Query Eyed for the Straight Keyword Results
Have you ever taken a look at the Google Search Query Report? Notice anything a little weird in the report? Well, myself and other colleagues have and it's a little annoying to say the least. Even though Google has far better reporting features than those of Yahoo, MSN, , however when they offer something to it's users that is not delivering the expectations that they claim, it's almost like they don't want you to know. In this case, identifying all of the actual "Search Queries" that people are typing in based on your Broad or Phrase Match, would be extremely valuable in terms of driving the most qualified traffic for the $$$. How? We would simply take all of the queries, make them [exact match] or "phrase match" and hence only drive traffic to the terms that people are typing in. You may ask yourself these two (2) questions.
- Is this the best scenario for driving traffic. Not necessarily.
- Is this the best tactic for improving ROAS? Well, it's definitely a step in the right direction.
So what does Google say about this. You can read Google's interpretation of this feature Google Search Query FAQs. But what is most annoying with this article is that their example of a Search Query Report is not matching up reality (ie. withholding data in actual "real-life" accounts.) In other words, they show you this below as an example of the report (see below):
Well, as you can see Google is not being as straightforward with this reporting feature and the lingering question is why not. Why are they not disclosing the actual keywords that are being searched on. What's the big secret? I mean, there are many other Analytics packages do offer this and are relatively easy to get. You have to pay for them, but it's out there.
So in conclusion, Google claims they provide the actual search queries to it's advertisers, however I have seen that they are not disclosing them. Perhaps, this is a technical glitch and will be fixed over time. However, we cannot ignore the possibility that they are intentionally keeping this from their advertisers in order to continuing to drive up their stock price and keep us all guessing?
What do you think?
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Check out my thoughts on the same subject matter at: http://henryshelley.net/2007/08/17/be-warned-%e2%80%93-adwords-search-query-report-eclipses-the-issue/
Posted by: Henry | Tuesday, August 21, 2007 at 10:58 AM
Google is offering some courses this month; I signed up for the four being offered, especially since I'm looking for answers to some of the questions you've been posting about recently (questions I also have been running into while trying to tango with the beast known as AdWords).
And now my shameless self-promotion: you can check out my recent entry about it (http://brandingme.wordpress.com/2007/09/05/google-education-courses-new-york-city/). And let me know if you're attending!
Posted by: Adrian P. | Wednesday, September 05, 2007 at 11:03 AM