Yahoo Search Marketing - Changes to TOS

Yahoo Search Marketing recently made what seems to be a drastic change to their Terms of Service. These new terms were sent out to all advertisers via email. Continued use of YSM services after June 13, 2008 constitutes acceptance of these new modified terms.

So What Actually Changed?

The new changes to the Yahoo Search Marketing TOS, listed ¾ of the way down the new TOS, seems to allow Yahoo to make any "Optimization" changes to your account without prior approval. According to a Yahoo Service Rep, this is supposed to help smaller advertisers who want to spend $100 a day, but are only able to spend $20 a day. To me it seems like Yahoo is saying, we know your business better than you, so if we feel the need to change adverts or add/delete key phrases we are going to do so. This new TOS change also seems to be targeted at the small advertisers as all those "not bound by an Insertion Order" meaning corporations and large companies with big budgets will not be affected. Below is the actual paragraph in question from the new TOS.

"OPTIMIZATION. In the U.S. only, for those advertisers not bound by an Insertion Order, we may help you optimize your account(s). Accordingly, you expressly agree that we may also: (i) create ads, (ii) add and/or remove keywords, and/or (iii) optimize your account(s). We will notify you via email of such changes made to your account(s), and can also include a spreadsheet of such changes upon your written request. If you would like any of such changes reversed, please reply to such email within 14 days of the change(s), and we will make commercially reasonable efforts to reverse the change(s) you specifically identify. Notwithstanding the foregoing, you remain responsible for all changes made to your account(s), including all click charges incurred prior to any reversions being made. It is your responsibility to monitor your account(s) and to ensure that your account settings are consistent with your business objectives."

What do I do

To keep an eye on any unwanted activity I suggest exporting your entire campaign, key phrases, adverts, landing pages, etc. into a spreadsheet and periodically checking for changes that could have been made by Yahoo. If you have any daily budget parameters that you are not currently meeting, I suggest you lower them unless you want Yahoo to spend the rest.

Email or Call to Opt Out?

You are able to email or call Yahoo to opt out of any unwanted changes. Tell them you want to "Opt Out" of the new "Optimization" changes in the TOS. I called Yahoo Support (1-866-924-6676) and was able to opt out of all "non-insertion" accounts within 15 minutes by supplying the username and password for all E-Power Marketing managed accounts. However conflicting stories from WebmasterWorld.com forum members leads me to believe that email/phone call or not, if Yahoo wants to make the changes they just might.

This may not seem like a big deal to some? and the intent may be inherently good, but for those advertisers that are affected and don't even know it, Yahoo may be crossing the line. Good intentions or not.

What happened to transparency? Why bury these changes in an unbelievable long TOS email?

Will two problematic search portals figure out how to do it right again? MSN and YAHOO!

From about 2001 to 2003 Google, Yahoo and MSN split the search market almost evenly. Since then Google has grabbed the lion's share of search traffic, while Yahoo and MSN lost searchers big time. Market share statistics vary due to whether the measurement is total portal traffic or search traffic. From E-Power's view, Google is somewhere around 70% of search marketing share. Yahoo is in the teens and MSN has single digit market share. How the once mighty have fallen!

E-Power believes Google took market share because it generates the best search results, while Yahoo and MSN delivered too many irrelevant search returns.

Can Yahoo/MSN meet the challenge to improve their search results?

Or will the two join the search engine scrapheap next to Excite, AltaVista, Infoseek and Lycos?

For years Yahoo was the premiere search engine with the best search results. It was King of Search!

Yahoo's search results suffered because it allowed black arts SEO such as IP cloaking ? if the Website was willing to pay fees through the Paid Inclusion Search Submit Pro program. Consequently many questionable search results appeared at the top.

So while Google was tracking searcher behavior to let the searchers determine the most relevant search results, Yahoo was allowing dirty SEO tricks - for a price. This provided short-term monetary gain, while degrading Yahoo's search results, thus causing a long-term drop in search traffic.

Yahoo's cash generator, Yahoo Search Marketing PPC, has become a pain to deal with. The paperwork for large programs is time-consuming and the customer service is lacking when compared with Google AdWords. Plus Google AdWords tools that measure, track and improve your program are far superior to Yahoo's.

MSN's search integrity seemed to wane around the time Daniel Feussner was director of operations for Microsoft US-Speech Engineering Services and Retrieval Technology in 2001-2002. Feussner stole around $9 millions in Microsoft software. He used the money for many luxuries ? a Ferrari 355 Berlinetta, a Jaguar Vanden Plas, a Humvee, diamond rings and a 51-foot yacht named the Brazilian Queen. Feussner posted pictures of his toys on his Website. He committed suicide before being brought to trial.

I always felt that the Feussner case said a lot about Microsoft. Why are its top decision-makers not the best and the brightest, with some common sense? Does being a monopoly make you competitively weak in markets where you are not a monopoly?

MSN went downhill, even abandoning its own search engine to use Yahoo's Inktomi. MSN Live returned with a search engine built on the old. Many times MSN?s search results will return 10 year old web pages. On a better note, it is improving. But it still doesn?t have search results as relevant as Google's.

That is the key.

Can MSN/Yahoo develop a search engine at least as good as Google? They can learn from Google. They can stop the nonsense from SEO black arts that no longer plague Google.

To do so, the MSN/Yahoo decision-makers need to not pursue quick money over long-term excellence. Google did not become this good overnight. MSN/Yahoo's #1 priority must be delivering the most relevant search results. Do that, then market share and revenues will follow.

Optimizing AdWords ROI - Google Analytics #3

Do you use Google AdWords? How do you measure your programs success? Well if you use Google AdWords and you don?t measure any performance metrics than now is a good time to setup Google Analytics on your site. Once you set up Google Analytics on your site configure it to measure your Google AdWords programs.

How do I set Google Analytics to Measure Google AdWords?

Well first off if you already have a Google AdWords account, the best place to set up Google Analytics is through Google AdWords. Doing this links your AdWords and Analytics data automatically which saves you the time of tagging all your PPC landing pages URL's.

1) Log into your Google AdWords account and click on the Analytics tab in the interface.

2) Choose "Create My Free Analytics" account.

3) Fill in Website and URL and Choose an Account name.

4) Before completing set up make sure the two radio buttons "Destination URL Auto-tagging" and "Apply Cost Data" are checked.

The last step listed is the one that will help you optimize Google AdWords ROI in Google Analytics. The reports within Google Analytics will show you cost data for each key word you buy as well as your specified performance indicators or goals. Just make sure you have set up Google Analytics Goals so you can properly measure AdWords performance.

Measuring your Site Targeted Campaign on Google

Previously Google introduced the two new PPC Beta Features; cost per click site targeting and Pay Per Action. The cost per click site targeting beta feature was much anticipated and allowed the advertiser to handpick sites within the Google Content Network that they wanted their ads to appear on. However, until recently there was no real ability to see how this new feature was performing as Google failed to give the advertiser the ability to properly track the cost per click site targeting campaigns. That is until recently. Google now offers what is known as a Placement Performance Report. This report, available in your Google AdWords reporting center, allows the advertiser to view site-by-site performance metrics for cost per click site targeting campaigns.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What Does that Mean to the Advertiser?

Improved ROI through greater transparency of your Google AdWords Content Network statistics of course. Before site targeting the advertiser was only allowed to see a general summary of what was going on in their content network campaign. Sure you could see the average cost per click, amount of clicks and cost per conversion from this general summary, but this gave you little insight into which actual site or domain was giving you the best results. And with little insight into specific performance, optimization efforts could not be properly measured.

With the new Placement Performance Report you can see which individual site or domain is or is not yielding results. This give the advertiser the ability to optimize his or her campaign based on individual site statistics. Is one site not performing? Try a new ad, lower your CPC or try targeting different key phrases. If you continue to see poor results than you know that this site is not where your market tends to hang out. If you have found a site that is delivering a positive ROI, then look into increasing your ad exposure on this site by designing a more appealing ad, looking into utilizing other PPC Optimization techniques, or just raising your cost per click to gain a higher position.

So take advantage of the new Placement Performance Reports offered in your Google AdWords report center. And remember, Pay Per click Results are Measurable. Coupled with proper optimization this can lead to a healthy campaign that yields a positive ROI.

Yahoo Launches Quality Based Pricing for their Content Match Product

Why is Yahoo Search Marketing introducing Quality Based Pricing for their Content Match product? Is Yahoo Search Marketing struggling to get advertisers to use their Content Match product? If so, why? And will this new Quality Based Pricing drive more advertisers to use the Content Match product? Before we delve into those questions, let's do a quick overview of the Quality Based Pricing and Content Match product.

The new Quality Based Pricing is an initiative by Yahoo Search Marketing to draw more advertisers into using their Content Match product. The Content Match product is a distribution network of independent sites that display Yahoo Search Marketing ads for a percentage of the click fee. This is known as Yahoo's Partner Network. The new quality based Content Match pricing is now going to be "based on conversion rates and other measurements of the ability to deliver more interested and valuable customers to you from particular distribution partner sites." Yahoo is saying that they will "help enhance the quality, potentially reduce the cost and increase the value of traffic to you." Is this the answer?

Is Yahoo Search Marketing struggling to get advertisers to use their Content Match product?

Rolling out this new pricing model says to me that, "Yes, Yahoo is struggling to get advertisers to use their Content Match product." But is this new pricing model the answer? No. The real solution to getting you more targeted traffic lies in how Yahoo targets their ads on Partner Network sites. The reason we do not use Content Match with out clients is because Yahoo's technology can not properly place ads alongside relevant content. We don't see the value in having an ad targeting "small blue widgets" showing up alongside content for "large pink gizmos." There is also no value paying a few pennies less for this poorly targeted ad. So no, this new Quality Based Pricing is not the answer we are looking for. Better targeting is, and until Yahoo implements this or allows us more flexibility with their Partner Network, we will not be using the Content Match product.

In a previous blog post I applauded Yahoo when they introduced their Panama Update, which included ranking based on price, and more important, ad quality. Yahoo took another step in the right direction when they allowed for separate Content Match bids which allowed the advertiser to bid less on these Content Match sites. The next steps in improving the Content Match product should be better targeting and allowing the advertiser the opportunity to pick individual sites with the Partner Network to advertise on.

Are Pay Per Click Results Measurable?

Yes! That is the beauty of Pay Per Click Advertising. The major PPC advertising venues supply you with a variety of tools to measure your return on investment. The tools vary slightly in name and look across the three major PPC Engines (Google AdWords, Yahoo Search Marketing and Microsoft AdCenter) but they all offer similar measurements.

Your 1st line of measurement is usually offered in the form of a campaign summary or dashboard that shows you what is going on in your campaigns. These summary pages allow you to see your account status and budget as well as several performance metrics including clicks, impressions, cost per clicks, conversions, monthly spend etc. Basically a quick snapshot of what?s going on.

More detailed reports are also available in the major PPC engines reporting centers. These reports will tell you almost anything you want to know about your campaigns. Want to know how much you spent yesterday at noon? Run a report to find out. Want to compare weekly conversion rates vs. weekend conversion rates. No problem run a report and find out. Want to see which ad has a better click through rate, or better yet which landing page leads to the most conversions? You guessed it, run a report and find out? I could go on listing report scenarios for pages. Instead I will just show you a screenshot from the Google AdWords report center that shows some of the options you have when it comes to reporting.

These are just some ways to measure the success, yes I said success, of your PPC campaigns. With proper optimization and proper monitoring your PPC campaign should be yielding a positive ROI whether it be in sales, signups, leads or any other actionable goal.

Google Introduces Two New Pay Per Click Beta Features

That's right, Google rolled out two new features for Google AdWords, but only allowed a select few to participate. Google maintains that this is done to learn from the beta test and then to adjust from there. So what exactly are the two new Beta Features for Google AdWords?

Cost Per Click Site Targeting

Well the first beta feature was rolled out in mid March. This feature allows you to create cost per click (CPC) site targeted campaigns. This feature is added to the current cost per thousand (CPM) site targeted campaign that you have the option of creating. What's the difference? Well both allow you to hand pick websites within Google's content network where you would like your ad to appear. Both allow you to set a maximum price you are willing to pay. The difference comes into play because the CPM method charges you based on the number of impressions your ad receives, regardless of clicks and the CPC method charges you every time your ad is clicked. You can read more about the site targeting features.

Should I Choose CPC or CPM?

If you are looking for measurable results I suggest testing both the CPM and CPC site targeted campaigns to see which yields the most favorable ROI. The best thing about site targeted campaigns is they allow you to target individual sites within Google's content network as opposed to opting into the entire network when setting up a normal key word targeted campaign. If you were not seeing favorable results when opted into the entire content network, give the site targeted campaigns a try.

Pay Per Action

The other beta test for Google AdWords is the Pay Per Action. This new pricing model, which was rolled out in beta on March 20, 2007, allows you to pay for completed actions that you define. These completed actions could be sales, newsletter or white paper sign ups, leads or even views of a key page. These new Pay Per Action ads are only shown within the content network. The ad formats supported are image and text ads along with the new text link ad format which are brief text link descriptions that re displayed within the content of the chosen site and look like regular hyperlinks. Read more about and sign up for the Pay Per Action model and beta test.

Why Should I Try These New Features?

If you have done all you can to Optimize Your Current PPC Campaigns and have not been able to grow your traffic or increase your conversions, then these two new features can provide you with a new avenue to improve your ROI. Picking individual sites used by your target audience can help increase traffic and conversions, as long as you do it properly.

Should you be Worried About Click Fraud?

Well first off lets discuss what click fraud is. Click fraud happens in Pay Per Click advertising when a person, computer or automated script clicks on an ad for the purpose of generating revenue without having any interest in the actual ad. Huh? Well basically someone displays your Pay Per Click ads on their website and they figure out ways of clicking on those ads, in turn generating money for themselves, without search engines realizing the clicks were fraudulent. Or to put it in even more basic terms, someone is scamming the money you are using for Pay Per Click advertising.

Well Should You Be Afraid?

Yes, you should definitely worry about click fraud, it does happen and the major pay per click search engines (Google, MSN, Yahoo) have finally admitted this. Funny, all it took was a lawsuit against Google and one against Yahoo and now they are being proactive about disclosing click fraud data.

What Are Search Engines Doing About Click Fraud?

Google recently released information about Invalid Clicks saying that less than 10% of all pay per click traffic is fraudulent. However, they state that they do know about this fraud so they refund the advertisers this money, in most cases before the advertiser is even charged for the click. Google also refunds you even if you have been charged for fraudulent clicks. Most advertisers don't know this is even happening, but if you open up your Google AdWords account and check your billing summary you might notice something on your statement that looks like this - "Adjustment ? Click Quality". This is just Google's way of saying; hey we are looking out for you, here is some of your money back. However, Google also states that about.02% of click fraud does go completely undetected.

What Does This 0.2% Mean to Me?

Well do the math. If you spend $1,000 a month for 12 months this equates to $240 a year that goes to fraudulent clicks. If you spend $5,000 a month for 12 months this equates to $1,200 a year that goes to fraudulent clicks. And this is just assuming that Google really only misses .02% of all fraudulent clicks. You get the picture. Put in your yearly spend and multiply by .02% and this is an estimate of how much you are giving away to fraudulent clicks.

What Can I Do About It?

Well, you are not going to avoid click fraud all together but if you want to advertise via the Pay Per Click model you are going to have to learn to live with some fraud. There is one basic principle to help combat click fraud. Watch your traffic like a hawk. Look for sudden spikes in activity or other suspicious activity. Take full advantage of the reporting software that the Pay Per Click Engines provide and look at your reports daily. Better yet, utilize some third party reporting software or get your log files from your webmaster. If you believe you have been a victim of Click Fraud, contact your account representative immediately.

Now What?

If you don't have the time or ability to recognize click fraud, then you should think about acquiring a PPC Management and Optimization firm or specialist to look after your interests. Not only will they be able to recognize suspicious activity, they will know how and whom to report it to. On top of that they should also be able to help you achieve a better overall return on investment for your Pay Per Click campaigns.

Google AdWords Quality Score Update

Inside AdWords: Quality Score updates

Google announced today that it is planning on updating its Google AdWords Quality Score. The new Quality Score update will give an even bigger advantage to well designed ads that create better response. If you have a high quality ad (according to Google) you will be rewarded with lower cost per clicks. If you have a low quality ad (again according to Google) you will pay a higher cost per click.

How Do I Know If I Have Poor Ads?

1. If your cost per click for any particular key word / phrase continues to increase
2. Your key word / phrase has recently been deactivated
3. Your ad rank continues to decrease

What do I do about it?

Google is implementing a new Quality Score column within the AdWords interface. This new column will label keywords within an AdGroup as Great, OK, or Poor quality. To see this column you will have to opt in by clicking the "Customize Columns" in one of your AdGroups.

Improving Your Ads

If you see that Google has labeled your ad as poor, your cost per click has been raised, or your key word / phrase has been deactivated or you are just not receiving a positive ROI, then you need to take several steps to optimize your campaigns.

1. Are you targeting the right keywords for your industry?
2. Are you targeting the right regions?
3. Do you have compelling ad copy?
4. Do you have a well designed landing page?

If you are having trouble getting a positive ROI with your Google AdWords campaign or you are confused about the updates to the Google Quality Score, contact a professional who can help you with PPC Management and Optimization.

The New Yahoo Search Marketing and You!

You may have heard that Yahoo has launched its new pricing and search ranking algorithm system. But what does this mean to you?

Say goodbye to the days when you could choose a keyword and bid precisely to a certain ad position. Now Yahoo Search Marketing has incorporated a new ranking model that requires proper PPC Management and Optimization.

Will This Affect Me?

If you use Yahoo Search Marketing for Pay Per Click, it sure will. However the effect can be positive if you pair it with the proper techniques. The playing field has been somewhat leveled because you can now pay less for your ad position if you design good ads and target the right key phrases! Now, just because someone has a bigger budget than you does not mean their add will rank over you.

Determining Your Ad's Rank and Position

1. Bid amount and Ad Quality will now affect your position. This replaces old system where ads were ranked by bid alone.

2. This allows you to focus on ad quality opposed to getting into a bidding war with your biggest competitor.

3. Improve your ad and you will be rewarded with a higher Click Through Rate, in turn potentially lowering your cost per click.

How is Ad Quality Determined?

1. Historical Performance ? your click through rate taking into account your ad's position and relative to the competition.

2. Expected Performance ? determined by several relevance factors measured by Yahoo Search Marketing's ranking algorithms.

How Do I Make this Work for Me?

Now that the Yahoo Search Marketing Pay Per Click engine is modeled similarly to Google AdWords, advertisers have a better way to optimize their PPC campaigns. To see if you are getting the most out of your campaigns ask yourself the following questions.

1. Are you targeting the right keywords?


2. Are you targeting the right regions?


3. Do you have compelling ad copy?


4. Have you split tested ads to find the right message points?


5. Do you have a well designed landing page?


6. Are you measuring your success with conversion tracking?

If you did not answer "Yes" to all of these questions, seeking qualified professionals for PPC Management and Optimization is a good idea. These professionals can help you design and optimize a successful Pay Per Click campaign that will improve your ROI.