Location In Google Adwords Options

[T.N]

Dears,

I'm optimizing an adword campaign for a website for a specific region. Say for example Alaska, So, is it enough to specify the location in the campaign setup? or it is necessary to add the location Alaska as a keyword on the campaign?

Need your help.


Thanks

[chris1]

The best thing to do is set up 2 campaigns:

1) Geo targeted to areas with general terms. So if you were advertising a dentist office in Alaska, you would geo target this campaign to Alaska and use general terms such as: dentist, dentist office, find dentist, etc.

2) Target the entire country and use geo-targeted keywords. So with this campaign you would target all of the US (and maybe Canada) then use terms like: alaska dentist, find dentist in alaska, alaska dentist offices, nome ak dentist, etc.

Both can have a lot of long tail terms. #1 lots of general queries and #2 lots of towns, cities, states, zip codes, etc.

[T.N]

Thanks Chris1 for your reply,

I understand from Adwords that is targetted to a specific location that the ads won't appear anywhere else except for that IP that for that location ( hope what I understand is right )

so, what is the benefit of adding the location on the AD thought it won't appear anywhere else except for that region??

I'm really confused about that, and hope someone tell me his point of view in details.

Thanks..

[Jill]

Some people sell products or services only to a certain geographical area, so that type of geotargetting is perfect for them.

[T.N]

Some people sell products or services only to a certain geographical area, so that type of geotargetting is perfect for them.

Thanks Jill for your reply,

that's really what I'm talking about, for that geographical area, is it enough to specify it to be displayed for that region only? or is it better to include that location as a keyword on the ad??

that's what I need to have some declaration about.

Thanks anyway

Regards.

This post has been edited by T.N: Nov 11 2007, 12:11 PM

[RiYo]

TN,

The problem with geotargeting is that it is not 100% accurate. Sometimes adds will show in other parts of the country and sometimes adds will not show in Alaska while I am living in Alaska. This is one of the reasons to have 2 campaigns like Chris mentioned.

Richard

[T.N]

Thanks Richard

[nethy]

ALso, someone amy be interested in producst/services somewhere where they are not currently present. I might search for 'auto insurance brittish columbia' while still in Victoria, Australia. You pick them up whith the geo-keyworded terms. Another upside is when you nail a location + product/service description/name on the head exactly with an ad.

You are likely to appear (and be) far more relevant then anything else on the page. With these, adgroups while you have very few impressions, its not unlikely to get 10%+ CTR.

Also, though I have only anecdotal eviodence from the limited number of campaigns that I am inolved with, geo-keyworded terms seem to convert significantly better. So, its good to have them seperated for bidding purposes and to scrape as many clicks as possible with the higher CTR.

[BlueSky]

that's really what I'm talking about, for that geographical area, is it enough to specify it to be displayed for that region only? or is it better to include that location as a keyword on the ad??

If you include a geo location in all your keyword phrases then there will only be a match if the geo location is included in the search. That is not what you want. For example, let's say you have a keyword "alaska widget" and a web surfer in Anchorage searches on "widget". The search will not trigger because the surfer did not specify "alaska widget". So, include the keyword "widget" and, if you want, also include "alaska widget". The reason you would include the second keyword is to i) get a more precise match which is good for campaign performance, keyword tracking, and cpc pricing and ii) possibly write location specific ads and/or landing pages that trigger when the user enters that specific location.

This way you will catch all searches intended for the campaign geo location whether or not the web surfer is located within the geographic area (within the capabilities of AdWords geo targeting, of course).

Another reason why you might want to include location names is to make use of dynamic keyword insertion.

Lastly, be careful of ambiguous location names. For example, an favorite example here in the New England is that Manchester, NH often gets confused with Manchester in the UK. Make use of negative keywords to avoid these problems...

[BlueSky]

2) Target the entire country and use geo-targeted keywords. So with this campaign you would target all of the US (and maybe Canada) then use terms like: alaska dentist, find dentist in alaska, alaska dentist offices, nome ak dentist, etc.

Why would you want to do that? That's what AdWords geo targeting does... Try this: set up a local campaign without including any geo identifiers, and then submit a search query using a geo identifier such as the zip/state abbreviation/state name or city name in the query. Even if you are located outside the geo target AdWords will find the local campaign in each case, no problem.

AdWords automatically associates the geo names for you, you don't have to specify them in the campaign to get a hit. YSM does the same.

[T.N]

For example, let's say you have a keyword "alaska widget" and a web surfer in Anchorage searches on "widget". The search will not trigger because the surfer did not specify "alaska widget".

Thanks BlueSky for your answer,

but why won't it appear, don't u consider it to be broad match ???

[BlueSky]

Thanks BlueSky for your answer,

but why won't it appear, don't u consider it to be broad match ???

For a broad match all of the words must be present in the query. So, if you force the user to include a location in every query you will miss all the queries that do not include the location... which is usually hugely significant. Variations of this is one of the tricks that PPC scam artists use to sell PPC plans with minimal coverage (and, therefore, minimal cost to the scam artist...) because the client is fooled into thinking they're getting good keyword coverage, but they're not!

[chris1]

Why would you want to do that? That's what AdWords geo targeting does... Try this: set up a local campaign without including any geo identifiers, and then submit a search query using a geo identifier such as the zip/state abbreviation/state name or city name in the query. Even if you are located outside the geo target AdWords will find the local campaign in each case, no problem.

AdWords automatically associates the geo names for you, you don't have to specify them in the campaign to get a hit. YSM does the same.

In theory, maybe. In actuality, I've found you can get more traffic by setting up two separate campaigns. Why take a chance that Google or Yahoo would miss any geo identifiers?

[BlueSky]

Why take a chance that Google or Yahoo would miss any geo identifiers?

You presume that you can assemble a list of geo identifiers better than Google or Yahoo can? I think not. If I had to bet on it my money would be on the search engines, not PPC campaign managers, to provide the most comprehensive list. Exceptions might be the use of non-official, abbreviated or slang geo identifiers - someone with local knowledge could do a better job but I would not count on it - most campaign managers do not have the time to do extensive research on this that will cover large geographies. At least, I don't!

[chris1]

You presume that you can assemble a list of geo identifiers better than Google or Yahoo can? I think not.

If you read my original post, the first thing it says to do is set up geo-targeted campaigns. So, its not an either/or question. You can have the geo-targeting feature working for you and still take advantag of benefits of what I am proposing. Here are three advantages to having a non-geo-targeted campaign comprised of geo-targeted keywords (in addition to your geo-targeted campaign):

1) Ensure that you get more coverage for your terms (+ volume)
2) More granularity of keyword data (+ ROI)
3) Ability to write better targeted ads that have the specific location searched for in the headline and/or ad text (+ CTR, + quality score, + ROI)