Rethinking AdWords Data within Google Enhanced Campaigns

Big news: Alex Trebek is turning 73 years old on July 22! The Canadian-born Jeopardy! trivia master has hosted the show for more than 29 years. His birthday also falls on another monumental time in history: the launch of Google’s enhanced campaigns.

When Google first announced its new AdWords “enhanced campaign” type last January, digital marketers around the globe responded with severe disdain for one particular reason. In its early stages, enhanced campaigns effectively forced advertisers onto mobile devices with a maximum adjusted bid of less than 90% of desktop bids.

For example, if you set a maximum cost-per-click (CPC) of $5.00/click for a keyword like “cooking classes” to be shown on a regular desktop computer, then you would also be forced to pay $0.50/click for that same keyword to be shown on any mobile device as well. Said another way, a $5.00 click on a Dell becomes a $0.50 click on an iPhone.

Sometime in May, Google decided to appease advertisers and allow up to 100% mobile bid adjustments. This effectively disables any mobile clicks from occurring in desktop campaigns, but the uproar doesn't end there. Enhanced campaigns still lock marketers into advertising on tablets without any bid adjustment option. Google's concession also doesn't allow for dedicated mobile campaigns.

However, enhanced campaigns also bring forth various new features, including assorted bid adjustments, enhanced ad extensions, and flexible bidding options. In the constantly evolving business of paid search marketing, agencies must be prepared to hold search engines accountable for platform “innovations” such as Google's Enhanced Campaigns. At Adpearance, we provide custom reporting solutions to ensure complete transparency and accountability for our clients. In response to the mandatory enhanced campaign upgrade to take place on July 22nd, we have revised our reporting procedures to make sure valuable insights are not left buried in Google's Mastodonic algorithm.

Hopefully, the following hidden reporting gems in AdWords will help you successfully make the leap from being a legacy campaign pro to an enhanced campaign pioneer. (Or in Trebek’s case, a verified genius.)

SEGMENT

The segment dropdown is available in most tabs within the AdWords interface. Within this navigation, Device, Top vs. Other, and Time selections will all help you understand the impact enhanced campaigns have on your account after the upgrade.

Device

The device segment separates each entry into three components—computers, mobile devices with full browsers, and tablets with full browsers. If the switch to enhanced campaigns is inciting your first forte into mobile, you will become good friends with this segmenting method. Use it to gage the traction that your enhanced campaigns are getting at various mobile bid adjustment levels. As an added bonus, customize your columns to include impression share statistics to see how often your ads are showing up for each device.

Top vs. Other

The top vs. other segment is all about ad position. AdWords compares placements directly above the organic results (top) to side and bottom (other) placements. If you plan on taking advantage of new automated bidding options, this segment will help you track ad rankings in relation to average CPC, click-through rate (CTR), ad spend, and more.

Time

The time segment splits the data into easily viewable rows by several available time periods. Selecting “Day” and “Week” will be most helpful in the beginning when you are comparing the performance of your flashy new enhanced campaigns to the legacy ones of yesteryear. If your campaign performance differs greatly, use these other methods listed in this article to troubleshot and optimize your enhanced account.

DIMENSIONS

Out of all the tabs, the dimensions tab is the one everybody loves to hate. It lacks a grand total for just about everything, and there are significantly less customizable column selections available when compared to those in the campaign, ad group, ads, and keywords tabs. Nonetheless, the dimensions tab can be a powerful tool in harvesting data from AdWords. You just need to get used to frequently exporting to Excel if you want to perform any sort of data analysis.

In reference to enhanced campaigns, the “geographic” and “user locations” reports available in the dimensions tab allow you to see what was responsible for triggering your ad and where users are actually located respectively. This can be helpful in deciding bid adjustments by location (10 miles around your business v. statewide) in addition to those made by device (computer v. mobile). If your campaigns are getting traffic from unwanted locales, add them to each of the campaign's location exclusions.

LABELS

Much like the dimensions tab, the use of labels is also a feature that normally flies under the radar. However, labels are a flexible and easy way of aggregating data across different ad groups and campaigns. Say you want to test your hand at the new automated bidding options available with enhanced campaigns. Instead of converting entire ad groups over to automated bidding, select a few top keywords and mark them with a keyword label. Not only will you be able to view their performance in the dimensions tab, but you will also be able to filter by label in the keyword tab as well.

As Google continues to hide more of its settings behind the scenes in order to encourage advertisers to bump up ad spend, AdWords customers will have to keep a close eye on how their ad dollars are being spent. 

Contact Adpearance if you'd like to learn more on how we can lead you through the enhanced upgrade and beyond so you don’t end up in Double Jeopardy!