adCenter Tutorial Part 4 – Match Types
From what I’ve read in the past, one of the more controversial aspects of PPC methodologies has to do with search network keyword match types. Since the merger of Yahoo! Search Marketing and MSN adCenter, the match types are exactly the same as those offered on Google AdWords: Broad, Phrase, and Exact. YSM was limited to just two and I often had difficulty remembering how the functioned exactly. Being so accustomed to how AdWords did things, it was a little confusing to use another PPC search engine that had a different syntax. Fortunately, things are now a bit more consistent after the “BingYoo” merger.
However, if you’ve read the previous posts in this series, you should know that assuming the AdWords and adCenter operate pretty much a like is to your detriment.
Though things on the outside may appear almost identical, things under the hood are constructed very differently. Keyword match types on adCenter do function very much the same as those on Google AdWords, at least with respect to the phrase and exact match types. If you’re not familiar with PPC keyword match types there a very good tutorials on this subject both on the AdWords and adCenter help pages.
Where I feel that the use and behavior of match types diverges is with respect to the Broad match type.
Let’s take a look at the use of the Broad match type on the adCenter Search Network first. In the first two installments of this series I focused on the difficulties of getting any kind of significant search volume from this network and discussed the need to use both long tail and broader keyword phrases based on the adCenter Keyword Tool results. This same strategy follows into my use of Broad match keywords – at least when initially building Search N/W campaigns.
This is where the controversy often creeps into the debate regarding using Broad match, at least on Google AdWords. The argument contends that you’re just wasting your ad spend bidding on what are essentially untargeted and some times even completely irrelevant keyword searches. As a result, many advertisers start out with only Phrase and Exact match keywords when launching Search N/W campaigns.
I can certainly understand the rationale for this approach, but I then need to counter with: “yeah but, what about keyword level tracking?” Now it does come down to how willing you are to babysit newly launched PPC campaigns and watching out for among many other things, what keywords you’re campaigns are getting clicks for. I know this is something I certainly do and I think it comes with the territory.
The reason I’m more inclined to start with all three match types in my adCenter campaigns is because I want to get as many impressions as I can. Heaven knows, that there are so few to begin with on this network. Now this certainly doesn’t mean that I’m willing to burn up cash without any regard to ROI. Nothing could be further from the truth. What I’m looking for at this stage of a campaign is which keywords are generating the bulk of the click volume and candidates for negative keywords.
The Broad match keyword searches produce both a nice list of negative keywords that I can add at either the campaign or adgroup level in adCenter as well as suggestions for additional keywords to add in as Phrase and Exact match types into my adgroups. There’s no need to create any further Broad match keywords from these variations.
With regards to the behavior of the Broad match type on adCenter, I’ve found it to be much more wide open than the corresponding match type on AdWords. Beyond getting your ads displayed for searches that simply have the base keyword(s) in them, you will also get some completely off the wall searches that are very unrelated to the base keyword phrase. Again, this is where a good tracking system comes into play.
From the adCenter Help Page:
Broad match can expand to include words that are closely related to your keywords. For example, a search query for red carnation might result in your ad being displayed, because adCenter automatically identifies carnation as a type of flower. Use broad match to expose your ads to a wider audience.
If you start getting too many untargeted searches for you Broad keywords and it’s not practical to filter them out using negative keywords, then it’s time to disable the Broad match type for these keywords. The way adCenter handles “pausing” match types is vastly different than AdWords and can bite you in the rear if you’re not careful. Make certain that you understand how this works in adCenter by reviewing their help pages on this topic.
My goal with any PPC campaign regardless of the network is to start out inefficiently and then get to a break even point as quickly as possible using my tracking stats. Ultimately, I strive to pare down the number of keywords in my ad groups to a mere handful of converting keywords with most consisting of Exact match with perhaps a few Phrase matches in the mix. I find sometimes that the Phrase match keywords will have a lower CPC on adCenter while still being triggers for Exact match searches hence yielding a better bang for my ad buck.
In future posts in this series I’ll discuss topics that were only touched on in this one such as tracking platforms, negative keywords, ROI tracking, and campaign optimization.
