Steps to make sure you can answer this question with yes.

Create a master login that has administrator access that will allow you to log into each account.

Make sure you can remove the login access of the current person managing the accounts, just in case your paid search manager fell of the Earth on bad terms.

Have your paid search manager create a master list of links and logins for all current accounts across all engines or directories.

Have the updated list sent to you on a regular basis and save it in a safe place that cannot be easily accessed.

Make sure you are familiar with logging into each engine or directory and the navigation of how to change passwords. Just in case you need to change them in a hurry.

Have your paid search manager send you copies of any updated custom reports and a quick update of reasoning behind recent changes applied. This will allow you to have a seamless transition to a new person in the eyes of the clients.

Upon the new release of the Google Adwords interface, you can see that it comes complete with ‘Opportunities’, including suggestions on keywords that could be added to your campaigns. At first glance, this seems to be nothing unique. Google has always given us free keyword suggestions, right? It seems that they simply put the keyword tool in the API to save us the step of going to our Favorites folder (or typing it into the browser). Well, there is a little more to it than that.

The new API gives you an option that reads ‘Increase traffic with these keywords’. You then have the option to go to the “Opportunities” portion of Adwords and to obtain pre-selected keywords that Google has already done the work on for you. You see, this is no longer a process of getting into a generalized keyword tool that is out there, this is different. It’s a much better ‘fit’ for your campaigns because it researches what keywords you already have and doesn’t duplicate your efforts. It breaks down keyword lists as according to the adgroups that you have already set up. Factors that it takes into consideration: budget, keywords, and previous campaign performance. This is truly customized to your account.

Each ad group is shown with an approximate search volume; this shows the estimated number of searches each month that match the new keywords proposed for your ad group. If you add all the keywords offered for that ad group, you could gain that number of potential searches.

When you select the relevant keywords that you would like added, you may save the draft for viewing later, or add immediately. This includes your preferred match types along with those keywords. 

At the chance of running into any keywords that are not a good fit, there is actually a ‘ratings’ column that allows you to notify the keyword tool. This helps the selection of keywords by the tool to do some refining to be a better fit for your account. It goes on 3 levels: keyword is fine, keyword is irrelevant to this adgroup, keyword is irrelevant to this account.

Another nice feature of this keyword tool is that it makes an attempt at giving you landing page suggestions at the keyword level. This is something to be reviewed carefully. My guess is that this isn’t perfected, I say this because many times the appropriate fields are left blank. These features are still new, but quite helpful.

One factor that I left out above is the CTR (click-through rate), as that’s one of the most important factors when Google is determining the Quality Score. This led to my curiosity as to why my keywords were assigned a Quality Score, even though they haven’t received any impressions yet.

Here’s the key, and here’s how Google assigns a Quality Score (even before keyword activation). Historical data. Other advertisers have used these keywords before, and Google is able to take an estimate from their performance and assign it a ’starting score’. Being that each account performs differently and according to their own dynamics, it’s likely that you will not stick with this initial scoring. It is simply the first step to your Quality Score.

So, lets say that you load your keywords and come to find that your starting Quality Scores are pretty low. This can be useful information for you. Google is indicating that these keywords have been used in the past, and there wasn’t much success with them. Of course, this doesn’t mean to ’scrap’ them, it simply means to keep an eye on them. On the other hand, if you see that your keywords are starting off with high scoring, Google is indicating that these keywords have had good performance in the past. Focus on these to perform well, and you can even go so far as to separate them into their own ad groups. It’s always a good idea to get your campaigns off to the best start possible!

The interesting fact is that the page with the more negative content is outperforming the other page. The page designs are only slightly different; the negative page has bolded bullets. Always remember that the page you think will perform the best may not always be what your searching audience is looking for and sometimes the only difference is one slight change.

I had a client once that was getting tons of hits but no conversions. All we did was simply change out the stock picture on that page from a man on a phone to a woman on a phone and the lead forms poured in. One small change can have a very different effect. Even if it is just a change in font, color of background or the color of your submit/order button. Never be afraid to test out different pages.

Step 1: Create a new report from the reporting tab.

Select Geographic Performance for the report type. Next select the level of detail you want to view under the settings. For this example I’m going to select Account level. Now here is where you will notice the only unit of time you can select is daily.

The date range is up to you, just select the most relevant time period you prefer to see the performance for. I have chosen the previous month for this example.

Add or Remove Columns, here is where you can choose what data you want to include in your report. I suggest you include Country/Territory, Region, Metro and City until you have a better feel for what area you want to narrow your reports down to. Also, select any conversion data you want to view if the account has conversion tracking in place.

Once you have clicked on Create Report and are returned back to the reporting page click on the name of your new report. You will see an Export Report button at the top of the report. Select the option for .csv (for Excel).

When you have the report exported and open you will see what seems to be just a mess of data. Save the messy report as an Excel Workbook so we can have some fun with a Pivot Table. Yes, I said Pivot Table, don’t get worried. I’ll walk you step by step if you have never worked with Pivot Tables before.

First click on Insert from the top menu, next click on PivotTable.

For your data range select all the columns in row 4 with data, then while holding down the shift key press the Ctrl button and the down arrow key. This should select all the data in the report from row 4 down.

Now select Impressions, Clicks, Avg CPC, Cost and the conversion data you want to include if applicable into the Values as the Column Labels.

You can leave Impressions, Clicks, Cost, Conversions and Total Conv. Value as Sum, you want the total tally of these on your report.

You can close the Pivot Table Field List at this point. I find it easier to edit the data and apply additional filtering if I copy the table and paste it into a new sheet.

Now here is a report that makes a little more sense. You can roll-up the geo locations to Country/Territory or Regions. You can also dress up the report a bit more to be more visual friendly. This is a good geographic performance report you can use to find which areas are performing best for a longer amount of time than daily. This report is also great for comparing PPC marketing efforts to any direct mail marketing campaigns.

This report can help you limit down your campaigns to only areas that generate a higher performance and reduce your spending over night for an almost instant increase in return.

1. How many keywords are you currently bidding on in your paid search campaigns?

2. How many of those keywords have had some type of conversion in the last 6 to 12 months?

3. Why are you still bidding on keywords that have not had any conversions?

This is one of the most common errors I find when our agency begins managing an existing paid search account for a new client. Would you keep betting on a horse if it continuously lost?

If you are not tracking conversions, bookmark this blog and come back in a month after you begin tracking conversions and read this again.