PPC Rant!, Vent your frustrations here Options

[Alan Perkins]

Apart from all this, PPC is great fun... (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Google

Editorial processes are going down the toilet e.g.

• A Car Ad is manually (i.e. by a human!) denied for using the word "Saloon" ... did you mean "Salon"? No I ****ing did not mean Salon!
• 3 weeks to review new creatives that were suggested by Google, while they are served with slowed delivery and a lower quality score, leading to lower placement, lower spend (but a higher CPC), lower ROI and a resultant loss!
• Hundreds of examples like this (although these were the worst!)

And they are going to start charging a fee for using the API. Allow me to pay you for the privilege of spending my money with you, Google. Thanks!

Oh, and their trademark policy is stupid! You can't use the word "Toyota" when advertising ... a Toyota? Try telling that to your local newspaper.

Expanded broad match - I don't want it. But I do want broad match! Let me have one without the other.

Yahoo!

The DTC is full of the same problems that people have been complaining about for years! And it's slow. And their API stinks - get some SOAP, Yahoo!, and quickly. (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

MSN

The adCenter is not even worthy of the moniker "Beta".

• The UI sucks and is full of usability holes
• Keywords are rejected for nonsense reasons (fix - delete them and resubmit the exact same keywords (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/eek.gif) )
• Prices are modified by the system! (Fortunately all keywords I have seen that have been modified have also been rejected! Still, this is very worrying).
• No API!

[daniel]

With you on that Alan. Working on an account at the moment that spans all the car manufacturers in the UK. In Adwords, each time a new campaign is added for a particular make I 'look forward' to the trademark warning showing.

Then it's on the phone, asking them to allow the ads that include BMW. Then later its' for Peugeot. Then Volvo...

When I told them that I would creating ads for every make and asked if they could 'ok' them premptively, I was told that they can't do this.

So I had the choice of creating a few campaigns and then calling them to allow them in a group, or call them after I created each one - so that they'd be live sooner.


Don't get me started on Yahoo! or MSN's bloody adcenter. Yahoo! are changing theirs very soon I hear, and it's going to be relevancy-based like Adwords, with a very nifty interface.

How could MSN get it so wrong though? The adcenter interface is shocking, and every set of keywords I submit is also rejected for no reason. I spoke to the support people, and they said it was because of the grammar in the ad....it's a bloody ad not a English exam! If it's a problem with the ad, why didn't it say that rather than just saying all my keywords are rejected?

Idiots.

[jtaylor123]

yes. I dispise MSN at the moment. It doens't seem to have my clicks correct EVER. It'll say I've spend $15.00, but I have 0 clicks! (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/censored.gif)

[ErinDecker]

Agreed, Google is not on the top of my list either. It seems that Google still hasn't figured out why some ads are not displaying. I get the generic letter -

Your ads are not showing consistently for some of your keywords due to a technical issue. However please be assured that your ads are showing as this is evidenced by click and impressions statistics in your account.

This has been the case for several weeks now. I hope they get it fixed soon!

[HorseCove]

Great post Alan. Its nice to know someone else has issues. (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)


MSN has some serious problems. We actively discourage clients from using MSN until they clean it up. In fact, we charge a premium surcharge for clients who insist on advertising on MSN. I figure it they really want it we'll do it, but it will cost them for the headaches we have to endure.

[jehochman]

Alan, I used to have issues with Google, but my rep has been really good and cleared up lots of them. It doesn't hurt to show up at the 'plex once in a while. They are ordinary folks trying to do a good job, faced with many challenges.

Adcenter is a work in progress, but I've noticed much better conversion rates than Google, so I am willing to tolerate their slap-in-the-face UI. Again, having a good rep at Microsoft really helps. Reps can do all the tedious stuff that the system should be able to handle, but can't.

Yahoo will be a disaster until they come out with a new advertising platform. They're late and suffering for it.

[Mel66]

Alan, I used to have issues with Google, but my rep has been really good and cleared up lots of them.  It doesn't hurt to show up at the 'plex once in a while.  They are ordinary folks trying to do a good job, faced with many challenges.

Adcenter is a work in progress, but I've noticed much better conversion rates than Google, so I am willing to tolerate their slap-in-the-face UI.  Again, having a good rep at Microsoft really helps.  Reps can do all the tedious stuff that the system should be able to handle, but can't.

Yahoo will be a disaster until they come out with a new advertising platform.  They're late and suffering for it.

Very true about the Google reps - in general they are top-notch. Unfortunately, they can't override the stupid trademark rules.

We *had* a great rep at MS Adcenter until a few weeks ago, when we were downgraded to "US Ad Services." We now have a lovely generic email address and generic phone number. Supposedly I still have a dedicated rep, but he has yet to reply to any of my emails. This makes no sense since we've been steadily INCREASING our MSN spend since the beta launch. And, we were a Search Featured Site in the old MSN Search, and were part of the original beta. Great way to treat a long-term customer. NOT

[Alan Perkins]

Alan, I used to have issues with Google, but my rep has been really good and cleared up lots of them.   It doesn't hurt to show up at the 'plex once in a while.  They are ordinary folks trying to do a good job, faced with many challenges.

Those challenges are self-inflicted, Jonathan. The system once worked better. Then they changed the system. Now it does not work so well.

I agree the reps are on the receiving end of it. We're based in the UK and we have an excellent working relationship with our rep, who clears up lots of issues (not the ones above, however). Maybe it helps that we spend a high six figures per month with Google, but I get the idea that we are still "small fry" in comparison with agencies who spend more but understand less. (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Adcenter is a work in progress, but I've noticed much better conversion rates than Google, so I am willing to tolerate their slap-in-the-face UI.

Agreed (for the present), which is why we use adCenter, but it was the fact that our bid prices were being modified without our input that prompted my original post. It was the last straw. We had one bid increased, for example, from £0.20 to £1.07. That's serious! Fortunately, the keyword was rejected (erroneously!) at the same time. In the meantime, Microsoft try to tell us that there are no bugs in the system and that we must have done it ourselves. Yeah, right. Like we were the ones who haven't been managing PPC for years and don't know what we're doing ...

[Alan Perkins]

MSN has some serious problems.  We actively discourage clients from using MSN until they clean it up.  In fact, we charge a premium surcharge for clients who insist on advertising on MSN.  I figure it they really want it we'll do it, but it will cost them for the headaches we have to endure.

That's a great idea! We do charge for managing MSN, of course, but we can't avoid it, as unfortunately ...

• If the client was getting Yahoo traffic before Yahoo lost MSN, then the client needs the MSN traffic back just to maintain the click volumes they had before
• Competition in some sectors on MSN is so minimal at present that we really owe it to our clients to establish their positions now, and take advantage of some very cheap clicks

[goodman]

Hi Alan, this post reminds me of that post on another forum that was like the top 10 or 50 annoying things about YSM. That guy was really on fire! Which makes me wonder why you were so easy on them and subsumed all the gripes under one sentence. (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Anyway, since Jill asked us all here from her newsletter, I feel like playing along. Some comments below.

Apart from all this, PPC is great fun... (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Google

Editorial processes are going down the toilet e.g.

• A Car Ad is manually (i.e. by a human!) denied for using the word "Saloon" ... did you mean "Salon"? No I ****ing did not mean Salon!
  
• 3 weeks to review new creatives that were suggested by Google, while they are served with slowed delivery and a lower quality score, leading to lower placement, lower spend (but a higher CPC), lower ROI and a resultant loss!

Some of this seems to be UK-centric. I know the editors would probably mess up "saloon" here, but three weeks? Looks like there are some issues with workflow there.

Hundreds of examples like this (although these were the worst!)

And they are going to start charging a fee for using the API.  Allow me to pay you for the privilege of spending my money with you, Google.  Thanks!

That being said, individual businesses using the API may be able to get the fees waived. I think there is an issue here that Google decided: third party software firms are building a profitable model around frequent bid checks and changes, and other campaign operations. It's one thing to "spend money," quite another to make a business out of spending other people's money more efficiently by putting as much of a load as possible on Google's resources. There is no "API" for a radio advertising schedule, for example. You can't log in and tweak ads throughout the day. Obviously the point can be reached where Google's price is unfair, but I think there is a real effort here to separate out large scale interaction from firm-level interaction. Also, you should get some tokens for your ad spend.

Oh, and their trademark policy is stupid!  You can't use the word "Toyota" when advertising ... a Toyota?  Try telling that to your local newspaper.

The law, and thus the policy, is more lenient in the US, so I wouldn't want people to get the idea it's straightforward. It does seem to keep changing.

That being said, Google is trying to dissuade advertisers from using trademarked words by making the quality score hurdle higher for new additions of those words - they basically admit that some types of words may have inherently lower quality scores at first.

One way or another, trademark issues are a pain. Sometimes that's an issue between the trademark holder and their dealers, however - Google doesn't make the law and they don't come up with some of these threatening legal situations on their own (i.e. it's companies like Toyota that drive it).

Expanded broad match - I don't want it.  But I do want broad match!  Let me have one without the other.

True dat. Nothing quite works the way it's supposed to, anymore, it seems.

Yahoo!

The DTC is full of the same problems that people have been complaining about for years!  And it's slow.  And their API stinks - get some SOAP, Yahoo!, and quickly. (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

I'm surprised you didn't come up with other specifics to touch on, but I think you were getting tired. (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

How about strange billing policies. I try to keep out of those YSM accounts (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) but a colleague did a little adjustment to the budget and the client gets billed *in advance* for a whole hypothetical month's worth of clicks. That's fun when the client calls at 5 a.m. your time to freak out about a $2,000 credit card charge that inexplicably Yahoo hits you with when you make a little budget tweak (well before that budget is spent).

MSN

The adCenter is not even worthy of the moniker "Beta".

• The UI sucks and is full of usability holes
  
• Keywords are rejected for nonsense reasons (fix - delete them and resubmit the exact same keywords  (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/eek.gif) )
  
• Prices are modified by the system! (Fortunately all keywords I have seen that have been modified have also been rejected! Still, this is very worrying).
  
• No API!

We've had good results with MSN but the nature of their service is so boilerplate. They reject whole groups of words for an ad that doesn't conform to guidelines, but the reasons are so vague you need to go back and request the real actual reason. It's a hugely inefficient system. It reminds me of YSM, or should I say GoTo. But if the goal is to get your ads up and running and you are willing to be hamstrung on actually managing the campaign effectively, it works and you can do it. Plus, you can daypart and do other fun targeting stuff. These are the *benefits* of AdWords you so take for granted in your rant. There is a lot you can do with these platforms, as clunky as they are. It sounds like a lot of the problem is human inputs - I've always had a problem with the notion that you might get uneven service levels from these providers based on relationships, because that's not fair to people spending good money. But that's how it seems to work in some places.

[Alan Perkins]

Some of this seems to be UK-centric. I know the editors would probably mess up "saloon" here, but three weeks? Looks like there are some issues with workflow there.

Apparently a problem with some new software meant that editorial could not do the jobs they were supposed to do.

Obviously the point can be reached where Google's price is unfair, but I think there is a real effort here to separate out large scale interaction from firm-level interaction.

AFAICT, there is no differentiation between firms using a small amount of API to spend a lot of money with Google, and firms using a large amount of API to spend a little money with Google.

Also, you should get some tokens for your ad spend.

Tell me more! I have seen no meaningful reference to this anywhere - certainly not in the Adwords API Terms and Conditions.

The law, and thus the policy, is more lenient in the US, so I wouldn't want people to get the idea it's straightforward. It does seem to keep changing.

The law, it seems, is different for Google than it is for Yahoo!, where we have no problems using these trademarked terms. And, when you go to your local newspaper in search of a Toyota, it seems that any number of private, trade and franchise dealers have no problems using that word in their advertising either! Why is it different on Google? Why??? (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/ranting.gif)

I'm surprised you didn't come up with other specifics to touch on, but I think you were getting tired. (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Yep, ranting is hard work. Time-consuming, too! You can go on, and on, and on .... And others have spent enough time, and brilliantly, ranting about Yahoo!

If you want to rant about billing policies, what about MSN's? We have credit card only (no invoicing) and no more than three accounts on one credit card! Could they make it any more difficult for agencies to run a business?

It's a hugely inefficient system. It reminds me of YSM, or should I say GoTo. But if the goal is to get your ads up and running and you are willing to be hamstrung on actually managing the campaign effectively, it works and you can do it.

Exactly.

It sounds like a lot of the problem is human inputs - I've always had a problem with the notion that you might get uneven service levels from these providers based on relationships, because that's not fair to people spending good money. But that's how it seems to work in some places.

We have a great relationship with our Google and Yahoo reps. But not everything is in their gift to fix instantly...

[Sarah]

With you on that Alan.  Working on an account at the moment that spans all the car manufacturers in the UK.  In Adwords, each time a new campaign is added for a particular make I 'look forward' to the trademark warning showing.

Then it's on the phone, asking them to allow the ads that include BMW.  Then later its' for Peugeot.  Then Volvo...

I do PPC ads for the same industry (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/eek.gif) When Google say that Toyota or BMW or Citroen or any other manufacturer is trademarked, just hit the Exclusion Request button. I have never been told 'No' and the ads run ok (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Now, stay away from MY keywords (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

Yahoo disallow keywords which have had their ad text tweaked and then re-submitted (apparently they are duplicates (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/goodjob.gif) ) so you have to do a csv download, then resubmit by upload and it's just pants.

This post has been edited by Sarah: Sep 14 2006, 07:54 AM

[Alan Perkins]

I do PPC ads for the same industry  (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/eek.gif)   When Google say that Toyota or BMW or Citroen or any other manufacturer is trademarked, just hit the Exclusion Request button. I have never been told 'No' and the ads run ok (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

BMW and Citroen are not really trademarked in the UK, but Adwords is not able to determine that ... so it applies a blanket exclusion.

Certain brands, however, are trademarked in the UK ... Toyota being one such brand. If you are getting away with advertising on those brands, don't count on it for long.

[Sarah]

If you are getting away with advertising on those brands, don't count on it for long.

Dammit! (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/censored.gif)

[jbgilbert]

Alan, Alan, Alan....

What got you all ticked off?

GOOGLE EXPANDED BROAD MATCH --- THEY "MUST" ALLOW ME TO OPT IN (or out which I will do)!!!! I actually think a lawyer could make a good case against Google around broad match spending money for keywords people don't elect to use!
DO I HEAR CLASS ACTION AGAIN?????

MSN --- NO COMMENT --- PURE CRAP AND THEY DON'T CARE OR GET IT.

I have beaten on MSN long enough and would rather forget them. HEY HOW ABOUT THE NEW MSN SEARCH ENGINE? Me too... me too... me too... These guys have no clue as to how to do business on the web!