Last week I launched a small new campaign for a client.

Following best practices I added two ads to the campaign and set them to "Rotate Indefinitely: Show lower performing ads more evenly with higher performing ads and do not optimise".

There is a caveat below this option which states : "Not recommended for most advertisers" - but I like living on the edge.

If there is one question that is always asked when speaking to a potential AdWords advertiser - it is this : How Much Should I Budget for This?

With traditional advertising things are clearer. Radio spots, and 20 seconds of TV space have a price. So do newspaper and magazine ads. They have a price and you know what you're buying... at least you think you do. You're buying a space in which to run your ad.

What you're not buying is any result. You hope to get a result. You expect to get a result. Experience tells you that you should get a result. But all you are actually buying is the space.

If the phone doesn't ring, that's a different problem - perhaps there was something wrong with the ad.

But with online advertising, and Google AdWords in particular, you are not paying for the space (in most cases - this actually isn't true of CPM bidding). Instead you are paying for the result - in this case a click through to your web page.

Recently I've read a few articles about just how poor the Google Display Network works for advertisers.

Many of the writers question whether it should be used at all.

And, as if this is not bad enough, Google are testing a paid version of the web experience where the ads are pixelated, so your senses needn't be assaulted and offended by their gaudy messages.

But, just perhaps, the GDN is an Ugly Duckling - just waiting to be recognised as the swan it really is.

Let's wander back in time... before the internet. You wanted to find a plumber, you went to the yellow pages, or the classified ads section of your local newspaper. Today we call that Google search.

But there were lot's of other things you bought that you didn't want. Or need. You saw them in magazines, or on TV or heard about them on the radio. Maybe someone left a flyer in your mailbox, or sent you a letter (remember those?). Today we call that Google Display Network.

Clutter.

It's what stops us from achieving our goals. Clutter on our desk. Clutter in our heads. And clutter in our PPC accounts.

When we take a step back from the day to day micro-management of ppc campaigns we can sometimes catch a glimpse of the bigger picture. The one where the fundamental principles shine through.

PPC management is simple and the secret is.....

So you start an AdWords campaign and you start to get traffic. You're doing all the things they tell you to do - you've got Google Analytics installed and you've got conversion reporting configured. You know exactly which keywords and ads are working and which are not - so now you can start really optimizing your account. How long will it take you to paint yourself into a corner?

If you're not careful - it could be quicker than you might think.

If you've installed Google Analytics code on your site it's always good to know if it's working... If you have Chrome you can install the Google Tag Assistant extension - or you can wait a few hours and check if there have been any visits - but how would you like to know immediately if the code is working - especially if you need the code to be checking across sub-domains, for example?

Go back in time... it's 1980 and you're working for an advertising agency on an account for a new line of high heeled women's shoes. They are classy - and expensive.

You've got some very cool photos and some awesome creative form your art department and they are ready to run out the color separations (remember those?)

They just need to you to tell them which titles you are booking.

Estaría bien poder recibir una llamada gracias a tu marketing y saber exactamente qué anuncio motivó la llamada, ¿verdad? 

La resupuesta es -¡si, sería estupendo! 

Desde hace unos años, nuestros clientes en Estados Unidos y Reino Unido han podido usar el Call Tracking para controlar las llamadas telefónicas que recibían desde sus diferentes anuncios, tanto online como offline.  

Éste es un pequeño resumen de la sentencia del tribunal de apelación en Estados Unidos referente al uso de la marca registrada de la competencia como palabras clave en Google AdWords :

The purchase of a competitor's trademark as a trigger for advertising through Google's AdWords program was unlikely to create confusion on the part of consumers and thus did not give rise to a claim of trademark infringement through initial interest confusion, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit ruled July 16 (1-800 Contacts, Inc. v. Lens.com Inc., 10th Cir., No. 11-4114, 7/16/13). (Source: http://www.bna.com)

Puesto de manera simple, significa que está bien usar la marca registrada del comptidor para captar tus anuncios.  Tal como dice la política de Google, aún no puedes usar la marca registrada de tu competencia en el texto de tu anuncio, y eso tiene sentido, pero durante un tiempo hubo un cálido debate sobre la legalidad de marcas registradas como palabras clave.

Asi que vamos a hacer la pregunta de nuevo :  ¿Son tus clientes estúpidos?

Es una buena pregunta. Si trabajo mucho en crear buen contenido en mi página web, y eso me genera puestos altos en los resultados orgánicos, y me está costando probablemente bastante dinero en escritores, búsquedas, etc. ¿por qué debo pagar más para lanzar un anuncio al lado de mi link orgánico?  Estaría desperdiciando dinero ¿no? 

Getting traffic to your site is one thing - and there are hundreds of ways to do that - but once the visitors are there, are you making the most of their visit?

Google Analytics can tell you how long visitors spend on a page, and they can tell you how many of your visitors completed a purchase, or signed up for your newsletter, or requested a quotation - or whatever it is you want them to do once they get to you. But is your site working as well as it might?