Slice and dice your data using AdWords labels

Slice and dice your data using AdWords labels: We are excited to announce the launch of account labels. Starting this week, you can organize your account’s keywords, ads, ad groups and campaigns into custom groupings so you can quickly and easily filter and report on the data that is of most interest to you. To see the opportunities that labels enable, let’s meet Bob.



Bob is an online retailer who sells apparel and accessories for men and women. He has campaigns for shoes, clothes and bags for each of his three major markets (New York, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania) and within the campaigns has separate ad groups for generic and brand keywords. This structure (ex: New York - Shoes - Generic and Massachusetts - Shoes - Generic) means that he has the same ads and keywords spread across different parts of his account. Before today, Bob could not easily sort his account or run a report to see how well sneakers are selling across geographies.



Enter labels.

Now Bob can create the label “sneakers” and apply it to all sneaker-related keywords across his account. He can then filter by this label on the Keywords tab to only see sneaker keywords, or he can run a keyword labels report to aggregate performance by label. These reports allow him to then compare --for example-- how sneakers perform against all other shoes, or other labeled groups.

Labels can be used to organize your campaign elements in any way you choose. Report on brand keyword performance versus all other non-branded keyword performance. Measure how ads that mention “free trial” perform versus ads that mention “free demo”. Or simply label your favorite keywords so you can quickly review them every morning.



Labels will begin rolling out this week to all AdWords accounts. For more information, please visit the AdWords Help Center.



Posted by Jon Diorio, Senior Product Manager, AdWords

Helping all businesses play big on YouTube

Helping all businesses play big on YouTube:

With a global audience of more than 800 million monthly visitors to YouTube, every day can feel like you’re advertising in the Super Bowl, and one video can launch a business. Many have had success growing their business on YouTube, by creating videos that demonstrate their products, share customers testimonials, or simply showcase how their business works.

Take TRX, for example. When former Navy Seal Randy Hetrick wanted to expand TRX as a business, he knew he needed to use video to show potential customers how the TRX suspension training system worked and demonstrate its effectiveness. After using YouTube Analytics to hone their optimal video length and broadening their reach with TrueView video ads, they saw a 5X increase in traffic, 2X increase in conversions, and most importantly, a 2X increase in revenue.

To help even more businesses play big with video, today we’re introducing a number of new products, resources, and tools:

Google AdWords for video now available to all. Similar to search advertising - where you pay for clicks and set budgets with bids - we created a new model for video advertising. With Google AdWords for video, you only pay when someone chooses to watch your ad and you can create and manage video campaigns from the same platform as your search and display ads. You can create an account and start promoting your first video in less than 5 minutes. With AdWords for video you can:

• Find the right audience: AdWords for video provides a range of options to reach the right audience. For example, you can promote your video by keyword to appear in YouTube search results, or you can choose to show your ad against content your customers are most interested in - such as sports or music. Connect with your audience on YouTube and the Google Display Network, which includes millions of websites. AdWords for video links to your YouTube account so you can easily start a video campaign with your existing videos.
• Measure the effectiveness of your spend: On average, we’ve found that YouTube video ads drive a 20 percent increase in traffic to your website and a 5 percent increase in searches for your business (Google Campaign Insights, 2011). With AdWords for video you can find out how viewers are engaging with your brand during and after they watch your ad. You can see how many viewers watched your entire video, visited your website, stayed on your channel to watch another video, or subscribed to your channel, after viewing your ad.
• Only pay for engaged views: With TrueView video ads you only pay when viewers choose to watch your ad so you aren’t charged when viewers skip your ad if they aren’t interested or have already seen your video. This means your ad budget is focused on viewers interested in your video. By displaying a call-to-action overlay on your video you can talk about a sale or specific offer to your viewers, share more information about your business, or drive traffic to your website.

$50 million in free advertising. We’re giving away $50 million in free Google AdWords advertising to help more than 500,000 businesses get into video. If you are new to AdWords, you can receive a $75 credit when you sign up. To put that into context, with $75 your video campaign can reach more than 1,500 of your most valuable customers on YouTube for one month. Request your free credit here.

Advertiser Playbook and support. To share best practices and tips on how video can be a core part of your business toolkit, we created a YouTube Advertiser Playbook. The Playbook covers everything from creating interesting content to promoting your video with ads. If you need help making a video, our My Business Story is a free tool you can use to create your first video. AdWords advertisers can also call our free phone support line, 866-2-GOOGLE, to get started with AdWords for video.

YouTube Ambassador program. To recognize business owners that are already using YouTube to grow their business, we’re naming 9 businesses from across the country to our first ever YouTube Ambassador program. These businesses have seen outstanding success in reaching new customers, building a brand, and engaging their fans with video. Hear their stories and learn more about the YouTube Ambassador program on the Official Google Blog.

Hear more from TRX fitness, a company that has built its business with YouTube

If you have a video you want to promote, get started with AdWords for video. And, join our YouTube for Marketers page on Google+ to stay up-to-date on our latest video marketing innovations.

Taking Automated Rules to the next level: Now in My Client Center

Taking Automated Rules to the next level: Now in My Client Center:

We’ve added My Client Center support, so you can now run Automated Rules across multiple client accounts, to help you manage many accounts more quickly, easily and efficiently. To get started, simply click the “Automate” drop-down menu on the Performance or Budget tab:



This AdWords Help Center article walks you through how to set up Automated Rules in My Client Center. As you may notice, the steps are mostly the same as for individual accounts, except that we’ve added sections for account and currency selection:

As always, remember to click the Preview results button to verify that you've set the rule up correctly. Previewing displays the time you’ve chosen for the rule to run in groups according to your clients’ timezones, and allows you to get a glimpse of the changes that the rule will make to the first account you’ve selected.

To see popular types of rules created by advertisers, please see this AdWords Help Center article. To learn more about Automated Rules, please visit Ad Innovations.



Posted by Andrew Truong, Product Marketing Manager

New Google research: Reaching your audience effectively with YouTube TrueView Ads

New Google research: Reaching your audience effectively with YouTube TrueView Ads:

With many Americans spending as much time online as watching TV, media-savvy advertisers are turning to creative new formats to attract attention and customers. We recently surveyed more than 1,600 Americans aged 18-45 and got some interesting insights into TrueView Video Ads, the family of YouTube ad formats that give viewers choice and control over which advertisers' messages they want to see and when.

Some of the best findings from our study include:

• 8 of 10 viewers preferred TrueView to standard in-stream ads
• 9 of 10 viewers thought TrueView created a better viewing environment
• 8 of 10 viewers thought the skip button was very clear
• Only 1 viewer in 10 always skips ads

Other results give insight into how advertisers can make their TrueView ads even more effective so that viewers watch, not skip, their ads. Based on the research, here are some of the best ways to make your TrueView ads stickier:

Make great ads that people want to watch and that spark their curiosity.

Viewers have the option to skip a TrueView in-stream ad after five seconds, so piquing their interest quickly is important. By far the most popular survey response from people who chose to watch an ad was this one: “I was curious to see what the ad was for.” Attention-grabbing openers and humor also keep people watching.

Include branding in those first seconds.

TrueView advertisers pay only when people actually watch their ads. They’re buying real value, not paying per impression. So, insert your logo or brand name in the first five seconds—which cost you nothing if the viewer doesn’t keep watching. Enjoy those free impressions!

Include new, different information in your TrueView ad if it’s been airing on TV.

In our study, we found that seeing ads on TV affected whether viewers later skipped those same ads on YouTube. To keep them engaged across multiple screens, be sure to provide new product information in the TrueView ad messaging and make it personally relevant to the viewer. Check out this case study from HGTV for great ideas on tweaking and optimizing your TrueView ad.

To read full details of the study and get more tips about creating effective TrueView ads, visit Think Insights.

Posted by Christina Park, Product Marketing Manager, Think with Google

10 Optimization Secrets To Drive More Mobile Traffic From Facebook

10 Optimization Secrets To Drive More Mobile Traffic From Facebook: One of the staggering facts in Facebook’s public filing last month was that 50% of their traffic is driven by mobile devices. That’s about 5x more than the average website. Perhaps even more staggering: the growth rate of their mobile traffic actually exceeded their US growth rate last...



Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.

6 Interview Questions For Conversion Optimization Hires

6 Interview Questions For Conversion Optimization Hires: So you’re looking to hire someone to do conversion optimization on your team? Here are six interview questions that you might consider asking. The answers aren’t necessarily black-and-white, but these kinds of questions can help reveal how a candidate thinks about conversion...



Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.

Tips For Growing Keyword Seeds With Excel Formulas

Tips For Growing Keyword Seeds With Excel Formulas: Have your seeds germinated yet? Last time, we talked about keywords as “seeds” of ideas; a single keyword to represent an entire keyword cluster. Now it’s time to make our seeds grow. Using the example of Artisan Construction Services again (thanks!), we’ll walk through the process that I use to...



Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.