Knowing Right from Wrong

5 secrets for managing keywords in your account

Picking keywords can be a daunting task. After all, how do you know which ones will work before you start using them?

The keys to success here are to experiment with a variety of keywords, and to craft a strategy that reflects what you offer and attracts your target customers. The Customer Solutions representatives I work with on a daily basis often work with advertisers who have gone down the wrong keyword path, and they’re very skilled at helping them get back on track. So it was only logical that I ask them for best practices when managing keywords. Here are their five secrets:

1. Consider Your Customer
There are two kinds of shopping searchers. First you have the window shoppers, who are just starting their search, are browsing different models, comparing prices and haven’t yet made a decision. Then there are those who are ready to buy. These searchers will most likely search on a specific model, and are looking for the lowest price and perks like free shipping.

When you are putting together a campaign, put yourself in the searcher’s shoes. Focus less on what you have to promote, and more on exactly who your target audience is, what they are searching for, how they are searching for it, and what they might type into a search box to find it. Consider all the facts about your purchase events, then work backward through the process to determine the keywords buyers would likely use.

2. Go High and Low
Many advertisers use both expensive, high-volume keywords and low-volume, “long tail” keywords. To make account management easier, we recommend using separate ad groups for high-volume and low-volume keywords.

Why? If you have a mix of high- and low-volume keywords in the same ad group, it may hurt your quality index score, which is based on the performance of the ad group as a whole. Also, using separate ad groups will make it easier to see which ads and keywords are working, and which aren’t.

3. Try Branding and Niche Marketing
High-volume keywords offer the opportunity for branding efforts, because you could receive a bunch of impressions but a lower click-through rate. As you know, with Sponsored Search, you don’t pay for impressions, so you can use them in part simply to get your name into the eyeballs of prospective customers. Low-volume keywords don’t offer the same branding potential, but their conversion rates can be higher.

4. Know the Wrong Keywords
Just because you offer a certain product or service does not mean you should bid on that term.

For example, consider an advertiser that sells all kinds of karaoke equipment. This advertiser bids on the term “subwoofer” — but the reality is that most people searching for a subwoofer aren’t going to buy it from a karaoke dealer, so these may be wasted clicks. If this advertiser really wanted to find subwoofer customers, adding a modifier to the keyword (example: “karaoke subwoofer”) might be helpful, so people know up front what is being offered, rather than having to click to find out that it’s not what they want.

5. Don’t Ignore the Obvious
Sometimes the most obvious keywords are the ones that advertisers end up forgetting, such as bidding on their brand name, domain name and variations thereof. If someone hears or sees your company name somewhere and can’t remember the exact wording, they may type in a phonetical spelling hoping to find your site. So you’ll have to think like a customer to figure out what they’ll type.

Tools You Can Use
Yahoo! offers a collection of tools to help you come up with keyword ideas. By clicking on the “+Add Keywords” link, you will get a drop-down menu with three options for adding keywords: Quick Add, Quick List and Research Keywords. You can get more info on these handy tools in our Help Center.

— Kastle Waserman, Communications Manager