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Oct 17, 2011
181
49
First Name
Dan
Unless you've been living under a rock, you're fully aware of the changes Google has made to Adwords and where they now display, or should I say "no longer display".

I published an article over on the blog - Don’t Worry, No One Clicked on The Sidebar Ads Anyway

In the article, I highlight the changes and why I'm not too worried about it.

I am happy to share how I kept my Cost Per Click in check even though the recent Google SERP change while increasing my market share. Just ask me below.

What do you think of Google removing the paid sidebar ads?
 
"Now that paid search ads are taking up more organic real estate, click-through rates for organic search listings — especially in the first two positions — will probably decrease because the organic results have been pushed farther down the page. Indeed, on mobile, we were already seeing SERPs where no organic listings appeared above the fold.

Since the organic search results will be relegated to further down the list, this will cause more advertisers to get more visibility from the top paid search ads, but it comes at a high cost."
- The real impact of Google’s new paid search ad layout on organic search via SearchEngineLand
 
There are a number of reasons Google could have made the change, but instead of speculating on their intentions, we are more curious what this means for the automotive industry and more specifically how it will affect dealer’s paid search campaigns.

Cost per Click is going to Increase
If I was going to make a guess as to why Google made the change, I would probably say this has a lot to do with it. Since Google is reducing the amount of real estate, our theory is the cost for each position is going up. It’s hard to say how much CPC will increase, but we expect it to happen gradually over time.

More Focus on Cost per Conversion
This change is a reminder that it’s Google’s world and we just live in it. If the CPC increases, as we believe it will, the amount of traffic your current budget will generate is going to reduce. While one logical strategy would be to double the current marketing budget, that is unlikely to happen. As an industry we will need embrace the new normal and learn to focus more on conversion metrics. By placing more emphasis on what it costs to generate a lead through paid search, we can worry less about the cost of each click.

Long-Tail Search Campaigns are More Important

Almost as a sub-point to necessary swim lanes, agencies and dealers are going to have to get A LOT better at creating and optimizing effective long-tail campaigns. There won’t be nearly as much competition for these terms so cost will decrease and viability will increase. Furthermore, everyone is going to have to be more creative about the types of searches we are targeting, think parts & service. The challenge will be managing the number of campaigns against the budget.

Paid Search for Conquest Just Got Challenging
If you thought using paid search for conquest was difficult before, try it with one third of the ad space. This may turn out to be so cost prohibitive that it is not just a viable tactic anymore. Or, it may just be a challenge to find more creative avenues to generate conquest traffic.

More Emphasis on Organic Rankings
Two things are going to happen that will increase emphasis on organic traffic. One is cost, which we have aptly covered here, the second is less distraction. With only four ads taking attention away from the user, we believe the CTR on organic listings could increase. Don’t post the obituary yet, it appears that SEO is not dead after all.

Bing Could Win Big
Depending on how Bing reacts to Google’s changes, they could end up being the big winner here. We are already an advocate of the Bing Ad Network due to the lower costs and higher conversion rates, but Google may be forcing us to spend even more money on Bing.

Impression Share as a KPI Could Change
We use impression share as a way to measure the effectiveness of our campaigns. Because real estate is going to be reduced so drastically, we may need to re-evaluate what we consider to be an effective impression share.

Google Search Partners
As of late, we are using less and less of the Google Search Partners Network. The metrics don’t justify their inclusion. With this reduction in ad space, however, we will have to test changes to ad engagement and costs to see if they are now a more viable option.

Source: http://strongautomotive.com/adwords-update-reduces-ad-space
 
"Now that paid search ads are taking up more organic real estate, click-through rates for organic search listings — especially in the first two positions — will probably decrease because the organic results have been pushed farther down the page. Indeed, on mobile, we were already seeing SERPs where no organic listings appeared above the fold.

Since the organic search results will be relegated to further down the list, this will cause more advertisers to get more visibility from the top paid search ads, but it comes at a high cost."
- The real impact of Google’s new paid search ad layout on organic search via SearchEngineLand
Yes
 
Google Search Partners
As of late, we are using less and less of the Google Search Partners Network. The metrics don’t justify their inclusion. With this reduction in ad space, however, we will have to test changes to ad engagement and costs to see if they are now a more viable option.

In all of my years I've never found the search partners to offer any value whatsoever. 10 years ago it was companies like Oingo pushing domain traffic at full-CPC prices, and with the inclusion of mobile the value is further diluted. Clearly this doesn't apply to GDN, only search. A lot can be done with GDN partners, I just wouldn't say paying full pop for partner "search" traffic has ever been valuable, at least in the lead gen industry I was a part of.