Download URL Tagging Tool - Google Analytics

Download the free URL tagging tool for Google Analytics






If you're using Google Analytics, I've created for you a free tool that will easily manually tag your destination URL. It's an Excel sheet that generates customized URL to help you track your online campaigns (banners, emails, non-AdWords PPC campaigns, etc.).

You can find it here.

Campaign tracking allows you to properly gauge the success of various ad campaigns.
If you don’t use campaign tracking, Google Analytics may not know how a user reached your site. And you won’t know what marketing effort helped the visitor reach your site.

Why tagging your campaigns' destination URL?

• Find how your visitors arrived to your website.
• Differentiate between organic and CPC
• Organic is tracked automatically
• Destination URLs must be tagged to identify CPC
• Did they come from Google, Yahoo, or MSN
• Did they come by PPC, or Email

You will find more information about campaign tracking here.

AdWords Editor Shortcuts

If you are an AdWords advertiser, you may already use AdWords Editor (if you don't, I can only advise to do so! http://www.google.com/intl/en/adwordseditor/

So here are the main shortcuts for AdWords Editor. Print and keep them at hand when you're optimizing your AdWords campaigns or launching new ad groups!

Ctrl+O Open account
Ctrl+R Get recent account changes
Ctrl+S Post changes
Ctrl+A Select all items in data view
Ctrl+Z Revert selected changes
Delete key Delete items
Ctrl+C Copy
Ctrl+X Cut
Ctrl+V Paste
Ctrl+K Add keyword
Ctrl+Shift+K Add multiple keywords
Ctrl+L Add negative keyword
Ctrl+Shift+L Add multiple negative keywords
Ctrl+M Add campaign negative keyword
Ctrl+Shift+L Add multiple campaign negatives
Ctrl+T Add text ad
Ctrl+Shift+T Add multiple text ads
Ctrl+G Add ad group
Ctrl+N Add campaign
Crtl+D Add draft campaign
Ctrl+W Exit Editor
Tab Switches between tree view, data view & edit panel
Ctrl+PageUp/Down If cursor is on the tab names (keywords, text ads …), then switches between tabs

AdWords Optimization - Optimize ROI

The first thing we need to know when we are talking about ROI is what ROI is. ROI stands for Return on Investment. But simply put, ROI is how much money you're making after you pay your advertising costs.

What is Return on Investment (ROI) Analysis?
ROI is a comparison of benefits to cost expressed as a percentage of the original investment. Advertisers measure ROI by taking the advertising cost and dividing over a specified conversion.

Common ways of measuring ROI are:

• Cost per conversion
• $10 cost per conversion

• Conversion Rate
• Click to conversion ratio of 2.5%
  

• Conversion value
• $10 in sales for every $2 spent on advertising

What is a conversion?
A conversion is a desired action performed by an end user. Tracking conversions allows you to understand the effectiveness of your advertising.

Common Types of Conversions
Acquisitions – Cost per Acquisition (CPA)
Orders – Cost per Order (CPO)
Registrations – Cost per Registration (CPR)
Leads – Cost per Lead (CPL)
Page Views – Cost per Page Views (CPV)
Sales – Cost per Sale (CPS)
Transactions – Cost per Transaction (CPT)


ROI Techniques for Keywords
Identify KWs falling within target Cost Per Conversion

• What are the top converting words?

• What are the top traffic words?

• What are the most cost-effective words?

• Expand the list of performing KWs to leverage success

• Synonyms, related terms, plurals, spelling variations, etc.

• Ensure top performing keywords are not being limited by daily budget

Identify KWs falling outside target Cost Per Conversion

• Try to isolate factors that are negatively affecting underperforming KWs

• Add negatives, review match types

• Ensure underperforming keywords are not monopolising budget

• Reduce amount of impressions being dedicated to these keywords

• Consider lowering bids to improve ROI

Other things that will affect ROI within keywords:

• Add specific to extremely specific terms
• Brand names, Product ID Numbers
  

• Add conversion focused words
• Buy, purchase, order, rent
  

• Separate spenders from bargain hunters
• Add negatives: Free, cheap, discount
  

• Separate shoppers from researchers
• Add negatives: reviews, how to, prices, trailers, what is
  

• Scrub keyword list for relevant keywords that are not found on the site
• You currently have keyword ‘motorola phones’ but you only sells ‘nokia phones’
  

AdWords Optimization - Optimize Traffic

When we are talking about traffic, we are talking about two different things. First, increasing traffic can mean increasing the number of impressions an ad is showing on. It also can mean increasing the number of clicks an ad is getting for their existing impressions. For the purpose of this section, when we talk about increasing traffic, we mainly mean increasing the number of impressions an ad can show on. Increasing the number of clicks per impressions would fall under CTR. However, when we are increasing traffic, we usually can help them increase the number of impressions and help increase the number of clicks per impression to impact overall traffic numbers even more.

To optimize keywords for a traffic goal, the most important point is to think of new, unique keywords. Not variations of keywords you already have. For example, if you are running on the broad matched keyword ‘dog toy’ and you add the keyword ‘cheap dog toy’ – that is not giving you new impressions. You would be serving on that query already, you are just moving the impressions you are already getting to new keywords. When you want to increase traffic on a term, you need to think of synonyms, abbreviations, etc that woudn’t be triggering your ad – like ‘puppy toy’ and ‘canine toy’.

Look for products on your site that are not currently being advertised – perhaps you are running on ‘dog toy’ keywords, but not your ‘chew toy’ category or your ‘dog bone’ category.

Do not remove existing keywords!!!! Remember, if you have a goal of increasing traffic, it means you are happy with the traffic you are already getting and just want more of it. It is very easy, once you have learned the best practices of optimization, to get your hands on a site and start weeding out keywords you don’t think work for you. Maybe you think they are too general, or irrelevant. Whenever you first devise your strategy, you should always be doing it with your goal in mind. If your goal is to increase traffic, and you remove keywords – are you meeting your goal?

Along the same lines, you do not want to focus on negative keywords. If you are happy with your current traffic and you add 100 negatives that cut your number of impressions in half – are you meeting your goal? If you are adding negative keywords, it will typically only be for keywords you are adding. Since you are adding new impressions, a negative keywords will just reduce the amount you are adding, it won’t reduce the overall number of impressions for that Ad Group. Just focus on high level negatives – only removing what is completely irrelevant. If a query is related at all to the theme of the Ad Group, don’t add it as a negative. For example, if you are adding the keyword ‘dog’ and you are selling dog toys, then you would add negatives like ‘pictures’, because a picture of a dog is completely unrelated to a real dog. But you wouldn’t add anything relevant to a real dog, or real dog owner who may be drawn to my dog toy ad.

• Look to build impressions by looking for keywords you aren’t using on the landing page.
  

• Always add all plurals and singulars of all keywords.

• Look for synonyms and other related keywords (abbreviations, full version of acronyms, etc)

• Add industry specific terms

• Product or brand name

• Common misspellings – only need to add major misspellings, ones where you aren’t even sure what is right. For example, ‘accommodation’ vs. ‘accomodation’ and ‘cannon’ vs. ‘canon’