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AdWords Ad Rotation: How To Restore Even Ad Rotation (Workaround)

UPDATE November 2012:

The post below is about tricking Google AdWords into rotating your ads evenly.

But tricks are no longer necessary: AdWords now has a ‘rotate indefinitely’ option for people who are serious about ad testing.

Find this in your account under:

Campaign / Campaign settings / Advanced Settings / Ad delivery …then choose ‘Rotate indefinitely’.

AdWords Ad Rotation Workaround — Rotating ads is a key part of PPC optimisation:
Don’t let that stop in your AdWords account.

Old post follows———————-

Google surprised AdWords users in May this year with their announcement that AdWords ad rotation would automatically stop and favour only the ad with highest CTR, after the ads were active for 30 days.

This sounds reasonable to some people, but for people testing ads carefully based on conversion rate and cost per conversion, the change was a 3-alarm fire.

Now Google has announced a helpful back-step on the ad rotation policy. The even rotation period is extended from 30 to 90 days, and there is an opt-out form to prevent the change on your account altogether.

Google’s ad rotation settings will switch from ‘rotate’ to favor the ad with highest CTR, unless you take action. If you don’t want to opt out, and you want to restore even rotation on your ads after the 90 day period, it is not a huge problem.

The method below is tweaked and tested and works just fine…

How To Restore Even Ad Rotation on Active AdWords Ads

First of all, the easy answer: Pause, then un-pause your ads. This will reset the rotation perios and it will be another 90 days until your ads start to run on a ‘CTR-preferred’ basis.

But if you have hundreds or thousands of ads, pause/un-pause is not a really simple thing! AdWords Editor lets you pause/un-pause any number of ads, but you could easily get ‘lost’ in the editor, unable to find the right ads to enable after you pause them. This would be a disaster!

Not to worry. You can do it all in the live online AdWords interface in just a few minutes.

Create a backup of your account using AdWords Editor: Open AdWords Editor, click ‘Get recent changes’, complete the account download, review and approve changes as needed, then click File -> Export Backup -> Export whole account… then save the account backup in a secure place. If you have a disaster, this will help you restore the account to an earlier state.
In the online AdWords interface (not AdWords Editor), click the Campaigns tab at top, click ‘All online campaigns’ at left, then click ‘Ads’ in the second tabbed menu. Now you can see all of the ads in your account.
Click on the column heading for ad status; this will sort your ads based on their status. Active ads should appear at the top.
Go to the bottom of the page and see if all of your ads are shown; there might be multiple pages. Click on ‘Show rows’ and choose ‘500’ (the maximium value) so you can see as many of your ads as possible (if not all of them).
In the header row above your ads click on the select checkbox, to select all of your ads. Now look down nerar the bottom of the page – if there are any ads selected that are already paused, un-check those ones! This will prevent you from reactivating old ads that you don’t want running.
Now, with all of your active ads selected, above the header row click ‘Change status’ and choose ‘Paused’. Sounds scary, doesn’t it? Fortunately, (as of June 2011), after you pause the ads the interface will think for a few seconds, then update, and the same ads will still be selected.
Now don’t touch anything… simply go back to ‘Change status’ and choose ‘Active’. You’re done. The reactivated AdWords ads will rotate normally.
If you have more than 500 ads, you’ll need to do this page-by-page in lots of 500. Watch the bottom of your list on each new page, and eventually you’ll get to your paused ads. When this happens, be careful to select only the active ads on that page before applying the changes.

Now your AdWords ad rotation will run evenly for the next 90 days.

If you have any troubles – or successes – please drop me a note.

Relationship Marketing: How to become your client’s ‘service superhero story’

You already know more than you think about relationship marketing. The concepts of relationship marketing are so simple, it seems more like common sense than marketing advice.

Do you know a fantastic service provider who you trust and respect? A ‘service superhero’ who gives you everything you want and more? It might be a…

Relationship Marketing Superhero — Taking outstanding care of your clients = taking control of your business.

doctor,
dentist,
painter,
plumber,
banker,
mortgage broker,
real estate agent,
mechanic,
gardener,
massage therapist,
travel agent,
hotelier,
butcher,
baker,
candlestick maker?

You can probably think of a perfect example – a time when outstanding service really made you sit up and take notice. Perhaps you have a mental list with many examples.

You probably remember the name and details for that service provider. (On the other hand, can you remember the name of the mediocre lunch place you visited sometime last year?)

Now, have you ever told your ‘service superhero story’ to colleagues, friends or family members?

Here’s one of my stories:

I’ve visited a Brisbane physiotherapist named David Brentnall. His expertise helped me solve a shoulder injury that seemed like it would never mend. He communicated clearly and patiently. He was thorough and not rushed. His expert, reasoned advice enabled me to take charge of my own recovery. I was fixed-up in no time, with only three visits to his office (plus a lot of homework).

Later, when friends had physical problems and needed a physio, I firmly recommended David. I know that three of those friends became loyal, enthusiastic clients for David. My friends and I know that David’s rates are not the lowest, but that has zero importance for us. It is about quality of service, trust and expertise.

This is the back-and-forth, one-two punch of relationship marketing – in action.

One: Excellent communication, outstanding service, trustworthy advice, exceeding expectations, and a personal touch with a bit of education thrown in.
Two: Loyal repeat business, higher per-client value, new referrals, less price-sensitivity among your clients, growing revenue.

(The only down-side to my story is that, several years along, now it’s much harder to get an appointment with David.)

Are YOU the fabled service provider for any of YOUR clients?

If you have 50 clients today, and you gain true ‘superhero status’ in the minds of each and every client, in a couple of years your clientele will double. And your revenue will triple.

In the service industry this can be done with no advertising, no mailouts, no PR…

Now image adding a few extra leads on top of that with some good integrated marketing!

Get your superhero cape tailored. Focus on relationship marketing and build your business on a foundation of INCREDIBLE service.

Personal Stories Create Powerful Copywriting

Do your ads, websites, videos or newsletters seem too dull?

Are you sending messages that fall on deaf ears?

Adding a personal story to your copywriting transforms it into something powerful.

Cattle in live export issue — A name and a story helps your audience get involved with any topic.

Recently in Australia, media attention focussed on the plight of farm animals exported live to counties like Indonesia, where the animals are subjected to cruel treatment that is considered barbaric and illegal in western countries.

Live export has gone on for a long time, and animal rights activists have opposed it with little success. In May 2011, charity Animals Australia took video footage of what happens to these animals.

Then they did something very smart. This is a lesson to anyone communicating anything important:

A personal story helps your audience relate to your message.

It is a simple concept and it can be done very quickly. It is not easy to do it well. Animals Australia did it very well when they introduced Brian. In their video, we see a dark-brown steer standing wobbly on a slippery floor in a big room…

“It was hard not to fall in love with Brian. He was a big, affable steer who was trying his best to keep out of trouble.”

This short, simple introduction gives a character to our subject and helps us relate to him. Next we see the final minutes of Brian’s life unfold in an abbatoir supported by Australian Government investments.

Without the introduction, any sane person will find this video horrifying.

With the narrator’s introduction of Brian, the video evokes empathy that is almost unbearable for anyone who has compassion for living creatures.

The introduction places you in Brian’s shoes. It focuses you right down on the emotions of his situaton. It highlights his fear and suffering. As a viewer, you can’t remain detached from his story.

Cynics would say this is manipulative. They’d say cattle don’t have names for a reason.

I’d say it is powerful communication. And I’d say that Brian, suffering immoral abuse, deserved a name.

This is an example of an important communication and copywriting concept being used well, for a good cause. Let me repeat it:

A personal story helps your audience relate to your message.

Every message can be made better by helping people relate on a personal level.

Every service has a personal experience.

Every issue has a personal impact.

Every product has a personal benefit or interest.

Find the personal story in what you write about.

Make it clear and snappy. Whether you are writing about candy, candidates or caskets, adding personal to your message gives it the POWER it deserves.

Reference:

The video from Animals Australia is extremely disturbing.
Hopefully my description was clear enough.
I suggest you simply donate $30 to Animals Australia or your local SPCA and don’t watch the video.

How to Choose an Online Marketing Consultant

Trying to find good online marketing help is a nightmare.

Online marketing is full of self-promoters and tricksters. It is a field full of traps. Online marketing traps cost you money – without improving your revenue. How can you find online marketing advice you can trust?

There is no reliable protection for the customers of marketing consultants. But there are a few things you can watch for before you sign up…

Who’s calling?

Are you talking to an experienced marketer – or a fast-talking sales person? Companies like Australia’s Reach Local have a reputation: Lots of sales staff / undertrained and under-resourced marketing staff.

Last month I was approached by online marketing agency E-Channel. E-Channel’s salesman is not a marketer. He isn’t knowledgeable about AdWords. He didn’t do his homework and he didn’t understand my business. He bragged about technology that’s irrelevant to my business. He couldn’t find any landing page that his company built. He showed-off clients’ ads by clicking on them (spending the client’s money). His pitch fell flat and he couldn’t understand why. I won’t trust a marketing agency if they won’t send an experienced marketer to talk to me. (On top of all that, E-Channel’s sales guy was arrogant, rude and aggressive.)

On the other hand, I recently spoke to Crockford-Carlisle about direct response campaigns. Who did I speak to on the phone? Jerry Crockford. The owner. He was generous with his time and was happy to visit my office. He thought about my situation, asked the right questions and prepared a thoughtful proposal. That’s good business.

Are they trained?

I did some digging and found that E-Channel only has two AdWords-qualified people on staff. That’s not encouraging.

Google certification isn’t a guarantee you’ve found a smart online marketer. The exams are easy and affordable. But most online marketers stay certified and stay on top of the latest changes. If a marketing agency can’t bother to certify their staff, what else are they skipping?

You should see key staff information and credentials – on the website, on LinkedIn, somewhere. If there are no marketing credentials listed, are there legitimate recommendations or testimonials from real people?

Agencies that belong to bodies like the Australian Direct Marketing Association are bound by some standards. Belonging to a marketing industry organisation suggests – at least – that an agency is willing to mingle with its peers and to be seen in public. But it’s no guarantee.

Who owns the work?

Watch out for this! With a company like Reach Local, you hire them for a while, pay a bundle of money, back out later and find that they’ve nailed-down your campaigns so you can’t access anything – no keyword history, no ad history, nothing. In my opinion, this is criminal.

Every SEM consultant should work within your existing account and should treat the account like they are a privileged guest – not an owner or a pirate. Get this in writing.

When you pay for work, the work belongs to you. Full-stop.

How about a 2-wine lunch?

If your marketing consultant can afford to wine and dine you, you’re paying them too much.

Don’t hire an agency for your ego – hire it for your business. Go eat lunch with a real friend who’s not charging you for their time!

What about consulting fees?

Listen: Don’t get robbed. Be cautious and smart.

Some online marketers charge a percentage of your revenue or a percentage of your PPC budget. This smells.

Your AdWords account is an asset. If it creates profitable conversions, it is a valuable asset. It is YOURS.

Imagine your business…

Today: Annual budget $100,000. 5,000 conversions. Annual growth 10%.

With a consultant, after one year: Annual budget $110,000. Consulting fee 20% (eg. E-Channel) = $20,000. 6000 conversions.

You paid a consultant $20,000 for 500 conversions. The consultant gets 2X more than Google for those conversions – and you’re still paying Google.

YOU created 90% of the account’s value – did the consultant earn a slice of that?

“If the conversions are profitable, why not?” Here’s why: You could find an expert to do that work for you on a flat fee. And you might get some additional services with the deal.

Flat monthly fees seem harder to swallow because they aren’t directly linked to your turnover. But if you get a good package of services on a flat fee, it creates a clear business relationship that’s fair and easy to work with.

I worked at Marketing Results in Brisbane. It was a busy, challenging job with lots of pressure to learn and grow. Owner Will Swayne takes AdWords very seriously and he takes time to review clients’ situations personally. No percentage-scams here – Marketing Results clients get high-quality services for around $2000/month. Packages can include AdWords, landing pages, email campaigns, etc. They build nice websites for fair prices. They always think about clients’ ROI. No fluff like meetings, lunches and brand-image workshops. (Full disclosure: I used to work there, but I don’t receive anything from them now.)

Get a guarantee.

This is not a popular thing with marketers.

Consulting is hard work and clients expect a lot. Some clients have dysfunctional businesses and expect a marketer to create profit out of thin air – while nothing at the business changes. Clients expect consultants to turn a sow’s-ear-business into a silk purse full of cash.

But that’s life as a consultant! If your consultant won’t stand behind their work somehow, don’t trust them.

Good luck in the online marketing minefield!

PS: A theme I’ve noticed in marketing agencies: Small agencies = better value and more accountability.

Sneaky SEO Mistakes Can Be a Disaster for Your Business

Even huge businesses make suicidal SEO mistakes

Google gets angry when people try to manipulate its search results. Sneaky SEO mistakes made US retail giant JC Penney disappear from Google pages on most of their keywords…

You’d guess that a retail leader like JC Penney has top-notch SEO to promote their website. In Google’s search results in the US, JC Penney’s dominance was overwhelming competitors. Until last week.

New York Time reporters were interested in JC Penney’s unbeatable #1 rank for thousands of keywords, so they looked under the surface. What they found was a lot of sneaky link building.

JC Penney (or their SEO consultant) paid people to create big networks of links pointing to the JC Penney website. They were careful to use good link text with keywords included. This helped put their site on top of Google’s results for countless keywords about common products.

But JC Penney didn’t ‘earn’ the links with good content; they paid people to create links. Those links are on websites that have no relevance to JC Penney’s products. They had links about down comforters placed on sites about Chinese medicine and rural real estate.

Google manually ‘punished’ JC Penney. The company will take a big hit in their online results and they got a lot of bad press as well.

Lessons for all of us:

Know what your SEO person is doing.
Use Google Webmaster Tools and review your incoming links.
Don’t try to trick Google. Focus on good content, use of keywords, structure and navigation, internal linking, good link text and legitimate links from relevant sites.
Follow Google’s guidelines on link schemes.

UPDATE:

Magazine giant Forbes has been caught contributing to the other side of the paid link problem. Google is slapping them down for putting paid links with SEO link text onto pages with unrelated content. More on Forbes’ paid links at Search Engine Roundtable.

Improve Your SEO Game: Google Webmaster Tools Makes Good SEO Easier

Here’s an excellent, practical presentation about using Google Webmaster Tools to focus on core keywords and objectives to get more profit from your website.

Important basic SEO tips here include using meta descriptions to control how your pages appear in Google’s organic listings, plus…

ensuring each page has a unique title and description,
checking internal link density for high-priority pages,
spotting irrelevant or undesirable search queries being associated with your pages (around 04:00), and
checking for problems on your site using ‘Fetch as Googlebot’.

These are all simple, powerful items that help you stay on top of SEO for your website.

Presenter Maile Ohye is not only a Tech Lead at Google, but an excellent presenter and speaker. I wonder if she wants a job in Australia?

How To Add Social Media Links To An Email or Blog

Boost exposure and web traffic: Add social network links to your emails, blog and web pages.

Any email you send is a chance to get web exposure on Facebook, Twitter and other social networks. Along the way, you can also get more eyes to your website.

You can make social networks work hand-in-hand with your email marketing and website content—it is easy!

Here’s how to add links for sharing on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn…

First, let’s look at two common mistakes in linking from emails:

Mistake #1: Send complete stories or ‘stand-alone’ emails. An email that includes an entire story and no links is a ‘dead-end’ communication.
Instead of sending a dead-end email, you can just show the story’s first two paragraphs (your job: make them awesome paragraphs!). Then give your reader a hyperlink leading to the rest of your story—which is located at your website or blog.

When someone clicks through to your site, you’ve got a better opportunity to connect with them—there is a lot more content at your website than in your email!

If your story is short, sometimes it’s okay to include the whole story in your email—but don’t leave it at that! Add social media buttons in your email so people can share the story (located on your website) without the original reader actually going to your website. (Remember, in this case your email story is repeated at your website, on its own page or post.)

A good rule-of-thumb for writing those ‘teaser’ paragraphs: The main purpose of each sentence = to make the reader want to read the next sentence… then the next sentence… then click the link to your website.

Mistake #2: Link directly to your social media profile page. Social networks are all about sharing. If someone likes a certain page on your site or your blog and they click a Facebook link, then it takes them to your profile page, you might create a ‘disconnect’. Is your profile page related to the post that caught their interest? At your profile page, will they find enough there to keep them interested or get them to share with friends?
Instead of always linking to your profile page, mix it up! You can link directly to the social networks’ sharing tools. This helps your readers to spread the word whenever they see a specific item they like.

Now, let’s build a few social sharing links:

We’ll use this blog post as our example—here’s the URL:

http://www.netgain.net.au/how-to-add-social-media-links-to-an-email/

Remember—the links we create can be added to an email AND to a web page or blog.

Add a Facebook sharing link

http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u=http://www.netgain.net.au/how-to-add-social-media-links-to-an-email/

When they click, your readers will link right into Facebook, ready to share your link. Facebook automatically adds the title, excerpt and an image with the shared link.

Add a Twitter sharing link

http://twitter.com/share?text=Boost exposure and web traffic using social network links in your emails.&url=http://www.netgain.net.au/how-to-add-social-media-links-to-an-email/

Note that the part after ?text= is your text that will be inserted into the tweet, so users don’t need to type a description unless they want to change the sample you provide. You can write anything you want, but you have only about 118 characters, including spaces (plus the 20 characters Twitter will use for the URL—you have 140 characters in total).

Twitter automatically provides a short version of your URL for the tweet. In this example, the tweet looks like this:

Eight Evil Myths About Improving SEO and Getting to Page One on Google http://t.co/DVAwhoE

Important tip: Edit URLs in Notepad or another simple text (or HTML) editor. Programs like Microsoft Word can add unexpected bits of code.

Add a LinkedIn sharing link

This one is more complicated than Facebook or Twitter.

Here’s the format:

http://www.linkedin.com/shareArticle?mini=true&url={articleUrl}&title={articleTitle}&summary={articleSummary}&source={articleSource}

LinkedIn is very finicky about the format of this link. Using a WordPress blog, for example, you must get EVERY bit exactly right to avoid an error page on LinkedIn. Note that:

you don’t include the {brackets},
you must include %20 for all spaces, and
include %3A for the colon in a web address.

Here’s my example (I’ve broken this into separate lines so you can see the elements more clearly):

http://www.linkedin.com/shareArticle
?mini=true
&url=http%3A//www.netgain.net.au/how-to-add-social-media-links-to-an-email/
&title=Using%20social%20network%20links%20in%20your%20emails
&summary=A%20great%20article%20for%20email%20marketing%20and%20social%20media
&source=Net%20Gain%20Marketing

For more detailed instructions, LinkedIn has an info page on linking.

Don’t use ‘naked’ hyperlinks: Use linked text

Now that you’ve got your social media links ready, don’t just stick those long, ugly URLs into your email or blog. Use linked text, like this:

Share on Facebook

Share on Twitter

Share on LinkedIn

Or better still…

Add social media icons to your web page or email

It is easy to insert social network logo (icon) images and link them, like this:

Facebook

Twitter

How did I do that?

I just inserted a 3-cell table so I could control the layout and spacing of the icons,
inserted an image into each cell,
then added a hyperlink to each image—the same hyperlinks we created above. Done.

Happy linking!