Tag: google adwords

MixRank: see your competitors’ most successful ads


 

 
Do you have competitors who advertise online? What a stupid question. Yes, of course you do. If you want to get the most out of your advertising, you need to be acutely aware of what your competitors are doing. You’ve probably got at least several dozen competitors, all constantly creating, testing, and optimizing ads and buying space on new websites. If you can find out what’s working well for your them, you should probably try it yourself.
 

Detail on a banner ad being run by Shopify.com.
 
MixRank gives you data on where your competitors are advertising and which ads are working the best. Just go to MixRank.com and type in any keyword or company URL to get a full competitive report. You can see search ads, display ads, basically anything that runs on Google (and they’ll be adding more ad networks soon).

Let your competitors spend the money to figure out what works best and then reap the rewards of their trial & error.

We’re not encouraging you to plagiarize your competitors’ ads (you’re better than that), but if your ads are under-performing (which you found out by going to MixRank), you might be able to look at your competitors’ best-performing ads get some insight into what’s resonating with your target audience. And if a competitor is getting an insane CTR on a website that you don’t currently advertise on, or with a keyword you’re not using, well then maybe you should start.
 

Detail on Shopify.com’s text ad performance.
 
Best of all, dear Internet people, MixRank is totally free. If you want to get serious, you can upgrade to MixRank’s paid version and get a helluva lot more data on your competitors.

May the best ads win!
 

1 Comment by on January 26, 2012
filed in Advertising Help & Advice
tagged , ,

Time for Self-serve Ad Platforms to Circle the Wagons?


 
Today ADOTAS.com saw fit to let me weigh in on the security and liability implications of Google’s apparent $500 million settlement with the Justice Department.

I doubt the self-serve ad world is going to come crashing down under pressure from government lawsuits, but it should give everyone a reason to ponder the implications of taking money from sleazy advertisers. With money at risk, self-serve ad platforms, and the online advertising world in general, may be a bit more judicious in choosing their clients and passing on the shady ones.

I think overall, a purging of scammy advertisers would be good for online advertising. It would raise the overall image that online advertising has. Despite some people’s privacy concerns, online advertising still has a tremendous amount of untapped potential to efficiently target the right ads and offers to the right people at the right time in the right place, and so on and so forth (as opposed to television, which gushes a never-ending stream of irrelevant, tacky ads no matter what your individual buying habits are).

With a lower proportion of shady ads, you might also see people click on ads more often. Any market economist will tell you, there’s nothing like trust to grease the wheels of commerce, and a lack of trust to bring everything to a screeching halt. If retail banking were like the internet, you could never be very sure whether a bank branch was just a phony facade trying to sell you counterfeit Certificates of Deposit. But it’s not. Why? Because of strict government regulation and the threat of punishment if banks engage in criminal behavior.

I’m indifferent to the particular case against Google…I have no idea whether Google did anything wrong. But if government oversight makes it easier for my company to make a legitimate buck on the web, then I’m all for it.

Anyway, go and read the column here.
 

No Comments by on May 17, 2011
filed in News and Updates, Press Coverage
tagged , , ,

How do I get Google to review my banner ads?


 
When you create a new Campaign or Ad Group in Google AdWords and upload banner ads, they are immediately given the status of being “under review.” Presumably this is so that Google can ensure that your banner ads aren’t deceptive, malicious, broken, or just plain too obnoxious.

However, in our experience, this “under review” status is perpetual—that is to say, the ads are never reviewed. This strikes us as odd, but we don’t pretend to understand Google’s inner workings.

So…how do you get your banner ads out of “Under Review Purgatory?” What we’ve found works well is to log a support ticket—this usually clears the situation right up.

How to contact Google so they will review your ads:

  1. While logged in, click the ‘help’ link in the upper right of the Google AdWords website.
  2. A new window will pop up. At the very bottom of this window, click the link that says ‘Contacting us.’
  3. Click ‘Ad Visibility, Approvals, and Performance’ along the left side.
  4. In the sub-section that appears, click ‘Ad Approvals and Policies.’
  5. In the sub-sub-section that appears, click ‘How long does it take for my ad to be approved?’
  6. On the right, you will see a link that says ‘Email AdWords Support.’ Click it.
  7. Fill out the fields (you will be asked for Campaign and Ad Group names) and hit ‘Submit.’
  8. This usually fixes the problem and gets your ads reviewed (and hopefully approved) within about 24 hours.

Questions? Contact us.
 

1 Comment by on January 24, 2011
filed in Ad Networks, Uncategorized
tagged ,

How to geo-target your banner ads in Google AdWords

If you run a car dealership in San Francisco, California, you don’t want your ads to be seen by people in Atlanta, Georgia or Paris, France.

Google AdWords lets you select the countries, regions, and cities where you want to show your ads. It’s easy.

First, go to the ‘Settings’ tab for your banner ad campaign and find the ‘Edit’ link to modify your geographic target:


 
A window will pop up. Check the boxes for all the places you don’t want your ad to appear. If you only want to show ads in one city, this might take a minute or two. The example below shows what you’ll see if you exclude everywhere except the San Francisco, CA metro region:


 
And that’s it. Run some tests to see if geo-targeting improves your campaign results. Try making your banner ads more relevant by designing them for specific regions.

Or even if you sell a product or service nationwide, pay close attention to where your ads are being shown. For instance, you may not want to advertise your line of cross-country skiing equipment in Florida.

Questions? Just email us.
 

No Comments by on December 5, 2010
filed in Ad Networks, Advertising Help & Advice
tagged , , , , , ,

Now that I’ve created my real estate ad, where do I run it online?

You’ve done the smart thing and created a real estate ad using Canned Banners. Now what?

There are some great options to get your banner ad seen by local home buyers. Here’s a few ideas to get you started:

Zillow.com

Home buyers use Zillow to search for homes, mortgages, and real estate advice. It’s a perfect target audience. You can target your ad based on ZIP code, which will ensure that only home buyers in your area see your ads.

Go here to get started: www.zillow.com/advertising/Agent.htm
 

Local news websites

The local news websites that you choose all depend on your area. For instance, if you want to find home buyers in the San Francisco Bay Area, you might consider advertising on SFGate.com, a local news website that gets millions of visitors every month.

You’re not just limited to newspaper websites. You can probably advertise on local TV and radio station websites, independent newspaper sites, and local blogs.

To get started, try a simple Google search like “san francisco news.”
 

Retargeting networks


Retargeting shows ads to your website visitors after they’ve left your website. If someone comes to your website and browses around for a few minutes, but leaves without contacting you, you can use retargeting to make sure they keep seeing your ads.

To get started, read this blog post we wrote about retargeting for real estate agents.
 

Google AdWords

Google AdWords lets you advertise with banner ads, not just boring little text ads. You’ll only pay when someone clicks your ad, usually somewhere between $0.50 and $1.50 per click (or more…it really depends on your campaign settings).

To get started, go to adwords.google.com and create an account. Then when you’re building your campaign, go to your ‘Campaigns’ tab along the top. Then click the ‘Ads’ tab:


 
Then select ‘Image ad’ from the ‘New ad’ button:


 
Then you’ll be able to upload the banner ads you created with Canned Banners. Make sure to upload the banner ad SWF files—these are the animated, interactive files.

In order to make sure your ads are being targeted at the right people, choose keywords that are unique to your area. For example, in San Francisco, you could choose keywords like ‘san francisco real estate,’ ‘san francisco real estate agent,’ or ‘noe valley real estate.’ Or read our blog post on how to target specific cities.
 

Questions?

Got more questions about online real estate advertising? Just email us.
 

1 Comment by on December 4, 2010
filed in Advertising Help & Advice
tagged , , , , , , , , ,
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