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Instagram is cutting back on its shopping features

Written on September 9, 2022 at 7:34 am, by admin

Instagram is planning to scale back on its shopping features to focus more on e-commerce efforts that directly drive advertising.

A change in priorities. In an internal memo this week Instagram staffers were told that the Shopping page would eventually disappear “given shifts in company priorities.” The memo states that Instagram isn’t going to abandon shopping altogether, but instead test a simpler, less personalized version of the page known as “Tab Lite.”

TikTok Lite. Instagram has come under criticism as of late for focusing too much on Reels and short-form videos, giving the platform more of a TikTok feel rather than the photo-sharing app it used to be. Celebrities like Kylie Kardashian made headlines when she shared a post urging Instagram to “stop trying to be like TikTok.”

There is a petition on Change.org to “Make Instagram Instagram Again.”

Will Instagram retreat. According to Reuters, this latest effort is an attempt by Instagram to move away from some of its longer-term projects to double down on video.

Why we care. Advertisers and brands who relied heavily on Instagram shopping features may need to find another way of promoting their products. Tough there is no word on when the changes will take effect, advertisers should start preparing for the changes as soon as possible.

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4 tips to get the most out of the Google Ads interface

Written on September 8, 2022 at 4:25 am, by admin

Nora Ephron tells the story of when she first fell in love with journalism. 

Her journalism teacher, Mr. Simms, asked the class to write the lead for an article using these facts:

 “Kenneth L. Peters, the principal of Beverly Hills High School, announced today that the entire high school faculty will travel to Sacramento next Thursday for a colloquium in new teaching methods. Among the speakers will be anthropologist Margaret Mead, college president Dr. Robert Maynard Hutchins, and California governor Edmund ‘Pat’ Brown.”

The class followed the “who / what / where / when / why” rubric they’d learned to create leads about the colloquium and its agenda, all of which Mr. Simms rejected.

The lead, he finally explained, was “There will be no school on Thursday.”

That was when Ephron learned that “the point” was more important than the details.

With that in mind, if the Google Ads interface were in a journalism course, it’d probably fail.

The charts and tables in Google Ads provide an overwhelming amount of facts and data, but don’t distinguish between high and low importance. Instead, the interface jumbles everything together, often leaving out key information and focusing on the trivial.

In this article, you’ll learn how to turn that around.

Even though the “factory settings” bury the lead, key details reveal the hook of your data story hidden in the Google Ads interface.

Fire up your Google Ads account, and let’s dive in.

1. Un-bury the lead

Just like young Ephron and her journalism classmates, Google Ads will give you a lot of details without ever getting to the point.

Your mission is to find what matters most, and make that the focus of your tables and charts. 

If you feel overwhelmed just looking at all the data and metrics in the Google Ads interface, start here:

Fix your overview summary card

The summary card in your overview page features unimportant metrics by default.

Here we see a card with clicks, impressions, CPC, and cost. Most likely, none of these are your most important metrics, so why would you feature them on an overview card?

How to fix the overview summary card

• Click the drop-down arrow next to each metric to change it.
• Click the background of the scorecard to toggle between adding or removing it from the chart.
• Click the three dots in the upper right corner to change the date segment or download the data.

Simply switching your metrics to your key performance indicators (KPIs) already makes the card much more useful. 

Most clients don’t care how many clicks they got, but they care very much that they drove $25 million in revenue, and how that metric is trending. 

Setting your card to reflect your KPIs helps you know whether you’re on track to hit your targets, and where to dig deeper.

Fix your statistics table

As with the overview summary card, the statistics tables in the Google Ads interface aren’t calibrated to help you find the point.

In English, we read left to right, so the most important metrics should be on the left.

But are they?

If looking at your metrics in the interface makes your eyes glaze over, you probably don’t have your columns organized correctly.

How to add and arrange columns

• Click on Columns and select Modify columns from the drop-down.
• Modify or customize columns to reflect your key metrics.
• Reorder columns to lead with the most important.
• Hit Apply to save.

While modifying columns isn’t a deep secret of the Google Ads interface, it will give you a huge edge in your account optimization if you aren’t doing it already.

Reviewing a statistic table setup like this makes it almost impossible to know what to do next:

After arranging the columns and adding a time period comparison, it’s a different story:

You can immediately tell which campaigns are performing well, compared to each other and compared to last year. 

Prioritize the most important info to make better decisions in the account, and prevent that feeling of dread when you’re just staring at data but have no idea what to do next.

2. Decouple your conversion actions

We’ve established that prioritizing Google Ads conversions in the interface will make it easier for you to optimize.

But not all conversions are created equal.

That’s because “conversions” aren’t a standardized metric, and can refer to different actions with different values for your business.

Any of these can be tracked as a conversion in Google Ads:

• A sale
• A page view
• A download
• A phone call
• A link click

It’s up to the advertiser to define which actions are tracked as conversions, but by default, all conversions are rolled up and reported on as a single activity.

Here we see a Google Ad statistics table with 358 conversions, for a nice CPA of only $5.19:

But what exactly are the conversions that are shown here?

To find out, go to Segment and select Conversions > Conversion action.

It turns out that less than 4% of conversions were actually for booked demos, the company’s primary KPI. The remaining 96% of conversions were page views (About Us, View Pricing) which were automatically imported into the account and tracked as conversions:

The actual CPA for a booked demo isn’t $5 but $142. ($1,857 divided by 13 demos.)

Applying this segment can help you quickly get to the bottom of which conversions are being tracked and how each performs at a campaign level, so you can fix your tracking or change your optimization strategy.

It may not be the story you want, but it’s the story you need.

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3. Are you really ‘message matching’ (or do you just think you are)?

You know what message match is. It’s when the keyword, ad and landing page are all about the same thing. 

Also known as “congruence,” message match is critical for improving your quality score, boosting your performance, and keeping the attention of your prospects.

But getting every single keyword in alignment with every single ad is no small thing, especially now that responsive search ads (RSAs) introduce so much variation to ad text. (Maybe the keyword matches perfectly on versions 1,2 and 4 but bombs on version 3.)

Here’s how to tell if your keywords and ads are aligned.

Segment your ads by keywords

In your Ad page’s statistics table, go to Segment > Keyword text.

In this view, you’ll play a game of “one of these things is not like the other” to see if all your keywords are performing similarly, or whether there are any outliers.

The table above shows that the brand “promo” ad is doing great on searches for discounts and coupons, but “sales” isn’t driving any sales. Not only that, the CTR is only 7%, which is far below the average 25% for this ad.

So what now?

You could:

• Pause the keyword.
• Edit the ad.
• Create a new ad group that better emphasizes the keyword in the ads.

Any of these options could be the best choice for improved message match, it all depends on the keyword, ads and offer. 

4. If you don’t segment ad extensions, your data will be wrong

Is there any part of the Google Ads interface that’s as misleading as Extensions tables? This table goes beyond “burying” the lead and makes it disappear completely.

For example, let’s pop in to check on how our “Gift Cards” sitelink is performing.

Looks great, right? $1.6 million in revenue, 73K clicks – this extension is on fire!

You know where this is going. Head over to Segment and select This Extension vs. Other. Now let’s have another look at the performance:

Turns out the sitelink only got 64 clicks, driving less than $2K in revenue.

The rest of the performance data relates to the headline or literally any other part of the ad that wasn’t the sitelink, but served when the sitelink served.

By default, the table will show you incomplete or inaccurate data about your extensions. Always use This Extension vs. Other for a true evaluation of performance.

Channel your inner journalist

Like an investigative journalist, you can learn to uncover the lead, and focus on what matters most in your account.

The Google Ads interface is constantly changing, without much announcement or fanfare. This article only scratches the surface of what you can uncover.

For instance:

• Find out how mobile landing pages affect your conversion rates by segmenting landing pages by device type.
• See if Search Partner volume has changed by segmenting for Network (with search partners).
• Filter your search term data by search term text to quickly see the spread of keywords triggered by similar queries.

Be curious, and see how you can use new filters, segments, columns and report features. You’ll be an expert in getting to the point of your data in no time!

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Webinar: 5 ways to survive an uncertain economy

Written on September 8, 2022 at 4:25 am, by admin

Most marketers work day in and day out to stay on top of how their market is evolving, but just one unexpected factor can shift the entire trajectory of your industry.

Join this webinar for an eye-opening discussion about how to identify consumer concerns, determine market barriers and where potential gaps may be using consumer and market intelligence.

Register today for “Sink or Swim: 5 Ways to Survive a Struggling Economy,” presented by NetBase Quid.

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YouTube updates Masthead ad requirements to allow sports betting

Written on September 8, 2022 at 4:25 am, by admin

YouTube is now allowing sports betting ads to serve on the masthead as long as the ads comply with the related gambling and games policy.

Recent masthead updates. Additional masthead updates were released in June for alcohol and prescription drugs. Full-day masthead reservations were discontinued and replaces with more targeted options. The new CPM option allows mastheads to be more accessible to a broader market of advertisers. 

Read the announcement. You can read the announcement from Google here. Google’s guidelines for advertising sports and gambling can also be found here.

Why we care. Advertisers who run YouTube campaigns for sports and gambling can now have their ads in the most prominent ad space, so long as they comply with YouTube policies.

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Google is rolling out new campaign and ad group Setup columns

Written on September 8, 2022 at 4:25 am, by admin

Google is slowly rolling out new Setup columns at the campaign and ad group levels.

What is a Setup column. The new Setup column was first noticed by Steve Seeley, who posted about the update on Twitter.

The Setup column includes information about:

• Disapproved ads
• Disapproved keywords
• Eligible ads
• Eligible keywords
• Eligible Responsive Search Ads
• Eligible ad groups
• Responsive search ad-strength details
• Eligible sitelink extensions
• Eligible image extensions

What Google says. Ads Liason Ginny Marvin commented that the Setup column was available to help advertisers “quickly identify any campaign/ad group setup issues..”

More Setup column info. You can read more info about the new Setup columns here.

Why we care. This info should help advertisers identify issues in their campaigns and ad groups as well as quickly find images, keywords, and ads that need to be adjusted. If you have access to the new Setup column, you should see it in your settings at the campaign or ad group level.

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Webinar: How to choose whether to build or buy with this CDP checklist

Written on September 7, 2022 at 1:22 am, by admin

What’s best for you? A CDP out-of-the-box? Building a customer data solution yourself? There’s merit in both options, and this webinar is here to help you narrow down what’s best for your business.

Register today for “How to Decide to Build or Buy: A Customer Data Management Checklist,” presented by Acquia.

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Google will update ad Destination requirements policy in October

Written on September 7, 2022 at 1:22 am, by admin

Starting next month, Google will update the Destination requirements policy requiring that ad experiences on destinations to conform to the Coalition for Better Ads Better Ads Standards.

What this means. This means that any ads that don’t conform to the new standards will be disapproved. Advertisers will be notified of disapprovals in the Ad Experience Report.

What Google says. Google made the announcement in an email, indicating that affected accounts may see their ads disapproved and to make adjustments by October. They did not give an exact date.

Advertisers can review destination requirements here.

Why we care. Advertisers who are unsure if their destinations meet the Better Ads Standards should review their accounts and make the necessary changes asap to avoid having ads disapproved.

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FINAL CHANCE to submit your Search Engine Land Award entry!

Written on September 7, 2022 at 1:22 am, by admin

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Bill Slawski’s SEO by the Sea website to live on

Written on September 7, 2022 at 1:22 am, by admin

Bill Slawski recently passed away but his hosting company will continue to ensure his website lives on after the site went offline when the hosting payments were not being processed anymore.

SEO by the Sea. Bill Slawski has published thousands of articles on his SEO by the Sea website, some dating back as far as 2005. The site is known as the most authoritative resource on patents on how search engines work in the space. In fact, he has written countless articles breaking down complex search patents for search marketers and SEOs to understand. The site is referenced by other SEO resources for many many years and will continue to be referenced in the future.

For many in our industry, Slawski was probably best-known for researching, analyzing, interpreting and writing about Google and search-related patents and algorithms at SEO by the Sea. He started the SEO by the Sea blog in June 2005. On SEO by the Sea, Slawski covered it all – from the classics (PageRank, TrustRank, information retrieval) to today (machine learning, the Knowledge Graph, entities).

SEO by the Sea went offline. Earlier this month, his website went offline due to payment not being processed. Of course, with Bill’s passing, he was not able to make payment and the site automatically went offline. After the site went offline, the hosting company heard from the SEO community and that hosting company decided to reactive the site.

SiteGround, the hosting company, wrote on Twitter “We agree that the blog holds significant value for the SEO community, which is why we have reactivated the service. The site should be accessible shortly.”

About Bill Slawski. Slawski did SEO before Google existed. Heck, he did SEO before SEO was even called SEO. He started when all of this online stuff was simply known as internet marketing and web promotion, in 1996. He provided consulting services to help make websites easier to find online, help make them easier to use, and increase conversions and revenue for clients. Throughout his career, Slawski worked on all types of sites – nonprofits, Fortune 500, educational institutions, e-commerce, professional services, consumer goods, B2B and more. Prior to his search marketing career, Slawski earned a Juris Doctor degree and was a legal and technical administrator at the highest level court in Delaware for 14 years. Slawski lived in Carlsbad, California.

Why we care. This treasure trove of information about how search engines and SEO work will remain live, despite Bill’s passing. It is wonderful to report that Bill and his knowledge will continue to live on through his website, SEO by the Sea.

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Google updates privacy threshold for Analytics Search Queries report

Written on September 2, 2022 at 1:13 pm, by admin

Google is updating the privacy threshold for the Search Query report in Universal Analytics, and the Google Ads query, First user Google Ads query, and Session Google Ads query dimensions for the explorations in Google Analytics 4.

What is the privacy threshold. Google announced new privacy thresholds last year, ensuring user anonymity by only reporting on terms that have seen sufficient search volume across all Google searches. They also committed to giving advertisers more data.

What this means. The new thresholds should make what advertisers are seeing in their Google Ads accounts more consistent with what they see in GA4. But Google says that “Due to differences in data models, with this update, search query terms reporting in Universal Analytics will be more limited than Google Ads reports.”

Learn more. You can read the announcement from Google here.

Why we care. The Search Query report has always been a source of data to help advertisers ensure they’re bidding on the right keywords. But if the new standards of privacy thresholds continue to only show keywords with significant search volume, it may no longer be a useful tool.

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