Organizing Ad Groups for Success

Arrange your keywords and ads properly to help you achieve better results

This is advice taken from Yahoo!’s Smart Start guide, which is packed with helpful content to assist you in making your campaigns as effective as possible. Whether you’re an expert search marketer or just starting out, the tips from Yahoo!’s “Sharon Goodsense” offer practical search marketing insights. Download Smart Start.

You probably know by now that your account is made up of campaigns, which are made up of ad groups, which contain your keywords and ads. It’s kinda like those Russian nesting dolls. You can also think of ad groups as containers for your ads and keywords. The ads in a particular ad group can be displayed to prospective customers searching for or viewing content related to the keywords and/or ads in that same ad group.

While you can have up to 1,000 keywords and 20 ads in a single ad group, we suggest you start out with no more than 20 keywords—paired with two or more ads—and adjust from there.

The way you group your keywords and ads is critical
Put yourself in your customer’s shoes as they search the web. You know what it’s like if you type in a search term and see ads that don’t really match your search. It’s frustrating!

Mismatching ads and keywords can be as bad as leaving the house in plaid shorts and a Hawaiian shirt. It’s just not good for your image, or in this case, your ad’s appeal. If you want your ad to get clicked, you’ve got to pair similar keywords together with relevant ads.

If your ad doesn’t get many clicks, your quality index can be affected. High-quality ads are generally more relevant to searchers and therefore get clicked on more often. And the low-quality ads? Well, they are usually not as appealing or relevant to searchers, making them less likely to receive clicks.

Improve your ad quality by grouping related keywords
If you group your keywords the right way (by themes, such as product or service type, or special offers) and achieve high quality, you could receive a better rank in search results and/or a lower bid.

Putting only related ad groups makes it easier to:

• Write ads that are more specific to your keywords, which can increase the number of clicks you receive.
• Test different landing pages, to see which of your web pages leads to the most conversions or sales.
• Eventually improve your ads’ quality, which could improve their rankings in search results.

Before you create any new campaigns, you should look over your existing campaign and make sure that the ad groups are structured in a way that will benefit your ads’ quality. You might need to move some keywords around, or create smaller ad groups with specific ads.

Good luck matching. You can save the plaid shorts and Hawaiian shirt for your next vacation—or costume party.

— The Smart Start Team