General Keywords: How They Hurt, and How They Can Help.

I’ve noticed lately, more than usual, that some of our advertisers are bidding on terms that are broad in nature. What I mean by that is that they add keywords to their campaigns because they are relevant to their content, but are so general that they attract a variety of untargeted clicks.

For example, if an advertiser has a website that promotes facial skin nourishment products, and bids on the keyword “health,” they may receive every search from “pet health care,” to “minister of health Canada.” This is not going to help an advertiser. Not only do surfers reach the site and then quickly click away, but the advertiser is charged for that click, regardless of relevancy and time spent on the site.

Another example is someone who does this with several keywords. An advertiser who was promoting file management software selected keywords like “document,” “the document,” “business,” and “investment.” These are terms that brought a litany of clicks that had nothing to do with the offer the advertiser had.

A common occurrence is the phone call I get from advertisers investigating their campaign. An advertiser might launch a campaign, look at their stats, and be pleased with their activity. They collect a certain amount of clicks, but no conversions. I’ll examine their clicks through our keyword report, and see the actual searches they have received, and the majority of their clicks have nothing to do with what they are promoting.

This being said, I’m not going to say these are keywords that should not be added. If a keyword can allow you to gain more traffic and is relevant to your content, I would add it too. An advertiser can use these terms, but to get the best use of them, especially if you have a unique product, is to optimize the keyword and campaign. Let me share with you some suggestions:

Add negative keywords. I’ve written about negative keywords before, but their basic function is to help filter away irrelevant clicks from reaching your site. If you have a keyword or phrase that could connected to other types of searches, negative keywords can prevent those types of “crossover clicks” from reaching your site. For example, a person promoting a building window repair site and uses the keyword “window repair,” might receive searches for computer related issues like “registry window repair Microsoft,” or “browser error window repair computer.” This is what I refer to as the “keyword Venn diagram.” Two separate concepts, linked together by a single commonality. It is often a good idea to consider how your keyword might be intertwined with another concept. This is where negative keywords come in. In this example, the negative keywords that this person would add could be “registry,” “computer,” or “error.” This can help to block those clicks from adding up in your account.

Adjust your keyword match. Our default keyword match is broad match, our least targeted match. If you combine that with a keyword that is already broad in nature, you will get a lot of clicks which may not do anything for you. For example, if you are running a singles dating site, and decide to bid on the keyword “girl,” you could easily receive hundreds of clicks for all sorts of things. However, if you feel that the keyword could help you, you could change the keyword match to our next keyword matches, phrase or exact. These will cut down the amount of traffic that the keyword receives, but you may still benefit from its traffic by attracting clicks that are more targeted and relevant to your content. This is also a scenario where negative keywords could be very helpful.

Use our keyword report. This report under the reports tab in your account allows you to see the actual searched terms that the keyword received. Having this information allows you to determine how a keyword is performing for you and if it needs adjustment. If you have general keywords, this report could become your new best friend. This will let you know what terms the keyword has attracted, creating options for negative keywords to add to your campaign.

Adjust your bidding. If your keyword is general, you may not have to bid very high in order to maintain your traffic. The keyword itself most likely produces traffic at a high volume, and by bidding at our recommended minimum of $0.05, you could gain a healthy flow of traffic at a lower price. This will also prevent you from sinking a lot of your budget into one keyword.

If all of this doesn’t help, don’t be afraid to delete. It may help keep the campaign from sinking. Sometimes you just have to let a man go. This is for the good of your budget and your site.

I hope you find this helpful. Please let me know what you think by leaving a comment below.