# Google Ads - who has cracked it?



## ladyumbrella (Aug 25, 2009)

Hi all,

I've started to play around with google ads and am only beginning the trek of enlightenment. I have read a few of the threads here and they have been helpful. I have created 3 separate campaigns and am getting a nice CTR and CPC and have a google quality score of about 7 for most keywords. 

Here are few things I've done and would like to get your thoughts:

CPC - to keep it down I am not bidding to be on the first page, the average position my ad is shown is about 6.1 but I find I am still getting a decent amount of clicks. I find that my CPC is generally about 20% less than googles CPC price. The problem is the bounce rate with the clicks. To try tighten it up I have added negative keywords for some of the clicks I've received from searches not relevant for us, ie "ladies baseball t-shirts" etc. 

Quality Score - I have 3 separate landing pages for each of my campaigns and all of the campaigns are grouped with similar keywords. I think this has helped and will continue to build landing pages for the specific ad campaign. I believe tailored landing pages makes it easier to get a higher quality score and the higher the quality score the more google ads likes you - but would love to get feedback on this.

CTR - For some keywords that I am bidding on the CTR is up around 4%..the total average is about 1.5% - is this an ok CTR?

From what I have learned I think it is not necessary to be competing for the top spots in the ads unless you can afford it. I am tightening the net on spurious searches to try get a more targeted traffic but my bounce rate is what concerns me. 

It seems like none of those who click on an ad hang around at all. An example of a landing page for a when someone clicks on an ad for "ladies t-shirts" can be seen here *ladyumbrella.com/ladiestshirts.ph*p (apologies for linking to it) and I would really like any feedback on it. Is it too text heavy or should it be more sales orientated? instead of linking to the gallery at the end should I sqeeze them to shop? 

Any thoughts, advice, strategies, tips, tricks or other would be greatly appreciated. I hope to update this thread and let you know how it progresses - hopefully it will prove useful to others as well...

Many thanks..


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## PositiveDave (Dec 1, 2008)

There is evidence, according to the guru giving a seminar, that the ideal position for the ad is between 4 & 6. The eye tends to go down the left then track across.
4% is a very healthy CTR, I'd be happy with 1.5%.
You will find area specific keywords cheaper i.e. ladies tshirts dublin rather than ladies tshirts.
Keep monitoring and do what works, drop what doesn't.


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## sgood (Oct 17, 2009)

I have found that using exact search queries only (by putting it in quotation marks) is the way to go, try a few search phrases out and then see which one's get you the best conversion rate then just focus on those.

The quality score is also linked to the CTR and the best way of increasing CTR is by have a good ad that stands out even if it's not at the top of the page... but the higher up you are the better the CTR seems to be Google AdWords Click Through Rates Per Position. So, you may have to bid more to get to the top but as your quality score increases your CPC will decrease. 

Although, If you are using your daily budget up anyway I think it is kind of irrelevant where you are showing up in the search, just bid as low as possible to get the most clicks you can per day and focus on the conversion rate.

The landing page looks good but I might change the hyperlinked "ladies t shirts" to take you to see the products, that is what I was expecting when I clicked it. Also, I think the "like" in this sentance needs to come out "At LadyUmbrella ladies t-shirts we like offer our own range of unique..." The links also open up on new tabs which I think can get blocked by some pop up blockers, I might be wrong that but might be safe to have them open on the same page.


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## ladyumbrella (Aug 25, 2009)

Hey, thank you both for the feedback.

Ye, one thing I changed is to the exact phrase and I am hoping this will yield some better results. All types of random searches were coming through when it was set to broad search and it was just a bit of a waste of money.

Ye, also think it is a good idea to try get more clicks and focus on the conversions. I am going to set up the conversion tracker now and see what happens. Thanks again for the help.


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