Ryan McMillan

So I was just reading the Google Adwords Blog and it would seem that there are some changes coming down the pike…and it looks like some BIG ones.

Google is targeting these three changes during in update in the coming weeks:

• Quality Score will be more accurate
• Keywords will no longer be marked as “inactive for search”
• The minimum bid price will be GONE.

Here’s more information to the Adwords changes.

Quality Score Accuracy:

Google is going to replace the “per-keyword” quality score metric with one that will dynamically evaluate an ad’s quality each and every time a search is performed.

Keywords no longer being marked as “inactive for search”

The new dynamic quality score for ads and keywords means that the dreaded “inactive for search” is going BYE BYE. Now, all keywords will have a CHANCE of being shown for search queries on Google and the Search network, however they noted that the former “inactive for search” keywords are not very likely to show since the new Quality Score per-query metric and bid probably will not be high enough for this past low performing keywords.

Minimum Bid = RIP

Again with the changes to the per-keyword quality score moving to a more dynamic system, Google is no longer going to be giving a minimum bid for each keyword. They are replacing that with some much more meaningful to advertisers. First Page Bid! This will be an estimate of the amount you need to bid to get on the first page for a given keyword. This will take into account the keyword, your ad’s Quality Score and the current competition for that keyword.

Now I’ve been an Adwords Advertiser for about two years now, and I’ve seen a lot of changes come down. I have to say that these particular changes really excite me for a couple of reasons.

By giving keywords and ads a quality score dynamically, this will allow your ads to run at the most ideal times and on the keywords and search partner sites that perform best for you. This will allow your ads to be shown “in the right place at the right time” thus ultimately giving the searcher more relevant ads for their query and increasing your click through rate on your ads. To take this even a step further this will probably lower your bids even more for your best performing keyword/ad combination.

Since your keywords are now given a dynamic or “on-the-fly” quality score, this will in effect re-activate your previously DEAD keywords. There is an outside chance that during a search by a user your keyword/ad/landing page combination could be the most relevant to the search, even if it had been previously deemed not worthy. This is a chance to get those non-performing keywords back into action!

The Adwords Minimum Bid is DEAD! THANK YOU GOOGLE! This has been a really unhelpful number for advertisers. The minimum bid was just that - a minimum bid to activate your keyword. Now this did not guarantee the ad would even run, and if it did it might have been buried 10 pages deep worth of ads and would never get any impressions. By telling us what we need to bid to reach page #1, this is incredibly useful for PPC advertisers so we can get our ads shown quickly.

Love to hear your thoughts about the upcoming Adwords QS changes…drop me a line below in the comments.