Finding and Using the Right Keywords for AdWords

Tools for Generating Keywords

Before you start on your AdWords campaign you need to pay very close attention to the words that you are going to target. This is not as hit and miss as you may think as you will already have words that are obviously associated with your product or service and you can then use these to generate more. Wordtracker and Nichebot are two paid for subscription services that you can use to research keywords but there are also free services such as Keyword Discovery, Hit Tail and Wordtracker’s free tool, FreeKeyWords. Yahoo offered Overture but this is no longer supported and produces outdated data so best to be avoided. Of course Google offers a free keyword tool for AdWords as well, but I strongly recommend that you try several tools so you can gain a broader picture of the context within which you AdWords campaign is going to be operating.

A simpler and very effective method for generating keywords is to look at your competitors and see what they are using for their sites and especially the landing pages. If you take “mp3 download” as a search term you can then see what is ranking highly on the search results. Examining the pages of these high ranking sites will give you a wealth of keyword and key phrase data for complimentary search terms. Performing this manually is possible however time consuming and costly as a result. The answer is to use a comparison software tool such as IBP/Alexa which will run comparatives of your existing site against

the top ranking URL’s and identify the factors that are accounting for their high search engine rank and recommend steps for you to take. In relation to your AdWords campaign this will generate a large number of keywords and phrases with a relevant weighting that has been arrived at in an objective fashion and usefully presented.

Why should we be so concerned at generating different keywords for our AdWords campaign?

For a start think of the popularity of the keyword that first springs to mind with your product or service. If you are selling music downloads just consider how popular the terms “mp3” and “download” actually are and you will then gain an idea of the task in front of you to gain exposure. Not only does the very heavy search volume for these terms make them expensive ads you will also be competing with a myriad of other products and services offering themselves on the same page and revolving around these terms.

It makes sense to think laterally and move outside of the box. Here’s a good example of how a slight difference can make a huge impact. This is a search engine example rather than AdWords but the principle is the same. Place “supermarkets” in google.co.uk and you will see Sainsburys come up at the top of the page but if you drop the plural and place “supermarket” into Google you will see something very different – try it and see for yourself.

Mispellings

The point is that slight changes in the word you are using can dramatically affect the impact of how you appear. If there is a difference between singular and plural spellings, consider the differences between English and American spellings for your keywords. This is particularly relevant if you are a UK company selling to the North American market where there are not only different spellings but words also hold a different meaning – just consider the word “randy” and try not to snigger when you meet an American by that name.

Another consideration with selecting your keywords is to look at common misspellings of search terms. Many people do have an issue with their spelling and this is reflected in how they use a search engine. It is not only the deliberate misspelling that you should be considering but the vernacular that is being used by your target market so try this example with Google. Input “cars” and you will have a mainstream car search engine come up but try “carz” and you get something very different.

How Many Keywords Should You Use

Answering this question is rather like solving how long is a piece of string.

In setting the parameters for your AdWords campaign I believe in keeping a very tight rein on the number of keywords that are being used. AdWord campaigns tend to reap the greatest success when they are tightly focused on a relatively small number of carefully chosen keywords rather than simply using a shotgun scattering method that blows your marketing budget. By carefully monitoring the ROI on your campaign keywords you can change the balance of the keywords used and let your campaign evolve over it’s life.

How Does Google Match the Keywords?

Google provides four ways of using your keywords and though all are important I recommend you pay particular attention to the last – negative keywords.

Broad Match

This is Google’s default setting so if your ad group has within it the terms “mp3” and “download” then your ad will appear for any search that contains these terms no matter what order they are in and also a wide variety of variations. You may find your ad displayed if “upload” or “mp4” was used in the search term or anything that is broadly related to the keywords you have selected.

Phrase Match

This provides more control over when your ad will be displayed. If you use quotation marks and enter in your keywords “mp3 download” then your ad can be displayed when that phrase is used but not when “download mp3” is the search term nor when plurals or synonyms are used by the user.

Exact Match

This allows your ad to be displayed only when an exact match to your keywords is used. Placing brackets around the key phrase [mp3 download] will only allow the ad to be displayed when and only when “mp3 download” was the search term. If the user specifies other search terms or they are not in the right order then your ad will not be displayed so you can see immediately that this is the most targeted and focused tool for your campaign.

Negative Keywords

Now we have covered how Google is matching keywords but we are looking to maximise the click throughs that are from potential buyers of our product or service. This is where you need to be thinking outside of the box so consider the following.

Earlier we used an example “mp3 download” so it would seem obvious that we are going to be using “mp3” and “download” as two of our keywords. This means that if “download” appears in a search we may ave our ad placed up there in the hope of a click through. Sounds good except…..

What if the search used is “computer anti virus download” ?

Is someone looking for an anti virus download really a prospective customer for an mp3 download?

What if someone uses the search term “mp3 accessories” ?

Are we really looking to market a music download to someone who is actually looking for a new set of headphones?

The question becomes how to stop our ad from being displayed to searchers that are using a keyword we’ve specified but in fact have little prospect of clicking through and purchasing from our ad? The answer is to use negative words. Negative words act to block our ad from being displayed if one of the negative words we specify is used in the search.

So with our previous examples, if we input “-computer”, or “-accessories” in our AdWords keywords then the searches “computer anti virus download” and “mp3 accessories” would no trigger our ad display.

In short, negative keywords allow you to target you ads far more tightly and allow you to qualify your traffic to a much larger extent than simple keyword matching and this will avoid wasting your PPC budget.

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