Hi Everybody! (bonus points for anyone who read that in Dr. Nicks voice.) Is it Monday already? Well last week I talked about composing a solid keyword list. This week I’m going to go deeper in detail about keywords and keyword matching options. Keyword matching options allow you to control how precise a user’s search must be to trigger your ad. Remember, the more targeted your keywords are, the more likely you’re likely to reach potential customers. There are four matching options for you to choose from; broad match, phrase match, exact match, and negative match.
Broad match keywords are your default setting. Broad match is pretty simple. If you enter a keyword in without any punctuation, it’s a broad match keyword. These keywords produce the most impressions and will get your ad seen by more people. The problem is that is usually a vague word/phrase and will produce a lot of clicks, but those clicks might be untargeted traffic which will not result in conversions.
Phrase match keywords are entered by adding quotations ( “ “ ) around the word or phrase. Meaning your ad will only trigger if someone search has the exact words in the exact order. If your keyword was “free games,” the search for free download games would not show your ad. Phrase match options are fantastic for question based searches. The phrase “engagement rings” would be shown for searches like “How much are engagement rings” and “cleaning engagement rings.”
The exact match option is entered by putting square brackets around the phrase. ( [ ] ) Exact match option means that only search queries with the exact words/phrase without any additional words or letters before, between, or after the keyword will trigger your ad. Example: The exact match [cheap video games] means that only a search of “cheap video games” would trigger your ad. A search for “where can I find cheap video games” or “cheap video games for sale” would not trigger your ad. Exact match tends to not get as many clicks but the resulting traffic will increase your click-through rate. Having you enter every possible combination of words/phrases you want to trigger your ad is more time consuming and could restrict some traffic if you have forgotten to include something.
Finally negative keywords, WOO HOO! Negative keywords are words that prevent your ad from appearing and are entered by using a minus sign ( – ) before the word. If you sell used video games on your website, negative keywords can help you immensely. A good negative keyword would be –free. That way for any search that is for “free used games” your ad will not be triggered.
It’ll take some time and effort but if you learn the advantages and disadvantages to the keyword matching options it will greatly improve your online PPC campaign.
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