Settings bids with Adwords

[DaveTheGoldfish]

I'll be launching a campaign shortly (working hard to make sure it'll have a good quality score before I actually launch it) and I have a question about setting bids.

I read somewhere that it's better to pay the extra $$ to get in the top 1-3 spots so you can get your CTR up at first, and once you get a ok-great quality score your bids will go down but you'll remain in the top spots.

I was wondering if anyone had any comments/opinions on this?

 

[CShoemaker]

I'll be launching a campaign shortly (working hard to make sure it'll have a good quality score before I actually launch it) and I have a question about setting bids.

I read somewhere that it's better to pay the extra $$ to get in the top 1-3 spots so you can get your CTR up at first, and once you get a ok-great quality score your bids will go down but you'll remain in the top spots.

I was wondering if anyone had any comments/opinions on this?

I would have to say, If you have to ask, you should be using YSM. Atleast to start out for a little while.

However, to answer your question. Yes, that is true.

 

[m0rtal]

As long as you don't bail out as you're losing money you'll be good. You can go from $2 a click to less than $1 for the same position if you stick it out. That's just an example - of course it depends on the niche. But overall you should see a big drop if you have a good ctr for a bit. Don't lower the bids too quickly either.

 

[DaveTheGoldfish]

I would have to say, If you have to ask, you should be using YSM. Atleast to start out for a little while.

However, to answer your question. Yes, that is true.

I was fairly sure that was the case, but I wanted to verify.

I've messed out with YSM before but I don't really agree with starting out with it. It may be cheaper, but I find Adwords so much easier to navigate and really get a proper campaign setup with really targeted ad groups and landing pages. YSM just makes it so difficult and I always found myself starting up sloppy campaigns.

 

[CShoemaker]

I was fairly sure that was the case, but I wanted to verify.

I've messed out with YSM before but I don't really agree with starting out with it. It may be cheaper, but I find Adwords so much easier to navigate and really get a proper campaign setup with really targeted ad groups and landing pages. YSM just makes it so difficult and I always found myself starting up sloppy campaigns.

You can get targeted ad groups with YSM. Landing pages don't matter either. You may be able to navigate around a little easier but since when do the fundamentals of starting a PPC campaign vary from adwords to ysm? You may have different strategies but the basics are the same. Especially when you are just starting out. I seriously suggest starting out with Yahoo first.

 

[Dave33445]

I have found success with a much different(more affordable) strategy for testing. Everyone says to bid high at first, I do not believe in loosing money, ever, when testing, or at any point.

Use position bidding, set to position 1 only and bid the normal amount. You will get almost no traffic day one but you will have a great ctr, slowly add position 2 and 3 while maintaining that high CTR.

Once you have some history, your bids drop FAST, and you can open up more positions.

Hope this helps.

 

[prince]

Everyone says to bid high at first, I do not believe in loosing money, ever, when testing, or at any point.

Use position bidding, set to position 1 only and bid the normal amount.

Ha. If you don't bid high, how do you set your position to #1?

 

[DonDadda]

Ha. If you don't bid high, how do you set your position to #1?

Within adwords there is feature where you can set your position to #1, just do that and set your bid to something very low and you'll be #1 for any keyword. The thing is almost everyone doesn't do it, so you can probably get away with it.

 

[prince]

Within adwords there is feature where you can set your position to #1, just do that and set your bid to something very low and you'll be #1 for any keyword. The thing is almost everyone doesn't do it, so you can probably get away with it.

I'm using position preference myself but be #1 for ANY KEYWORD? If an exact match keyword is worth $4/click to be at #1 on a new account, there's no way you can start bidding at $0.50 and rank #1 can you? Unless I'm missing something.

And also, if you are using 1 keyword/per adgroup - speedppc, how do you mass edit the position preferences for each keyword?

 

[Sticks79]

Except for Mortal & Cshoemaker's couple of posts ...this thread is full of dis-information and douchefucks please ignore it...

And no im not throwing my 2'cs in as there is plenty of good adwords info here already.

 

[hannahmcintyre]

Chalk up another vote for starting with YSM. Conversion rates tend to be higher with Yahoo as well as cheaper bids. Get the campaign working well on Yahoo, then move it to Google to scale when you're doing a great ROI.