Micro Marketing

Optimizing for Microsoft adCenter

Different Search Engines Require Different Tactics

Let’s be candid. It’s no secret that Microsoft’s share of total search engine queries is a fraction of Google’s. I think I can safely speak for all Microsoft employees that we wish it were otherwise, but there it is. We may convert at a higher rate, and often at a lower cost, but there’s no denying the difference in traffic volume between the two engines.

The costs associated with campaign management
make advertising to the thin end of the long tail
less attractive and less profitable.

Given the disparity in query share, advertisers typically optimize their pay per click campaigns for Google and then export them with little change to adCenter. It may economize on campaign management but it doesn’t always optimize for the distinctly different character of Microsoft’s traffic. In other words, you may be leaving a pile of money on the table.

When the Long Tail is Short

Everyone's heard of the long tail. Loosely translated, it means low volume sales can still be profitable if a lot of different items are sold. In search, that means campaigns with huge keyword inventories where each keyword receives precious little traffic individually. In aggregate that traffic becomes substantial.

The profitability of the long tail assumes a low cost of sales. In the real world there is a substantial difference in the investment of time required to run a campaign with a thousand keywords or a half million. Here's a short list:

• Keyword research (positive and negative)
• Configuring URLs with tracking parameters
• Refreshing creative
• Bid management for ad position
• Segmenting traffic by demographic, geographic, and day part
• Bid boosting for qualified traffic
• Optimizing CTR and CPA
• Identifying highest value leads
• Testing changes to landing pages
• Analyzing web analytic data by PPC keyword

And that's the short list!

The costs associated with campaign management make advertising to the thin end of the long tail less attractive and less profitable. Long tail tactics often make more economic sense on Google than on Microsoft.

Microsoft represents an opportunity to bid
aggressively on more general keywords.

Microsoft may have less traffic than Google but, as I’ve said, it tends to be profitable traffic. The difference in conversion rates is dependent upon market vertical (your mileage may vary) but it is consistent. In other words, Microsoft's traffic shouldn't be ignored, just treated differently.

Optimizing for Microsoft adCenter

I don’t want to discourage you from exporting your Google campaigns to adCenter but I’d suggest you favor your core keywords—keywords with high volume and high CTR. (The high volume ensures the keyword is a head term, the high CTR ensures it’s a keyword relevant to your business.) With the discrepancy in query share, your long tail terms on Google might not be worth the cost of maintenance on Microsoft. And if you don't maintain them, if you don't continually refresh and optimize your campaigns, they're going to be less effective no matter which search engine you use to advertise.

Secondly, Microsoft represents an opportunity to bid aggressively on more general keywords—one or two words with broad match type enabled—qualifying your traffic with negative keywords, a clear value proposition in your creative, targeting, and bid boosting.

With Google, focus on the long tail of the snake.
With Microsoft, focus on the head. In all cases,
avoid getting bitten.

Let’s say, for example, you're an online florist. On Google you've bid conservatively in the past, typically on keyword strings of three or four words, typically with exact match but sometimes daring to use phrase match, your ads placing somewhere near the bottom of the second page but often pushed to the third or even fourth page. Now you want more—more impressions, more clicks, more sales. More, more, more! (Queue the maniacal laughter.)

You're thinking about bidding on the keyword "flowers." You're not Flowers-R-Us, however. Aggressively bidding on Google for a first page ad placement on such a general keyword would likely devour your monthly budget in a matter of hours like some necrotizing fasciitis (flesh-eating bacteria, for the rest of us). The lower volume on Microsoft, however, might make it more manageable and the higher conversion ratio might make it more profitable. Again, your mileage may vary.

The Bottom Line

With Google, focus on the long tail of the snake. With Microsoft, focus on the head. In all cases, closely monitor your key performance indicators (CTR, conversion rate, and cost per acquisition) to avoid getting bitten.

Increasing the number of impressions for your head terms, even on Microsoft, may also reduce your CTR or increase the number of unqualified clicks, neither of which is desirable. There are several techniques you can use on any engine to qualify your traffic and some unique to Microsoft. I’ll cover those in my next post.

Technorati Tags: SEM,SEA,PPC,search engine marketing,search engine advertising,pay per click,Google,Microsoft adCenter,long tail,CTR,conversion rate,cost per acquisition,qualifying traffic,Charles Thrasher