Simon Bell .biz

In yesterdays blog post I explained Google AdWords quality score and how it affects your campaign. If you don't already know what QS is I highly recommend you read yesterdays post before reading today's.

So now you know what a quality score is and how important it is. Do you want to get a QS of 10 out of 10?

It is possible to get a 10 out of 10 QS but things have to be running pretty sharp in your AdWords account.

But, before I explain in detail how to get a 10 out of 10 quality score I want to run through a very important part of your campaign.

What's Your Break-Even Point?

You're break-even point is how much money you can afford to pay-per-click to break even (e.g. spend $10 make $10 back). Once you know your break-even point you can work out how much under you break-even point you can afford to pay-per-click; your profit margin.

For example: You're selling an e-book at $30 (all profit). You're conversion rate is 5% (i.e. if 100 visitors landed on your website 5 of them would buy the e-book). So, you would make 1 sale for every 20 visitors to your site. The formula to work out your break-even point is:

Profit / Visitors required for one sale = break-even point

Using the example above: $30 (profit) / 20 (visitors required) = $1.50

This means if you were paying $1.50 per click you would be breaking even (it would cost $30 in advertising to make $30 back). If you want to be making a 50% profit margin, reduce your break-even point by 50%. So, at $0.75 per click, it would cost you $15 to get a sale of $30 = $15 profit margin.

Once you know your break-even point you can start setting you maximum CPC without worrying that you're losing too much money. Just make sure if your conversion rate alters that you re-calculate your break-even point.

Note: Make sure you’re using your profit figure and not your sales figure. For example: if you're selling a physical product such as a digital camera, it might sell for $200 but only $100 might be profit. Similarly if you're selling affiliate products, make sure your profit figure is your commission and not the sale price.

Organise Keywords into Ad Groups

Your keywords need to be relevant to the adverts they're promoting. The best way to do this is to break keywords down into different ad groups.

For example:

Ad group name: weight loss
keywords: weight loss, instant weight loss, weight loss before Christmas, weight loss guide

Ad group name: lose weight
keywords: how to lose weight, lose weight before Christmas, weight loss guide

Make sure each main keyword (e.g. weight loss) is in its own ad group with its long-term keywords with it (weight loss guide etc).

This will ensure you're keywords are ready to have highly targeted adverts created for them.

Relevant Advert Copy

Using the ad group example of weight loss you can then create ad copy that's highly targeted to the keywords within the ad group. This will speak directly to the reader, as opposed to speaking broadly. If you speak directly to the reader, they're more likely to click on your advert. More clicks = higher CTR. Higher CTR = higher quality score.

Weight Loss Guide
Looking for a weight loss guide?
Updated for 2010. Instant download.
www.website.com

You'll notice that the advert has the main keyword appearing in the main title and also on the first line. This is crucial to keyword relevancy. So when a user goes onto Google and searches for "weight loss guide" this advert will jump out the page at them!

Ad Variations

One of the best features of AdWords is the ability to create multiple versions within a single ad group. You can then optimise the campaign to show adverts more frequently that have higher CTRs.

To get a high quality score you should be aiming for a CTR of 1% absolute minimum. The higher the better. So, create several different adverts for each ad group. Let them run for a few days. See which adverts have the higher CTRs, and then remove the ones that don't.

You can keep repeating this method until you have an advert that rakes in 5% or even 10% CTR. Just keep altering the copy!

Matching Types

When selecting your keywords there are four different match types to choose from:

Keyword = broad match
[keyword] = exact match
"keyword" = phrase match
-keyword = negative match

Broad match
Allows your advert to show on similar phrases and relevant variations

Exact match
Allows your advert to show for searches that match the exact phrase

Phrase match
Allows your advert to show for searches that match the exact phrase exclusively

Negative Match
Doesn't trigger your advert for any search that includes that term

Try experimenting around with different matching options for keywords to see how it affects your quality score.

Keyword Optimisation

Other than the CTR of your adverts, the second most important part in gaining a high quality score is the keyword optimisation on the actual page of the website you're advertising.

If your keyword is "game fishing" make sure it appears in the meta title of the page, the meta description, the meta keywords. Make sure "game fishing" appears in the title tags (H1, H2, H3 etc), at least 2% in the main body and at least a handful of times in bold. Try to include the main keyword in the image alt tags too.

You may have to create different landing pages for each ad group in your campaign. Yes, this might take time to do, but you'll be rewarded with a high quality score!

Make Sure You're Relevant

The most fundamentally important aspect of any AdWords campaign is its relevancy between what it's advertising and what it's offering.

If you're offering a fishing solution, sell it to the fishermen and not to the people buying fish!

Don't bid on wide, generic keywords.

Drill down to find long-tail keywords that are in a niche. If it's not possible for your particular product then at least write targeted adverts.

Google rewards advertisers of relevant adverts with high quality scores. I get clicks for as low as $0.05 and sometimes lower in my AdWords campaigns because I have high QS.

Google's main aim is to provide search results that are relevant. That's why they have such complicated algorithms. The same principles apply for the AdWords program. Produce adverts that are targeted and you'll pay less and be shown more.

So go on, start implementing the steps above to get clicks for just $0.05!

All the best
Simon

P.S. If you get clicks for just $0.05 and your break even point is $1.75 CPC for a product that sells for $30, you'll be making $29 profit per sale!