Adwords Confusion - Where are these clicks coming from?

[JerDoggMckoy]

Ok, I posted two images showing that my Google Adwords search settings are to receive clicks only from google's search engine, as we are doing testing on keyword behavior with a few specific keywords.

The second image will show that we have somehow 7 total search clicks, but not for any of our specific keywords.

I'm confused. . . and hungry. . . I'm 'confungry'. jk any thoughts are welcomed.

search-1.jpg search-2.jpg

[MarkLoud]

A couple of thoughts. 1) these are unlikely to have come from the display network as they would not show Under the search total, so safe to say your campaign settings are fine. 2) have you deleted any keywords or edited the keywords in any way (even the match type)? If so adwords won't show the clicks against the original keyword, it will clear the stats for the updated keyword and just keep them in the total at the bottom. E.g you had 2 clicks on "blue widget" and you edited the keyword to [blue widget], adwords will clear the 2 clicks alongside the keyword but keep them in the total below. Mark

[JerDoggMckoy]

Thanks Mark, good thoughts. However, I haven't made any changes to the keywords, match types or the ads of this campaign. I did edit the campaign settings late last night, which if tracked by East coast time, it may have been search results from Google's search network maybe, but I still think the keywords would have been identified regarding which ones brought in the clicks.

The clicks are now up to 9 clicks, but still no credited clicks to the keyword phrases. However, I don't know how new this is, but I just noticed that the clicks are now 'accredited by the Media Rating Council', which could mean clicks are coming through, they are just not being considered legitimate and 'chargeable', so maybe that's why they are not being shown or deducted from ad spend. Article is here: https://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/answer.py?hl=en&ctx=tltp&answer=153707

[MarieHaynes]

I find that sometimes there can be a lag in how things are reported in Adwords.  So, perhaps by tomorrow you will see the data as to where those clicks came from?

[MarkLoud]

Also another possibility is that they have been free clicks. I think I have seen this mentioned somewhere in adwords reports, I think it has something to do with when linking your google places account with your campaign - have you done this?

[JerDoggMckoy]

This test campaign is for all states outside of the one we reside in, so we have not attached this specific campaign to our places account.

[JerDoggMckoy]

Yeah, it could be. Thanks for the response. We are now up to 32 phantom clicks for a total cost of $26

[DavidKonigsberg]

We get that sometimes also -it shows up as "other keywords" i just go into analytics and find them that way.

[MarkLoud]

Just another thought, have you tried seeing what your search term report tells you in Adwords as this might show you search terms that have clicks against them that are not showing on the main overiew panel.

Go to the Dimensions tab and change the view to Search Terms and drag that out to Excel.

The other possiblity is that Google has just gone crazy....... had to happen some time

[JerDoggMckoy]

Thanks for all the help everyone! It appears that those supposed 'phantom clicks' are a result of our product listings being added to the campaigns, and those don't get tracked as individual keyword clicks. Here is the exact response I got back from Google for future reference:

"Having reviewed your account, we can see that you have successfully setup
product listing ads for your campaigns. So, the missing clicks are from
the product listing ads. Please note that the keywords do not record any
clicks for product listing ads.

Instead, to view the statistics of the product listing ads, please select
desired campaign and click on 'Auto Targets' tab found beside Ad
Extensions in the central menu bar. This will give you performance
statistics for your product ads."