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Yahoo PPC vs Google Adwords PPC.

Written by seg @ 1:53 AM permanent link on Friday, June 5, 2009 | Post a Comment | 1 comments

I have been avoiding learning how yahoo works for some time. Today I decided to really get into it. Our agency has a Yahoo agency rep that helps us out a lot and I just spent a lot of time talking to him on the phone. Come to find out Yahoo is very different. Here are a few items I hope this turns into a big discussion.

1. Quality Score:

Google - Quality score is on an individual keyword and is figured out at time of search. You can have low and high QS keywords in the same ad group. Broad match and phrase match keywords only show the average QS. Only exact match shows a close to real QS and even then it is still an average since QS is based on things that happen at time of search.
Yahoo - Quality score is only shown at the ad group level. This means that everything in the ad group contributes to the QS. A bad QS keyword can drag down the others. They recommend that we organize ad group like in Google but then split up the ad group by traffic. This means that I get 3 times as many ad groups in Yahoo than I do Google.

2. Match Type.

Google Phrase, Broad, Eact, Negative Phrase, Negative Broad, Negative Exact. Broad is a wild card that will find all keywords with any of the keywords in your term plus synonyms, plurals, singulars and anything that could be remotely related. Phrase will take the exact match of what you put in the term and allow any other terms that have that exact phrase plus anything before or after the term. Exact is very exact nothing more nothing less. Negatives work the same way except they don't do any guessing. If you put in a singular you have to put in the singular as well. If you put in a negative match you can't have the exact match of the same term. Google considers a plural and singular keyword to be two different words. Negatives can be done at the Campaign and ad group level.

Yahoo - Advanced, Standard, Excluded Words. This has been very confusing to me. It seems that you have broad and really broad. Yahoo does not have an exact match. Advanced is just like Google Broad and standard is just like Google broad used to be. If you put in a negative match keyword it won't be excluded if you have it as a standard or advanced match. If you put in a singular it will also exclude the plural. Yahoo considers plural and singular keywords to be the same keyword there is no way to separate them. Negatives can be done at the account level and ad group level.

There are many other differences like campaign settings and geo targeting and so on but these are the 2 main things that are not obvious. I'm not saying that all this is true it is just my understanding. I hope we can talk about this and maybe clear up some of this stuff.

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Trouble with yahoo search marketing:

Written by seg @ 9:07 PM permanent link on Tuesday, May 12, 2009 | Post a Comment | 1 comments

First let me say that I've been using Google Adwords almost exclusively since I started into the world of PPC, however I did try out the Yahoo program a year or so ago. I wasn't impressed with the setup so I abandoned it. I decided to give it a try again and guess what...they still don't have their shit together at Yahoo. This is what I don't like about their program vs. Google.

1. Campaigns take FOREVER to kick in. I thought Google took a while, but it took 24 hours before I saw any of my ads appearing on the Yahoo network. This just kills you when you have a hot idea that you want to get going on, then you have to wait a day or more and your inspiration fades.

2. Editorial Reviews - If you create an ad copy that for some reason doesn't jive with some Yahoo algorithm, your ad goes to Editorial Review, and the waiting game begins again. I've had half a dozen ads sitting in ER now for days...wonder if they'll ever be reviewed. At least Google get around to them in 24 hours or so.

3. Reporting - As far as I can tell, Yahoo only updates the reporting stats once a day. How the hell can I figure out if a campaign, ad or even keyword is effective if I have to wait until the next morning to see statistics?

4. Help - Getting a response from a Yahoo rep is nearly impossible.

If anyone has any tips to get around these issues...I'd love to hear them. I'd rather pay more per click and have a reliable system that gets ads showing and working in a timely manner.

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How to increase Click throughs on your Ads

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 12:01 AM permanent link on Wednesday, August 27, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Main problem in PPC ad writing is there's no enough space for you to express your ideas. Humm? For example, in adwords there are two description lines with 35-35 characters and a title with 25 characters. Shrinking our ad to this much character spaces is sometimes really difficult. Your sale process starting at your landing page. But bringing people to your landing page is done by your adcopy only. The number of visitors coming to your landing page depends on how effectively you could convey the ideas and features of your service. So utilize all the characters effectively.

Here are three ways you can increase your click-throughs - Use influential Words in Your Titles - An influential word is an emotionally thrilling word that gets the attention of visitors and makes them click because you've strike a trigger. Some powerful power words are: amazing, incredible, successful, vital etc.

Promise a Benefit - Tell your visitors that you are going to give some benefits like free shipping, free consultation, discount etc. But it should be genuine.

Be Specific - Be specific when telling about figures like company turnover and revenue. If you are concentrating more on these steps, your adcopies will give you more click throughs.

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Concentrating on a Single PPC Provider?

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 12:01 AM permanent link on Tuesday, August 26, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

It seems that 95% of PPC Advertisers concentrating on Google adwords only. What you think? Is that enough for your online marketing? How will you reach people who exclusively using other search engines like yahoo and msn? So it is better to create PPC account in other search engines also. It is not a must. And do a market research before doing so.

For some product, I have seen yahoo is working better than Google. Especially tax saving, payday and consolidation programs. Normally we are seeing minimum clicks and conversions in MSN when compared to adwords and yahoo. But remember one thing. What you are spending in MSN for that clicks and conversions are also very less when compared to the other two search engines. so try to create account in at least two search engines. But don't go too risky.

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What should you do if unexpected increase found in PPC?

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 12:01 AM permanent link on Saturday, August 23, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

A sudden increase in clicks means that either your campaign is working nicely or it could be a click fraud. What should you do if you find a click fraud?

First, try to discover why you are experiencing a spike in click. According to Yahoo Search Marketing Blog, a sudden spike in clicks may happen because of any of the following reasons:

* Changes to an ad's ranking in search results
* Change to the match type used for your ads
* Keyword seasonality
* A new distribution partner added to the Yahoo network
* Yahoo Buzz placement
* Yahoo Front Page placement

You could see a spike in the number of clicks if there is a change in the placement. Example one of your major competitors paused his campaign and suddenly your ad got a better placement. That could increase the number of clicks that you are getting. Adjust your budget and monitor your campaign. If it's a click fraud you can see many clicks without adequate conversions. Yahoo can help you. You can report sudden spikes and ask for an investigation. Yahoo's Traffic Quality Center will help you. They will send you a report which can tell you why your clicks have suddenly gone up and you'll be able to take action accordingly. Each of the search engines has a service like this. What you have to do is report it on time. Remember all sudden rises in clicks may not be frauds. Think logically. Suppose your site is down and search engines are showing your ads. What will happen??

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Tips to Increase Ad Quality

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 1:01 AM permanent link on Thursday, August 21, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

It is very important to pay attention to your ad quality. Each search engine that uses a quality score and you can check that very easily. Your keyword bid is inversely proportional to your ad quality score. That means the higher your ad quality score, the lower your keyword bids will be. You can expect a better ROI and save money with higher ad quality. It is nice to see something ensuring you better click throughs. You can do three things to increase your ad quality. Applying these very simple ad campaign management tactics will improve your ad quality.

Select the right keywords - Find maximum number of keywords relevant to your product or service. Some keywords might be appropriate to your whole campaign but only be applicable for certain ads within that campaign and some others might be relevant for every ad in the campaign. Remember to avoid too generic keywords.

Stay with your budget - Never spend too much or go overboard. You can't reach your expected ROI. You will spend more on low performing keywords also. So always stick on to your pre-decided budget; if the change is not essential.

Group highest converting keywords together in one ad group. In yesterday's post I have explained it.

Have a look.

https://www.searchenginegenie.com/pay-per-click/2008/08/tips-to-optimize-your-ppc-campaigns.html

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Why Not Your Ads Are Getting Clicked On?

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 1:00 AM permanent link on Tuesday, August 19, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

You have spent very much time on keyword and market research. You have given pretty good biddings also. Still your ads are not getting clicked. You might have faced this problem. The best way to get clicked on your ads is to write ads that demand a click through. The language and content of ad copy need the prime attention. If you are sure that you are targeting the right keywords only, then go behind your adcopies. Try to write better copies. Always write more than one adcopy for each adgroup. The success of your ad is determined by quality score of your ads. Be sure you pay care to the quality score and keep checking and experimenting those ads until you get them right.


What you have to do?

* Make your ads compelling and clear
* Compare your ad variations
* Use keywords in your titles and descriptions
* Target keywords to correct landing pages
* Separate ads into ad groups
* Try to get good quality scores (you can check quality score of your ads in adwords)

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Incremental and Demographic Bidding

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 8:35 PM permanent link on Monday, August 18, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

I think you know what I am going to tell here. Like geographic targeting, you can target people of specific gender and age group in your pay per click campaigns. Each search engine has the capability to target your ads in the direction of a precise demographic. It is known differently in different search engines. Google calls it demographic targeting and MSN AdCenter calls it incremental bidding. It is very simple. What you do is simply modify your keywords bid for the targeted demographic which is already defined. Suppose you are selling anti-aging cream targeted toward women ages above 30. You can adjust your bidding for the important anti-aging-related keywords that you are targeting so that you bid on the demographic that is important to you. You can bid .50 on "anti aging cream" and up your bid for that keyword to $1.00 for the 30 and above age range. Obviously women ages 30 and above are more valuable to your business than women in the 18-30 age range and it makes sense. You can still attract the younger women through your normal keyword bidding, but by using a higher bid for the older group target demographic as more valuable and the search engines will place your targeted ads effectively.

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How Many Keywords are Enough for a PPC Campaign?

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 10:03 PM permanent link on Thursday, August 14, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

This doubt is a very common among PPC professionals and beginners. The most important aspect of any pay per click campaign is the keyword research and that I have already told it here many times. We have to spend significant time on keyword research. The success of your PPC campaign directly depends on how effective you could choose the right keywords based on search engine statistics and relevancy to your business. I don't want to explain about the keyword research again. I don't want you to feel bored.

I have only one thing to tell you. Find maximum number of keywords relevant to your product or service. Some keywords might be appropriate to your whole campaign but only be applicable for certain ads within that campaign and some others might be relevant for every ad in the campaign. Remember to avoid too generic keywords. Otherwise your pocket will be empty very soon. How many keywords is enough for your campaign id depends on you niche. In a narrow niche you have to limit your keywords. But my advice is to use as many keywords as you can without worrying about your niche concept. But I am telling you one-thing again. Don't go for too generic keywords. Take relevant keywords only. Start your campaigning with an effective keyword research. Success is certainly your way.

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How Simple your PPC Campaigning is?

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 10:00 PM permanent link on Wednesday, August 13, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Simplicity is the most powerful policy behind a successful PPC campaign. It should appear simple. Sometimes it is very hard to do. But remember thing. Something appears simple and clear only will be attracted by your targeted visitors. It takes time and skills. Make your PPC ad and its landing page language as simple as possible. Usage of colloquial phrases and terms sometimes makes opposite effects. The users might not be able to understand what you are actually wanted them to tell. Result-they won't click on your ads. And sometimes colloquial terms will help. Some scientific or technical terms won't be familiar to the audience. In that situation use simple colloquial terms. So always think what your target visitors will search for and what terms they will use to find the product. Simple ads sell better and they get more clicks. Like that way, simple landing pages with simple language convert more sales. Keep your landing page simple and appealing that it can touch your visitors' emotions. Result-more sales, more profit.

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The Unquestionable Relationship between Ad Copy and its Landing Page

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 12:11 AM permanent link on Monday, August 11, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Your ad copy and landing pages are very closely attached. If your landing page and ad copy work perfectly together, you'll have a successful and happy pay per click campaign.

Ad Copy

Ad copy is very important. Your ad copy is the first thing which is giving idea about your product or service to your targeted searchers. In sponsored search and in content network, the following things draw attention of visitors.
In your ad-copy, try to use credible and reliable data. Your adcopy should impose interest and curiosity on your visitors. There should be a call to action. Be honest and target right audience.

Landing Page

Conversion happens in your landing page. It can be an existing page in the web site or you can design 1 for PPC conversion purpose. But that page should have a power to retain your visitor in that page itself. Avoid other attractive links from your custom landing page. Landing page also should contain credible and reliable content. List the most important features of your service. It should be close to the sale. 10 more steps to purchase a product will make visitors feel bored and they will stop the attempt and go to your competitor's website.

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PPC Success Begins With Research

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 11:59 PM permanent link on Saturday, August 9, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

The beginning of pay per click is depends purely on research. There are mainly two types of research in PPC. Keyword research and competitor research. Market research will come under keyword research only. What you think? Which research is more important? Keyword research or competitor research? I think they have the equal importance in PPC management. You have to do some prior research before you start your first campaign.

Keyword Research

Keyword research is simply the selection of best performing keywords which can bring visitors to your website. You may have wasted thousands of dollars on page ranking and conversions if the right keyword phrases are not targeted. Keywords are the back bone of both PPC and SEO. Even if you attain high search engine rankings, you may not get appropriate traffic if the selected keywords are not right.
You can see more about keyword research in my blog post here.

https://www.searchenginegenie.com/pay-per-click/2008/06/importance-of-keyword-research.html

Google's external keyword tool is the best tool to check the keywords and their average search volumes. Filter 10-20 keywords which you feel most relevant to your business.

Competitive Research

Now make a search for each of those keywords using both broad match and exact phrase match. See what your competitors are targeting and advertising for. Do organic searches to find that. Check who is ranked high in the organic search listings and still paying for top placement with their paid search ad. Those are your most competitive competitors. You can go to their websites and do more research. Please don't click on any sponsored search ads. As you don't want people who are not interest in your sales/service to click on your ads, give the same importance and respect to your competitors also.

After completing these stages, you can go for a deeper and comprehensive research.

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Important Things to Know About Landing Pages

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 11:19 PM permanent link on Thursday, August 7, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Landing pages are very important. Take the time to study how to do it correctly and your PPC campaign will be a big success. So you have to give much importance to your landing page design. Here are some suggestions.

1.Include a call to action - We have already discussed this topic. Let your visitors know what you want them to do and make them do it.

2.Polish your copy - The most important thing is your landing page content. That content should have a power in it to convert into a purchase. If it is not like that, do more and more work and make it like that.

3.Use simple and short paragraphs - Keep the paragraphs short and make it easy to scan. People can find something they like in it and they will stop and read.

4.Don't put much exiting page links in your landing page. If the visitors find a link much appealing they will go that way.

5.One important factor about PPC advertising and heavy traffic to your landing pages is detaining the contact information. You can close the sale any time later.

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Try a Call to Action - Your Ads do convert

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 10:37 PM permanent link on Tuesday, August 5, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Simply writing ads are not enough in PPC. There should be some power in the ad that forces the viewers to click on it. That means there should be a call to action in your adtext. The viewers feel that the ad can lead them to the service or product what they have searched for. The call to action can create urgency to the demand. Some examples are -

- Apply now
- Order today
- Download here
- Free quote
- Free shipping
- Request a quote
- Free estimate
- ---% discount

This is an easy way to increase conversion. Try it today itself and feel the difference. But something you always have to remember. Your landing page should be informative and include "free" and "% of discount" only if those are available in your website.

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Be Familiar with These PPC Terms

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 8:41 PM permanent link on Sunday, August 3, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

After 1 week training, my PPC trainee asked me what is CTR, what is CPC and Quality Score. Then only I remembered that I forgot to explain her these terms. Ok. Here I am explaining some of the common acronyms associated with pay per click advertising. Before starting your PPC advertising, you should understand these terms thoroughly. Otherwise, you might make a conclusion based on an incorrect guess.

CTR - Click Through Rate. This is the number of times that viewers of your ad click to go through to your website. We can calculate CTR by this formula-

CTR=Clicks/Impressions * 100

CPC - Cost Per Click. This is how much you are paying for clicks on your ads. It is usually expressed as an average because most of the time you will not be paying the same amount. The actual cost per click varies depending on many factors like competition and some other factors, but it is always within the range of your pre-set values.

CPC= Costs/Clicks

CPM - Cost-per-thousand Impressions - This is how much you are paying for each 1000 impressions of your ads. That means, for every 1000 views of your ads, you have to set a budget and pay that.

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Misspelled and Competitor Adgroups

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 3:36 AM permanent link on Wednesday, July 30, 2008 | Post a Comment | 1 comments

Include misspelled and competitor adgroups in your campaign. If you are waiting for people correctly knowing the spelling of the keywords or people searching for your company only, your ad is not going to work well in search engines. Try to include maximum misspelled keywords in your misspelled adgroup and top competitors in your competitor adgroup. If someone searching for your competitor gets attracted by your adcopy and apply for your service. Why should we spoil one lead? Suppose your company ad is coming in local radio and someone hearing this ad trying to locate your website. It is not sure that whether he knows the spelling of your company or the product he's searching for. Our wristband campaign is getting many clicks and conversions for "ristbands", "wristbands", "wristbands" etc. So bidding on misspellings is an intelligent way to increase the efficiency of your PPC advertising. Try this now itself if you haven't experiment this before.

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Yahoo Search Marketing

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 8:13 PM permanent link on Monday, July 28, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

I always forget that yahoo's ppc service is no more overture and it is Yahoo Search Marketing only. Leave that. When you are writing ads for yahoo search marketing, create 2 ad descriptions. 1 short ad description and one long ad description. If you have the option to add both these, why should we skip it. If you are adding only a long ad description, in some search engines, search results with descriptions longer than 70 characters will be cut off. So try to create unique long and short ad descriptions. Your 190-character long ad description is supported by yahoo's many distribution partners' sites. So use this chance to give maximum important points about your product and service.

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Top 10 Pay per Click Search Engines

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 9:17 PM permanent link on Sunday, July 6, 2008 | Post a Comment | 1 comments

Google AdWords

Yahoo! Search Marketing

Microsoft adCenter

ABC Search

SearchFeed

7Search

MIVA

Enhance Interactive

Findology

Ask.com

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What about adding negatives to your AdGroups?

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 9:09 PM permanent link on Wednesday, June 18, 2008 | Post a Comment | 1 comments

It is seen that people are adding all broad-matching keywords without negatives. Broad match can create thousands of search results and majority of them will not be relevant to your ads. So its a powerful way to include negatives. You can include -ves either in campaign level or in adgroup level. That will help to stop your ads from showing for irrelevant searches. So find maximum negatives for your keywords.

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Targeting homepage only?

Written by Jinu Sunil @ 3:51 AM permanent link on Monday, June 16, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

It is not advisable to send all your traffic to your home page. Suppose you are a florist and running an online floral ordering site. It will not convert much if you are dropping people who are searching for "orchid" in your homepage which contains details about hundreds of flowers. It is better to drop them in a page which contains details about most wanted orchid species like Anguloa, Cattleya, Cymbidium, Laelia etc. Give website user the opportunity to find their result at first click. A messy home page will tempt them to close that site and go back for a new search. Remember you have to pay for each click. Better send the visitors to the page they asked for in the first click itself.

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Yahoo Search Marketing will edit your account without your permission.

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 1:54 PM permanent link on Wednesday, June 4, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Yahoo search marketing recently made major change to its TOS where it allows their employees to edit ads without the users permission

"OPTIMIZATION. In the U.S. only, for those advertisers not bound by an Insertion Order, we may help you optimize your account(s). Accordingly, you expressly agree that we may also: (i) create ads, (ii) add and/or remove keywords, and/or (iii) optimize your account(s). We will notify you via email of such changes made to your account(s), and can also include a spreadsheet of such changes upon your written request. If you would like any of such changes reversed, please reply to such email within 14 days of the change(s), and we will make commercially reasonable efforts to reverse the change(s) you specifically identify. Notwithstanding the foregoing, you remain responsible for all changes made to your account(s), including all click charges incurred prior to any reversions being made. It is your responsibility to monitor your account(s) and to ensure that your account settings are consistent with your business objectives. "

Don't know how ethical it is but i am sure this is not the right thing to do since its a blatant invasion of account privacy

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Fixed CPC - Yahoo search submit pro

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 1:35 PM permanent link on Wednesday, May 28, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Yahoo Search Submit pro does offer an option where you can set a fixed CPC like 30 cents of something and use it for all the keywords in your campaign. Similarly i know exact seek does it. There are not many PPC search engines which offer this kind of stuff. I know Yahoo search submit does this since we do it for a particular client.

To qualify for Search Submit pro you need to have a budget spend of atleast 5000$ a month. Anything less than that will come under Search Submit Basic.

How it Works
You provide an XML feed of your URLs.
Your URLs are reviewed for quality and relevance. Approved URLs are then included in the index that powers algorithmic search results for Search Submit partner sites such as Yahoo! Search, AltaVista and AllTheWeb.
When Internet users visit the Search Submit Pro partner sites and enter keyword searches, your listings may appear within the search results based on their relevance to the user's search request.
Your content is kept up-to-date by frequent refreshes, typically every 48 hours. This ensures that potential customers view the latest offerings on your Web site.

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problems with yahoo PPC - webmasterworld member

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 11:27 AM permanent link on Sunday, May 25, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

A webmaster world member tells the frustration he faces with yahoo search marketing and his PPC campaign with yahoo.

He says

"I've been away for a bit but decided to get my fellow members input on something that just pisses me off to NO END.

I advertise with Yahoo Search Marketing and have for a while now and I noticed last week that my account wasn't performing right. Low conversions, high impressions, low click through rates...around 0.70 when I usually experience about 2.00.

My rep is a GREAT GUY and has really helped me in the past and told me it was probably market fluctuation and try to wait a few days....I did what I was told and notice yesterday that my click through rates have plummeted even further...conversions were horrible and impressions were through the ROOF...about 170,000 impressions as of 2pm cst when in a normal day I would get 40 - 50,000 TOPS. I started digging and noticed that some of the keywords were INCREDIBLY OBSCURE and stuck out like a sore thumb...naturally I disabled them...about 20 or so...I'm talking some of these keywords would have 30 or 40,000 impressions....keywords that normally get minimal impressions.

What happened?

It did what it set out to do...my traffic was slaughtered b/c over the few days these false impressions gave the overall impression my account was performing poorly therefore lowering my ad placement and giving more weight to other ads with better click through...giving these ads higher placement with lower costs and driving down the competition.

I initially talked to yahoo about this and was told there was nothing that could be done other than shutting off the keywords...WHICH I DID. BUT, the damage is done...I sent an email to my rep trying to get management involved to solve this problem...it just SUCKS they do not have measures in place to protect us loyal advertisers from THIEVES.

"

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Some yahoo coupons posted in digitalpoint

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 1:00 PM permanent link on Tuesday, May 20, 2008 | Post a Comment | 1 comments

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Yahoo Search Marketing Exam suspended until further Notice

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 1:35 PM permanent link on Sunday, May 11, 2008 | Post a Comment | 1 comments

Yahoo Search Marketing was conducting exams to qualify Agencies, PPC management companies and individuals as Yahoo Search PPC ambassadors. It seems yahoo has suspended the program now.

I don't see any official report from yahoo but when i go to sign up page i get the following messages "Yahoo will no longer be accepting new Ambassador applications until further notice."

Yahoo will no longer be accepting new Ambassador applications until further notice. - So yahoo has stopped accepting Ambassador applications is this a temporary one from yahoo or they wont be accepting any more applications. Our company just tried to sign up but we are unable to. Anyone else having similar experience?
This is the URL for registering for Yahoo Search marketing Ambassador exam.

https://approval.myaffiliateprogram.com/ambassador_signup.asp
You can see following message
"
Yahoo will no longer be accepting new Ambassador applications until further notice.
Welcome. To register for the Yahoo!® Search Marketing Ambassador program including access to the online learning modules and the Ambassador test, there is a one-time, non-refundable fee of $50, which is only payable by credit card. Please note the Yahoo!® Search Marketing Ambassador program is only open to businesses operating in the United States or Canada at this time."

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Looking to promote your prom dresses website in PPC?

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 1:49 PM permanent link on Tuesday, May 6, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Are you looking to promote your prom dress selling website or are you already an advertiser. Yahoo Search Marketing Blog offers some valuable tips on areas you need to target and improve to get maximum exposure, sales and traffic through Yahoo Sponsored results.

Some valuable tips:

1. Separate Campaigns
Targeting different type of customers for different theme is very important. YSM blog suggests creating separating campaigns if you are running a gift card sale as well as a prom dress sale.
2. Promotional language
Ofcourse i agree with Yahoo on this one, Promotional language is very important people love to hear words like gifts, coupons, sale, discount, offers etc. So make sure you add proper promotional campaign in the ads.

3. Keyword/creative conflict
Make sure that your titles and descriptions don't clash with their associated keywords. Even when the keyword appears in the creative, searchers may skip the ad if the main focus appears to be on something else.
4. Keyword insertion and Alt Text
Our Keyword Insertion tool helps make sure that the user's search term always appears in your ads, and Alt Text helps the ad appear the way you want it.
5. Customization helps
Greeting card sites that offer customizable cards should be sure to mention that in their ads, as it likely will resonate with searchers.
6. Scope of offerings
Searches using general terms shouldn't lead to an ad for a very specific item. For example, people searching with terms like "prom dress" usually want to be able to browse a variety of styles and colors, and may not click on an ad that promotes a "red floor-length strapless prom dress."
You may not still remember everything about your prom night or graduation, but if you remember these few important tips, you can make your ads the "class" of '08.

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Importing Campaigns / Ad groups from Adwords to YSM

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 12:01 PM permanent link on Friday, May 2, 2008 | Post a Comment | 2 comments

Many people have contacted us asking whether there is any easy way to import keywords, campaigns, ad groups from Google Adwords to Yahoo Search Marketing. From my experience currently there are no options for the end users but yahoo's inhouse YSM experts can add data imported from Google Adwords. But to qualify for this you need to be a privileged user .

To be a YSM privileged user you need to have a minimum Ad spend of 6000$. If you qualify then Yahoo's inhouse search marketing experts will add the campaigns imported from Adwords into the YSM control panel.

MSN adcenter already has an option for end users but Yahoo Search Marketing don't have such an option . So of you are thinking of importing data from adwords and adding it to YSM currently its not possible,

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Yahoo now the great lord of truth

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 12:18 PM permanent link on Friday, April 25, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Yahoo has now added a new feature in Yahoo Search Marketing . They are now showing status of Click Filters. Click filter is a new feature where yahoo shows the status of Fraudelent clicks and the money refunded because it. This is a great new feature and possibly a by product of the merger of Click Forencics and Yahoo Search.

Recently Yahoo tied up hands with Click Forencics a company who has been loud on fighting click fraud.

Before joining hand with Click Forensics Yahoo said its click fraud rate was around 12 to 15% and most of these funds are returned to the advertisers. Google Claimed click fraud rate in their sponsored results are only in single digits.

Now Yahoo have a good reporting system where they show the status of click fraud in search results inside the Yahoo search marketing control panel and return the funds to advertisers who suffer from click fraud.

The report can be customized with the following data:

  • Impressions
  • Clicks
  • Invalid Clicks
  • Invalid Click Rate
  • Click-through Rate (CTR)
  • Cost
  • Average Cost-per-Click


Great job Yahoo we wish to see more of such features in future.

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Yahoo changed Minimum bid value - yahoo updates bid value

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 1:00 PM permanent link on Sunday, April 20, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Recently yahoo has made changes to the minimum bid value you a user can bid for their PPC program. Before it was 0.10 $ standard for most of the bids but now it is not anymore that value. Your bidding depends on the quality of the ads and the number of click throughs it attracts. If the user likes the ad and if it results in more clickthroughs then your site will attact a much lower bid.

Also the value of the keyword matters when it comes to bid value. If the number of advertisers are more and if they are willing to pay more for that keyword then the minimum bid value for that keyword will be changed,

PPC Blog Jeff

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Yahoo kicks of with a new search engine crawler

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 1:18 PM permanent link on Tuesday, April 15, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Yahoo crawler team have come out with a new crawler that will crawl the web in a more sophisticated way. Yahoo Slup 3.0 is the new version of yahoo's search engine indexing crawler that has been introduced recently for crawling the web. Yahoo Search engine is the 2nd most important search engine only next to Google and its very important we give attention to yahoo search rankings.

Yahoo has done a major crawler infrastructure update and this is causing massive indexing in major sites. Things should be settling down very soon but yahoo has reported new crawler activity from a different set of IPs for many sites.

According to yahoo the same derivatives in robots.txt for New Yahoo slup 3.0 will work,

"The crawlers will also publish a new user-agent, 'Yahoo! Slurp/3.0.' Existing
robots.txt directives for 'Slurp' or 'Yahoo! Slurp' will continue to work, but
if you have directives specific to 'Slurp/2.0,' they won't be recognized by the
new crawler (though usage of the 'Slurp/2.0' user-agent is very rare on the web,
so you won't likely be affected). We recommend specifying the shorter version
of: User-agent: Slurp. "

Official statement from Yahoo search news blog

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Yahoo - Yhoo - willing to play more with MSFT ( microsoft )

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 10:31 PM permanent link on Thursday, April 10, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Yahoo Inc has started playing games with MSFT to increase the bid or a possible higher sellout. Microsoft has offered 31$ per share for Yahoo which rates it to around 44 billion now Yahoo has planned to partner with Google to deliver Adwords sponsored results besides yahoo's search results.

This looks like a desperate attempt by yahoo to make MSFT offer a higher bid for them.,

According to Financial express:


Yahoo announced on Wednesday a test to outsource Web search advertising to
Google Inc. Sources say the test is part of a planned three-way alliance to
combine Yahoo with Time Warner Inc's AOL instead of Microsoft Corp.

If there is a possible merger with AOL then Yahoo will be a much lower brand. AOL is already struggling by itself I dont think they will make Yahoo a successful business if the merger happens.

So what should Yahoo do? I personally feel Yahoo should be sold to MSFT since Google is too dominant in Search industry now. That's not the best thing since competition always makes better goods to be delivered to end customers.

PPC Blog Team

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Yahoo Search Marketing New Affiliate Policy

Written by Search Engine Genie @ 8:22 PM permanent link on Tuesday, April 8, 2008 | Post a Comment | 0 comments

Yahoo search Marketing was not allowing direct links to a non-personalized affiliate landing page. Yahoo's Search Marketing has implemented New guidelines for affiliate Marketing in their ad-publishing. A publisher can have direct links to a affiliate's page they don't to have a customized landing page setup on their site or on the affiliate service provider's site.

Yahoopete yahoo's YSM support Rep who posts in Digitalpoint forums said about a year back

"Currently, we don't accept direct links to a non-personalized merchant's page. The landing page must be owned or controlled by the affiliate (not the merchant) or be personalized/co-branded with the affiliate's name or business name."
Current affiliate policy updated October 2007,

"Yahoo! Search Marketing Becomes More Publisher Friendly After more than six months in the making and much customer feedback and testing, we are pleased to announce that Yahoo! Search Marketing (YSM) has recently updated its editorial policies and will now allow U.S. publishers to direct link to their advertisers. In the past, YSM's editorial policy prevented publishers from linking directly to their advertiser partners and required that traffic be sent first to the publisher's Web site. The new policy eliminates this restriction and opens a much broader search marketing opportunity for publishers."

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