The following excerpt is from Perry Marshall, Mike Rhodes and Bryan Todd’s book Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords. Buy it now from Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iTunes | IndieBound
I once did a consultation for an adoption agency. When I looked at the agency’s Google account, it was an absolute mess. All kinds of keywords were dumped into this campaign or that with no rhyme or reason. The keywords didn’t match each other, the ads didn’t match the keywords and the landing pages didn’t match the ads.
Luckily, their AdWords account was still working, and it was bringing them some customers. As I looked closer, I saw the only reason their clock wasn’t getting totally cleaned was Google’s Quality Score algorithm. Because everything was so mismatched, most of their keywords had Quality Scores of one to 3. The keywords were underwater and the ads weren’t showing at all. Only a few keywords, which were lucky enough to be OK, were getting traffic at all.
It was at that point that I realized Google’s Quality Score algorithm is mostly designed for the lowest common denominator. It saves the average advertiser from paying a hideous stupidity tax and ensures that what little they accidentally do right generates some results.
As the client repaired the damage, slowly but surely, their Quality Scores went up, traffic went up, cost per click went down and more adoptive parents came in.
Here’s a quick summary of the fastest and most effective methods for cranking up your score by a few notches:
Aggressively split-test your ads
Click-through rate (CTR) is the biggest factor in your Quality Score, and the best way to improve CTR is by testing new ads. The object is to beat the performance of your old ads.
Split out your keywords into small, targeted ad groups
The fewer keywords you have in each ad group, the easier it is to make your ads relevant and the easier it is to…
