would enter the auction at different times (exact first; broad last), so bidding on all match-types with different bids was meaningful.

This would ensure coverage while communicating where the advertiser wanted the budget to go.

The Rise Of Close Variants

2016 saw a lot of things change. Google removed the right-hand side of the search results page and introduced “close variants.”

Close variants have expanded quite a bit in recent years but used to be contained to quality of life matching.

For example, an advertiser would no longer need to bid on abbreviations or misspellings.

Search term reports showed whether the match type was “vanilla” or a close variant.

This meant we could see which keyword variant represented the best return on investment (ROI) without having to use every possible version of the keyword.

Fast forward to 2018-2019, and close variants became even more disruptive. Implied words and synonyms were acceptable in all match types. Additionally, mod. broad was sunset.

By the 2020s, broad match started to include audiences, which brought it back into popularity. Meanwhile, phrase and exact match enjoyed equal popularity with control-oriented advertisers.

Keywords As Audiences

While search keywords were undergoing these transformations, audience-based keywords were starting to make their way into display and video campaigns.

These keywords had different but equally powerful functions:

• Topic and Content Targeting: Bidding on placements corresponding to the content of the keyword.
• Custom Intent: People who search in a certain way or who show interest in the keywords you picked.
• Audience Signals: In PMax campaigns, advertisers can build an audience signal based on desired keywords.

Negative Keywords

Negative keywords are just as critical as targeting keywords.

Like regular keywords, negatives have match types:

• Broad: So long as the words in the negative are there in any order, the ad won’t enter the auction.
• Phrase: The negative keyword phrase order needs to be maintained in order to block traffic.
• Exact: The exact negative keyword (nothing added or removed) will stop the ad from entering the auction.

Negatives retained their utility and never took on close variant properties.

This means advertisers would need to include all variants as negatives if they wanted to block traffic.

It also made it tougher to justify keeping match-type driven campaigns and single keyword ad groups (SKAGs) due to how many negatives would be needed to protect those structures.

Keywords Today

One of the reasons why keywords are so important is that they are a common ground for both SEO and PPC.

They can be used to work together to create content and bid strategies.

But, with the search term report starting to hide search queries, this common ground is starting to disappear.

In today’s world, where privacy is super important, we now have to guess the best keyword concepts based on traffic forecasts and performance.

Additionally, Performance Max represents an all-in-one campaign type that only uses keywords as an audience signal.

It’s gaining momentum for a few reasons:

• More and more advertisers are being pressured to adopt it due to sunsetting features.
• Genuine utility for brands looking to communicate with their customers at all stages of the buying journey.

Are Keywords Still The Best Guiding Star In Targeting Strategies?

While keywords do require people to search in specific ways, they may not always line up with the world’s focus on privacy.

In a world where protecting the consumer is the number one priority, it might be better to focus on your audience and the creative elements of your campaign.

This is especially true as the privacy-first web forces more protections on what data is shared with advertisers.

One of the reasons search terms will be hidden in the report is that there aren’t enough people searching in that way.

As such, an advertiser would have no problem matching the exact way a person searched to the person who became or didn’t become a customer.

As that level of data becomes a privilege instead of a right we need to get more comfortable with cohorts.

That said, you can still put proactive protections (negative keywords and audience exclusions).

The Future Of Keywords

Instead of focusing on the keyword, we may soon be focusing on audiences and building strategies that meet customer needs.

Two examples of this shift are shopping campaigns and local service ads.

Shopping campaigns work by using Google’s algorithm to read your feed and match user queries based on info like product title, description, and category.

Local service ads don’t use keywords at all, instead focusing on reviews, proximity, and how well a query likely applies to a service you’re bidding on.

These ad types consistently provide great ROI and show that actively bidding on keywords is less important than understanding the people behind the queries.

Final Takeaways

Keywords have been a key part of digital marketing for a long time.

While their role is definitely changing, they still have a pivotal place in campaign strategy.

Audiences and feed-based campaigns represent the future of active targets.

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Featured Image: ING Studio1985/Shutterstock

6 Ways To Optimize Your PPC Performance via @sejournal, @LisaRocksSEM

PPC optimizations are critical to improve your paid search advertising campaigns’ performance.

Before we get into our top tips, what exactly is PPC optimization?

After paid search campaigns are launched, running, and collecting data, optimizations begin.

Pay-per-click (PPC) optimization is the process of reviewing, analyzing, and editing campaign elements to improve performance based on business goals.

Now for the second big question: where should you start?

Let’s dig into some ideas to optimize your PPC performance to get you started or spark new ideas.

1. Keywords

Keywords drive ads in the search results and help match searchers with the most relevant ads.

Experts know that frequently, the search queries don’t match exactly with the keywords in the account.

This is where the keyword match type comes in.

While exact match is the most relevant to serving ads, it is also the most restrictive and can leave some opportunities behind.

On the other end of the spectrum, broad match is the most flexible in keyword matching but can lead to irrelevant searches triggering ads.

Regardless of which match type you decide on to get started, you should continually review to ensure you’re reaching the right audience.

Here are a few metrics that serve as indicators of performance for keywords:

• CTR: The click-through rate (CTR) for search for more general keywords describing the product or service should be over 1% at a minimum. The CTR for brand terms is usually much higher at 3% or more. If the CTRs are less than that, it means the ad does not seem relevant to the user, who doesn’t click. Check search terms and ad relevancy.
• Conversions: Compare historical conversion data to the new keywords to see how they compare and whether the keywords are not relevant enough, or match-typed too broadly.
• Interactions, time on site, website metrics: If the traffic is not interacting with the website as you would expect, this may also be an indicator the keywords need optimizations.

2. Search Terms And Negative Keywords

Digging more into the keyword topic, oftentimes irrelevant searches or navigation searches will trigger your ads and cause poor performance.

PPC optimization needs to employ a solid negative keyword strategy.

I divide my negative keyword efforts into two categories.

Proactive Negative Keywords/Lists

Create themed keyword lists themes around parts/accessories, job hunting, products/services you don’t offer, and competitors’ names you don’t want to show up for.

For example, say your company has an employee login for your main website. You notice employees searching for the employee login are clicking on ads to reach it.

You will want to use that “login” theme to create negatives on possible searches that may occur to avoid spending PPC budget on employee searches.

Reactive Negative Keywords

Review the search terms triggering ads for the match type and keyword. Click the box next to the search term to edit, add, and exclude as appropriate.

Screenshot from Google Ads, August 2023

Use the new negative keyword lists to apply to similar campaigns as a proactive measure. The shared lists can easily be updated in the future, with all campaigns sharing the list automatically updated with changes.

Below is a basic example of a shared negative keyword list designed to exclude searches related to job hunting that may trigger ads and waste click costs.

Screenshot from Google Ads, August 2023

3. Budgets

I get asked about PPC budget strategy nearly every day, and for good reason! Managing a budget is an art; finding the perfect overall investment and campaign allocation for PPC ads takes skill.

While most advertisers set a monthly budget not to exceed, technically, the budgets are set at the campaign level for a daily budget.

Google will serve the ads to get the best results, so the actual spend may be under or over the daily budget, but will not exceed the daily budget x 30.4 days in a month.

Therefore, while keeping an eye on the spend is important, checks are in place to ensure the automation is working for you.

With that said, Google doesn’t optimize between campaigns, so it is up to you to optimize this on a regular basis. Better-performing campaigns should receive a higher percentage of the budget.

While this is a good basic rule of thumb, it isn’t always the case.

This may not apply in cases where branding and awareness or certain display campaigns don’t show many conversions. Also, company brand names may convert higher but don’t need more budget.

You can also set an account budget if you are using monthly invoicing for payments. This enables a set budget amount across campaigns with a start and end date, which is handy if you need more structured billing.

Be sure to check out 15 Tips on How to Rock a Small PPC Budget, which can help with ideas for budget challenges.

4. Responsive Search Ads (RSAs)

Responsive Search Ads (RSAs) are the standard ad type in Google Ads. Some advertisers may still have previous versions running, so those should immediately be transitioned to the most current version.

RSAs contain up to 15 headlines and 4 descriptions that automatically mix and match and test via Google Ads AI. As data is collected, Google’s learnings result in ad strength feedback ratings: poor, average, good, or excellent.

In addition to the overall ad rating, individual asset performance ratings are provided: learning, low, good, or best.

Once an asset has 500 impressions and the ad has over 2,000 impressions, it’s time to replace low-performing assets.

These ratings can serve as a guide to know which assets need optimization attention.

Using automated asset suggestions can be helpful, but use common sense and marketing writing best practices to showcase features, benefits, calls-to-action, etc.

Screenshot from Google Ads, August 2023

5. Location Targeting

It’s a good practice to optimize location targeting by business goals and performance results.

Some advertisers will use the handy set-up in the PPC platforms, which may auto-select large target areas such as an entire country, when geo-targeting is available in a number of more granular settings: state, cities, zip codes, radius around an address, and more.

Consider the following strategies to optimize the locations where your ads are served:

• Bid adjustments – Set bids by location so that your bids increase for searchers in the area you want to reach more.
• Layering a city over the state and adjusting the bid higher in that city to favor it over the rest of the state.
• Excluding locations you don’t serve or where you are not likely to find quality leads or customers.

Below, in the location view, advertisers can see performance by the segment they select and then analyze performance.

Increase bids for high-producing locations, and consider reducing bids for areas that don’t convert as well or remove altogether.

Screenshot from Google Ads, August 2023

Remember, the more granular location targeting reduces reach but can be more efficient.

That’s why it’s important to see the reports to view results for the various geo segments and optimize.

6. Conversion Actions

With the recent launch of GA4, be sure to audit your conversion actions. Some things to look for:

• Migrate goals in Universal Analytics to GA4 right away.
• Confirm the conversion tracking is working.
• Confirm that the primary conversion is your business’s key performance indicator (KPI).
• Can you add new conversion actions to get richer information on PPC results?

Consider a variety of conversion actions.

For example: tracking purchases, email signups, whitepaper downloads, or chat interactions to get a full picture of the user’s engagement and actions with the website from ads.

Bonus Tip: How Often To Optimize?

When a campaign first launches, it will need to be monitored every day (or every few days) to identify red flags and fix those issues in real-time.

An example of this is errors in set-up or disapproved assets. You want the campaign to get to a stable place where the impressions, clicks, etc., look consistent with no red flags.

The campaign needs to acquire data, so don’t make any big changes until there is enough data to analyze.

This could mean thousands of impressions or clicks, or letting three to four weeks go by, depending on the volume allowed by the budget.

Final Thoughts

Because people never stop searching, there are always opportunities to improve an account through frequent and consistent PPC optimizations.

As always, if this post generated some new optimization ideas for you, add them to your strategy and test them out today.

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Featured Image: The KonG/Shutterstock