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Ah! Ok, so on the left hand side of the tool, there is a pop up that says something like "My Keyword Ideas". After you minimize that, there will be 3 boxes for selecting your match type. Select Exact from this list and deselect Broad.

It never used to be like this. There have been many many changes and even more to come here soon. So I wouldn't doubt if it moves location or doesn't work appropriately in the future.

Let me know if for some reason that doesn't work for you either.

gI0BNWr

I'm not aware of any guides specifically discussing what you are looking for, I'm sorry.

However, I am a little concerned about the approach you are taking with your sites. Of course everyone wants to make money from their site with quick turn around, but Moz and the majority of the Moz community are focused on creating audiences and gratifying, consumable content that keeps people coming back for more. I guess you could say we're less Transaction focused and more Lifetime Customer focused. At Distilled, we call this "Making the Internet Awesome".

Regarding your last question concerning the types of tactics people here use, we design and implement strategies that will build relationships with our customer base. The majority of people here are representing their company and their company's services, so they are most likely selling a product. It doesn't sound like your site has a service or product, so it may be difficult to glean the type of information you are seeking.

I would suggest you have a look through the YouMoz & Moz blogs as well as look through the already answered questions here in the topic area that you are interested in researching.

Here's the setup I would do::

Enhanced Campaign: Target Virginia (assuming you service that Richmond)

Adgroup: Richmond Removalists
Keywords: "Richmond" specific keywords (you should use broad modified as well as Phrase & Exact, so:: +Richmond +Removalists, "Richmond Removalists" and [Richmond Removalists])
Ad Copy: Richmond Specific heandline

Adgroup: New Suburb Name
Keywords: New Suburb specific keywords
Ad Copy: New Suburb specific headline

Adgroup: Non Brand, non-suburb specific location
Keywords: nonbrand, no location qualifier
Ad Copy: "Removalists Local to You" or something similar

However, I also see a benefit with city-level targeting at the campaign level. But for ease of time, this way may be best and less complicated to manage if it's not going to be your primary focus in life.

I agree with Martijn. There isn't really one PPC resource but the two he listed are great. The only problem I have with Certified Knowledge is they don't date stamp their blog entries. So the information could be from yesterday, or 8 years ago.

I collaborated on this project and still think that it's a great way to get started understanding how to build & manage PPC campaigns, even though the landscape is changing quite rapidly. It's a step by step guide for small businesses on how to navigate AdWords campaigns and management. Each section links out to a relevant articles so it takes the guesswork out of figuring out where there are valuable resources.

Distilled is also working on creating PPC modules for DistilledU, however that won't help you out right now. I wish I were superwoman and I could have it completely finished for you tomorrow! However, Keep asking PPC questions here. There are several people who manage accounts answering questions and several other people willing to correct them if they are wrong. Moz is still the place to learn from peers.

If you are trying to determine whether or not you should use the Accelerated setting, I would take it off for now - ESPECIALLY while you are learning and understanding subtle nuances. You will see a difference, but set your manager's expectations: You're new and starting out and traffic will fluctuate while you are learning. It's only to be expected.

Hey! This is a common issue between AdWords and GA. Analytics is tracking the number of visits, and AdWords is tracking the number of clicks. I'm not completely up to speed on what qualifies as an actual Visit to GA but it's not the same as what you're paying for. Sometimes when people don't stay long enough to count as a GA defined visit, it won't appear when reviewing traffic sources.

And when you see higher numbers in GA than in AdWords, there are a few other things that could be happening as well. AdWords is always about 4-6 hours behind the real up to date time. So as long as you aren't looking at today only, this shouldn't be a factor. Google also will credit you for what they believe to be fraudulent clicks, so they will also lower your numbers in AdWords.

What kind of variance are you seeing?

Also, you may want to look at the Advertising>AdWords>Campaigns section instead of the Traffic Sources section. I don't know when Analytics starts tracking last non-direct touch (if that's only in the goals or if that's throughout). But as soon as you leave the Advertising tab, things start to get wonky.

Matthew, Joram & Branden have all provided really great answers, and it looks like you're on the right track.

Have you connected your analytics account with your adwords account? Here's how if you haven't yet. I know there's been some redesigning going on insight Analytics, but it should still be the majority of the same information. Might take a bit of trial & error though.

IF you've already set up GA & AW then you should be able to see AdWords conversions filtering into your current goals. Go to the Conversions section, then go to Overview. In the refreshed screen, select by Source / Medium. This will give you a decent idea of how AdWords has been helping.

Generally, I would say that if you don't know how AdWords has been contributing to your bottom line, then I wouldn't increase budget. Are you managing all online marketing for your company?

Hello!

Phil just flagged this up to me. Great Question. The keyword level targeting for video is no where near as specific as Search advertising. I would say even Display Network keywords have more accuracy (which is saying quite a bit about how horrible the YouTube keyword lists are).

Phil's suggestion is excellent. I would do that in addition to taking these steps:

I would first start with a retargeting campaign with video. You can make the list in Analytics and bring it into AdWords.

Then I would make a target group based on Topic & Interest (topic being the content of the video, and interest being interest of the user). You can always go in and see where your ads are appearing and exclude, like the Display Network.

But, the first half of your question was referring to ROI and tracking. It's tricky. You have to override the system. Here's how:

Step 1. Create a mirrored landing page...a version of an existing page which you can direct all video traffic to with an unique URL. eg www.DOMAIN.com/NewLandingPageStep 2. Tweak the GA code (ONLY on the mirrored landing page) to something like this http://www.youtube.com?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=VideoAdsFull example below

var _gaq = _gaq || [];
_gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-123456789-1']);
_gaq.push(['_setDomainName', 'Domain.com']);
_gaq.push(['_setReferrerOverride','http://www.youtube.com?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Video']);
_gaq.push(['_trackPageview']);

(function() {
var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true;
ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js';
var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s);

})();

(no matter how hard I try, this won't format the way I want it to. I'm sorry that looks so shitty)

Regular video traffic from the GDN should be tracked normally but if not then creating a second page and having a different dummy referrer should be easy enough.

This is the hack that one of our Google Reps provided us. I don't have much information on ROI. I haven't dedicated a great amount of time to it (which is something I need to do and figure out this month).

Hope this has helped!

I think with Google's Keyword Tool you need to choose your match type. If you choose broad or phrase, then it will pick up any and all instances of "presonus 16" but if you choose exact, then it won't.

So I think that Google does compile data on the words typed as well as on the suggestions. But I haven't heard of any data that suggests they are willing to be public about how reliant on the data they are. I know for Google Instant Suggest (or whatever it's called) if you click on the suggestion within a second or two the ads don't count that as an impression, so it may be similar to that kind of thing? Google may see the blue linked suggestion click within a specific time as the actual intended search query.

John and Rui have handled the technical aspects of how retargeting is really valuable, but with the number of visitors you have in the retargeting list I'm really curious what other settings you have for this campaign.

How many impressions have been set per unique visitor? 
How low are your bids? I would say keep them at about $1.50 CPC (not CPM) and see how things go. If you're already at this level then you may want to consider increasing your costs a little more.

Yes Retargeting is going to be cheap, but please keep in mind that Click to Conversion is not the only way to track retargeting progress. Be sure to use the View-Through Conversion column as well.

CTRs will always be low because that is the nature of the display network (sometimes getting a .12% CTR is as good as it gets).

Other things you need to pay attention to are how old is your messaging? What is the message you are using for everyone? Do you only have one product and so is one message OK? As John mentioned in his comment - you should have multiple segmented lists from the initial retargeting list. Some people are not ready for a hard sell. Some need to be reminded that you exist first.

Also, what pages are you using for your retargeting code? This will also have a significant impact in how you see returns come in. (Hint: start with Confirmation or Thank You pages first, then slowly build out from there and segment the lists accordingly)

Google wants there to be a completely fair way to bid on keywords that you are not SEO-perfect for. CPC can be used as a general indicator for competitiveness of the industry, but it's not directly considered when ranking.

oh! ok

I dunno, I think that sounds pretty normal. I would only start cutting keywords out if they were high cost, no return.

So since you work in a really niche market, and if you want to test the theory of "buy X" v just "X", then I would request incremental budget from marketing to run a 2-3 week test on your major head terms on broad match. then look at the search query report for only that keyword during that test time to get some new ideas for keywords to target.

Yes to what Dave said.

"big broad terms are expensive and usually have a higher Cost Per Conversion. Long-tails are more specific, cheaper and lead to more conversions."

The term "widget" is a big, broad term.
The term "best widget for email" is long-tail.

What types of widgets are you selling? Some example modifiers could be

desktop widget
Mail widget
Best mail widget
Best widget for email
Android widget for mail

Does this help clarify?

Yes to what David & Dave have said.

To add, I think you should also not be targeting the term "widget" so generally. "buy" probably isn't the best modifier you could use, or the best use of your time if you have a lengthy list of one word keywords.

I would hope that you are advertising on more keywords than just broad head terms, like "HP" "Windows" "Widget" "Tech" "Money" "word" -- i went a little off topic there, but I'm sure you get the point.

You should rely minimally on big, broad terms like these but instead,  target longer 2-4 word phrases more frequently. It will improve your CPC and overall ROI.

When you are setting up your columns in the Keywords tab, there should be an addtional "Destination URL" option. You can pull this column to the top of the list (for ease of sight) and assign a specific URL to the keyword.

You can also do this in the AdWords Editor which for me is easier than dealing with the interface.

Hey! This is really common, and something I deal with a lot.

AdWords is First-Touch Attribution based. Meaning that no matter how someone got back to your site, AdWords will still claim the conversion for itself.

So if someone browses through to your site like so:
Paid > Organic > Organic > Paid > Direct
the first paid search click is going to receive the credit for the conversion, in AdWords' eyes.

So yes, your affiliate cookie is being dropped because someone is most possibly coming back to the site through a different channel.

The best way to look at this is to check out the Multi-channel funnels in GA to see if there is a higher percentage of profits being attributed to AdWords at the first-click level.

This would be my first guess, but there are several other pieces that could be broken. I don't think it's broken, but if this theory doesn't work out, I'm happy to troubleshoot other possibilities.

I agree with this.

However, you should not be bidding for 1st position with the highest bids possible. 1st position costs 25% more than 3rd position and doesn't necessarily have an arguable CTR or Conversion rate.

What keyword types are you advertising on? This is going to make a SUBSTANTIAL difference in how much you are spending.

Are your keywords major head terms for "HP Printer" or are they a little more focused like "Refurbished Laserjet Printer" -- as this second one is probably not as broad as the first, the chances are higher that it will cost less.

But the specifics of your account aside, what is it you are ultimately using AdWords for? Are you research or ROI focused? Because if this is going to stick around a little longer than a one time test, we need to discuss your processes to lower costs over the lifetime of the account.

My colleague Kristina Kledzik wrote a really strong post about how to integrate PPC into your online marketing strategy, and one of the major CTAs toward the end was "Don't give up. Try it for at least 6 months" before you can determine that PPC isn't profitable.

The takeaway is that PPC is hard work, and to make the best decisions for your business you're going to need to dedicate a lot of mental space to making sure it runs smoothly. You don't have to spend a lot over your test times, but you do have to be committed to attempting to make keywords work.

Hey Stephanie,

I can confirm that David is correct. If you don't have an account rep, just call AdWords and let them know you're interested in seeing if you can be added to the beta. I believe it's open.

Just so you know, when you sign up for a beta, you don't get the data in AdWords ad extensions section (or at least this is how it was a while back). I would suggest, depending on the requirements for the beta, creating a new form specifically for AdWords and tagging it in your mail client. That way you can at least know how it's working before you dive in.