SES Magazine
Justin Seibert
February 2009
Google’s content network stinks!” That
used to be my standard reply when
someone asked me about contextual
targeting, also referred to as content
matching. It wasn’t too long ago that
the first thing my company did when setting up or taking
over a paid search account was to uncheck that box
next to “Show my ads on: The content network.”
I tried content matching with several accounts over
the years, and the results were just terrible. Prior to
November 2007, you had to pay on a cost per 1,000
impressions (CPM) basis instead of the standard costper-
click (CPC) pricing model that GoTo.com founded
itself on — the model every major paid search marketing
provider has used since.
So not only was Google’s content network not
sending you much quality traffic, but the impressions
often went through the roof, sapping your budget. The
smaller the account, the worse a blow it dealt. Add in
that Google opted you into the network automatically,
and less savvy small business owners and marketing
managers faced a stacked deck.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the content
network forum...
Recent Improvements to the Content Network
The nice thing about search engines is that they have
to constantly increase the relevancy of their results, or
else folks will start using another search engine. The
same holds true on the advertiser side. While Google’s
search results continued to improve, its return for
many advertisers on the content network — and thus
all advertising for less sophisticated advertisers due to
its opt-in nature — decreased.
Google knew it had a huge cash cow on its hands
with a content network that was in danger of slaughter.
So they decided to do something — or rather some
things — about it. Here are some of the most important
of those improvements that began in summer 2007:
- Transparency: Through placement performancereporting, you can now see exactly
where your ads show and how each
site is performing, all the way down
to the conversion level.
- Death to CPM: Maybe not death,
but you’ve had the option to use
CPC bidding on the content network
for about a year. Both my company’s
internal data and a conversation with
our agency reps at Google confirm
this is the more cost effective way
to go.
- Targeting within websites: You
can now target individual sections of
many sites that are more relevant to
your ideal potential client. It may not
matter much where your ad shows
on smaller content network sites
based around one theme. For large
news sites, though, various sections
may perform drastically differently.
A financial services advertiser may
do great in, say, the NYTimes.com
business pages section, but terrible in
the movies pages.
- Axe underperformers: The Site
and Category Exclusion tool allows
you to chop out not just particular
sites, but types of sites as well, like
parked domains.
- Adjust bidding: Through placement
targeting, you can create in
effect your own personal content
network and have your ads only appear
on those sites. As of last August,
you can now set bids for specific
sites that you target. Additionally,
you can utilize keyword and placement
matching at the same time as
part of Google’s enhanced online
campaigns.
Numbers Don’t Lie
Early results with improved contextual
targeting have been very encouraging.
Tests resulted in cost per acquisition
(CPA) costs at half or less than
the overall search account. Even in a
fairer comparison of short-tail search
campaigns to general, open placement
content network campaigns (see chart),
content network conversion costs have
been in the general vicinity or lower
than search.
Google’s internal data shows similar
results for median advertisers:
- Content CPA 7% lower than search
- 25% more conversions using
search and content network together
Many verticals are having even more
success, including financial services
(CPAs 16% lower, 30% more conversions);
entertainment/media (CPAs 8%
lower, 40% more conversions); and
education (CPAs 15% lower, 31% more
conversions).
Five Tips for Success
Even with all the improvements,
success with the content network isn’t
guaranteed. Implement the following
and you’ll put yourself on a better path:
1. Keep search and content network
campaigns separate. You won’t be
able to target ad groups as effectively,
and combined campaigns make data
tougher to analyze — especially ad
effectiveness.
2. Bid high early, and don’t touch
the campaign for about two weeks.
It takes more time for Google’s system
to synthesize your campaigns than for
search, so you need to have patience.
Keep budgets low during this test
period so that you won’t sweat early
results that may not be as good as after
you start refining.
3. Thin out weak performers. Run
performance reports regularly to see
what’s working for you, and adjust
accordingly. You may want to test this
for yourself, but I’d also recommend
blocking parked domains.
4. Keep ad groups tightly defined.
This is true for search as well. With the
content network, you especially need to
define ad groups around one particular
theme and can do so sometimes with
even just one keyword. My general rule
of thumb is five keywords per group.
5. Be careful with changes. If you
have a campaign that’s working well,
don’t start messing with it. Tinkering
is okay, but don’t make wholesale
changes. Or, when something isn’t
working, you’re usually better off pausing
or deleting the whole campaign (or
at least ad group) and moving onto a
new test. Quality scores take a lot longer
to accrue and can be more unforgiving
with contextual advertising than paid
search.
Get Started
We’re still in the early stages for effective
content network advertising. Sure
it’s been around for awhile, but really
at a beta level. Google’s been gradually
improving the service to the point that it
now offers advertisers a realistic shot at
great ROI.
Think of it like those early days of
paid search, when early adopters could
jump in and post really great numbers
before all the competition jumped in
and started driving up CPCs. If you’re
reading this article, you’re probably still
doing well with paid search — just not
quite as well as in those frontier days.
Through both their search and content
networks, Google today reaches more
than 80% of Internet users worldwide.
Even if you’re cynical because of
poor prior performance, it’s time to try
contextual advertising again. Start with
a small budget, create a highly defined
test, and give it a shot.
Justin Seibert is the founder
and president of Direct Online
Marketing (www.directom.com),
an Internet marketing firm that
specializes in paid search, search
engine optimization, business
blogging, and online reputation
management. He has actively
managed search campaigns for eight years and
carries certifi cations from Google, Yahoo, Microsoft,
and Marketing Experiments, as well as a B.A. from
Vanderbilt University.
This article was originally printed in the February edition of SES Magazine. You can view the original article by clicking here. |
