CPC determined by visit history

I seem to be having a t-shirt flavoured Gmail AdWords week. This is Google's targetting system; I clicked on one and so now their system is tempting me with more t-shirt goodness.

This could be my favourite AdWord of all time.


The site in question can be found selling Engrish t-shirts here. Don't go clicking on the poor site's AdWords campaigns.

The ad reads:

Engrish.com can help you with our pleasure. Let's shopping t-shirts!

The t-shirt AdWord which first caught my attention this week was for Torso Pants. I liked the site so much that I bookmarked it using my Google toolbar. I'll buy something later.

Here's a thought; I bookmarked Torso Pants via Google. Google continues to show me AdWords for Torso Pants. If more people actually used Google's bookmarking feature then I, as an advertiser, would want an AdWords option which let me decide whether or not to show my ads to people who had already bookmarked me.

I might decide - they know about my niche store already; I don't want to ad serve them.
I might decide - I want to remind them that I'm here; I do want to ad serve them.

In fact, you can take that concept and simply throw away the Google bookmarking feature. Wouldn't it be a good idea if you could set CPC based on whether the searcher had been on your site recently, some time in the past or never before?

Disclaimer: I'm heavily NDA'd by Google but, at the time of this post, I've never talked to them about CPCs determined by visit history. If I had knowledge of CPC/visit history features then I wouldn't be blogging this!

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Google UK bidding on Matt Cutts

One of the techniques you can use to examine what people are getting up to on Google's Content Network is to use Gmail. Gmail infamously scans your email, picks out keyword topics and places ads accordingly. You can actually access this data by using this link https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=1&view=rl&rlk=[keywords] so, for example, to see Content Network matches to the keyphrase [Matt Cutts] use this link https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=1&view=rl&rlk=matt%20cutts. You need to be logged into Gmail. Google also gives us some insight to the system.

Your results will differ from mine. You'll see in the image above that I've got UK ads - and that's because I'm at home in the UK.

So, is Google really bidding on [Matt Cutts]? Heh. Nah. This is more likely to be a content broadmatch. Matt Cutts' name gets mentioned on so many SEM blogs that Google's systems have noticed and made the connection.

The system is actually working; if I'm emailing someone about Matt Cutts then I'm likely to be writing about something Matt's blogged about and Google's quite right to be trying to sell me search engine marketing.

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Top 10 List of Things Not To Have Expanded Broadmatch On

We had a spot of good news today which inspired me to put together this top ten list!

• 10. Safety Equipment
  • (Goggles are not an expanded match for safety rope)
• 9. Jobs
  • (Police jobs are not an expanded match for illegal jobs)
• 8. Celebrity news
  • (Simon Pegg is not an expanded match for Johnny Depp)
• 7. Religious terms
  • (Voodoo is not an expanded match for Dunfermline Athletic)
• 6. Books
  • (Lord of the Rings is not an expanded match for Lord of the Flies)
• 5. Places
  • (Edinburgh is not an expanded match for Sydney)
• 4. Dates
  • (1966 is not an expanded match for 2008)
• 3. Names
  • (Robin Richmond is not an expanded match for Batman)
• 2. Dating
  • (Men are not an expanded match for women)
• 1. Google
  • (Money is not an expanded match for quality)

Apologies for the obscure football joke! Expanded Broadmatch is a (fairly) new twist from Google's CPC system. Google now pretty much matches X with Y by default on broadmatch (aka the new extended broadmatch system).

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Example of a Google Gadget Ad

We've been on the beta test for the gadget ads in a number of countries. I think it's fun to look at a German example which is (currently) live on Kinkaa.

As you're there to look at Google Ads be careful not to click on any of them.

Don't see the gadget? That might be because it's not showing any more. It's more likely to because you're not in the target audience (German, Austrian, etc). So, here's a screen shot!



Once again I'm impressed with our German team. They're way ahead of the curve.

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MIVA beats Google at Condé Nast

Here in the UK, MIVA have won a prestigious account with Condé Nast. The pay-per-click engine gets exclusive rights at powering the PPC content network for all 12 sites controlled by Condé Nast Interactive U.K. This means 54 million extra impressions for MIVA. The sites include Stylefinder, Vogue.com and Vanityfair.co.uk.

MIVA beat Yahoo and kicked off Google.

This is also an email deal. I suspect it may have been that which won it for them. MIVA will also put their pay-per-click adverts in 500,000 opt-in emails. Here's a comment from MIVA's press release which talks about it.

"Two MIVA Pay-Per-Click Ads will be displayed in each email newsletter through MIVA's proprietary MIVA Mail technology. The technology which underpins MIVA Mail ensures that the latest Ads from across MIVA's network are displayed regardless of when emails are opened."

Gosh. I'm almost tempted to sign up to a newsletter to see how the updating content ads work. An iframe or JavaScript insert in an HTML newsletter? Risky! Spam and security filters around the world will brickwall those emails.

Any one got an example of an email with a MIVA Mail ad in it?

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The Google, Ask and Yahoo Love Triangle

Over at Search Engine Land Danny's noticed that Ask is bidding on Yahoo on Google.

This isn't the first time this has happened. Way back in October 2006 I noticed the very same thing.

Something has changed, though. Back in 2006 the tracking for Ask's bid was routed via Atlas. Today it is going via http://pixel1366.everesttech.net/. That's an Efficient Frontier tracking redirect.

The love triangle continues - but some of the supporting friends have been changed.

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Dead Birds - When Life Scuppers Your Marketing Campaign

It was about two weeks ago that I first saw a dead chicken on the way to work. I was pretty sure it was a dead chicken... but, come on, a dead bird? Yuck. The advert had been on the side of a bus which had whooshed past at speed and I was left with some doubt in my mind. Who would be advertising dead chickens on the side of a bus?

A few days later I saw another. A different poster - a brown chicken rather than a yellow one - but clearly a dead chicken. Swiftcovered, heh? At the back of my mind I could vaguely recall a TV advert when a guy trying to arrange his insurance gets very frustrated at a bunch of chickens clucking at him in a call centre spoof. It is the same people.

Current affairs have not been kind to Swiftcover. The deadly Asian strain of bird flu - H5N1 - has broken out at a turkey farm in England this weekend. The news is full of images of dead birds being dumped into large trucks.

The public is worried. The BBC has interviews with Joe Public who all say they'll be steering clear of poultry. Of course, these people are over reacting, but Joe Public has a propensity to do that.

It's just bad timing. Very bad timing. Under no circumstances do you want your brand associated with bird flu. Unless, well, you sell flu vaccinations or health insurance. Unfortunately for Swiftcover they only sell car, travel, dog or cat insurance. I suspect only farmers get chicken insurance.

I should remind you that this is a personal blog and opinions here (I have lots of them) do not reflect the opinions of the company I work for.

My first reaction to the dead chicken advert was a bad one. Sure - it got my attention - but I didn't think "Ah-ah! Swiftcover!" My first thoughts were "Yuck. Was that a dead bird? What on earth?" A negative response. I don't mind being challenged when it comes to important issues like domestic violence, famines abroad, climate change or drugs but my hackles rise when someone tries shock tactics to sell me car insurance.

Given the bird flu outbreak the dead birds seem even less pleasant.

As it turns out this isn't the first time Swiftcover's chickens have been used. The Register has an article dating back to 2005 which explains that despite 800 complaints Swiftcover was allowed to depict call centre workers as chickens (call centre workers in the UK complained). Now Swiftcover are killing those call centre workers off. Another negative association.

I remember the dead birds not the insurance deals. Now the 24 hour news channels are full of H5N1 stories I strongly suspect most of the UK will be noticing the dead birds before they notice the insurance offers too.

I do remember the phrase "clucking call centre" though. Simple word games always stick in my head. If I didn't camera-phone a picture of the Swiftcover advert I would have gone to Google to check for that.


Swiftcover's SEO hasn't done too badly here. They've got the site in at #3 for the search. Swiftcover are doing the right thing by having a page up with their quriky advertising. In fact, I took the chance to review the TV advert I remembered. They should have the videos up at YouTube though. I would have had a web page for every advert.

It's the PPC players who are doing badly here. Swiftcover aren't represented at all and this would have been a chance to build that brand message. Look at all those pro-call centre adverts who really shouldn't be there. "Clucking" should be a negative keyword for everyone of them.

The other "key phrase" is swiftcovered. The name "Swiftcover" doesn't actually appear on the poster (and I'd always encourage people to put the domain in there). What happens if I search for [swiftcovered]?


Ouch. On this search the organic results are not kind to Swiftcover. They're not on page one. I suspect my suggestion of having one page per ad on their site would have helped them out here.

It's the PPC player (or a big affiliate using Atlas Tracking) who get the position right here. If it wasn't for the AdWord then Swiftcover wouldn't be represented at all.

I'm afraid there's not much you can do to future proof your marketing campaign from the random stuff that RealLife(™) throws at you. I suspect some people would encourage brands to stay away from negative images though. All big brands, especially those which live entirely online, need to coordinate their online and offline advertising. When you're creating a buzz phrase or a memorable quote via posters, radio or TV you should be sure you can be found online for the same quote or buzz. It's a must.

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Ask.com bidding on Yahoo.com in Google.com

Ah. Is this a deliberate bid? It has Atlas tracking so it seems professional.

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Google advise: Hide text

I'm being obtuse... but...

Google asks that you hide text. Google Analytics uses display:none to hide tracking tag values within a <textarea> tag set.

I'm being obtuse for many reasons but one clear response to this is that search engine spiders should never access the confirmation page that this code is designed to sit on.

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Anti Competitor AdWords Tactics

A little known and therefore not so widely enforced AdWords rule is Google's policy on double serving. You can't double serve on AdWords. This actually means you shouldn't double serve on AdWords although many people do.

What's double serving? Double serving is having two different AdWords creatives listing for the same keyword and for the same site. In fact, double serving has a broader ruling than that insofar as sites owned by the same company which sells the same thing are not allowed to run side-by-side in AdWords. Their AdWords accounts should be linked and only one AdWord should run. This rule is there to stop people simply setting up different sites and effectively owning the right hand-side of Google.

The catch is that it's not very clear that similar sites may be linked. Not every webmaster knows which big brand owns which other - heck, many webmasters would struggle to separate companies from brands.

The key is to stay in the know. If you have a client who, for example, is into loans - a very competitive PPC market - the know the other big loan players. Know which banks have a branded loan company in their umbrella. If you see branded loan offering running alongside the main bank for a loan keyword then that's a breach of Google's double serving policies.

The thing to do is to kick up a fuss. It won't make you popular with any of your campaign managers at Google but its a great way to cut swathes through your clients competition.

Sometimes the arguement comes up that the two sites look different. That's not enough. The sites must have different products and services.

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Advertise on this Site

Last night I mucked around with the new "Advertise on this Site" option on AdSense. I did so while wearing the webmaster hat for my main hobby site. The "Advertise on this Site" link doesn't ever really appear there since I've one publisher who already cleverly targets image banners there for me.

As already noted by the AdSense community the "Advertise on this Site" option is horribly bare bones. We're encouraged not to set up separate AdSense accounts for every site but keep them all together under one (this blog, for example, is part of the same account).

The "this Site" concept is broken. Most of us have a number of sites. If you click on the "Advertise on this Site" option on Search Commands then you get the page I designed for GameWyrd. It's odd Google let the feature go live when it is badly targeted.

I was frustrated by the lack of space too. I wanted to explain how GameWyrd uses AdSense on my page. I prefer to sell cheap banners to community publishers as that's what I want to appear on the site. Google AdSense fills any gaps I have in the banner rotation. There's simply not enough character space to say this.

I'm really far from impressed with the feature so far.

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