Four15 Digital

Menu

Category: SEM

Learn how to use Search Engine Marketing to grow your business in an increasingly competitive marketplace. In our guide, you’ll learn an overview of search engine marketing basics as well as more in-depth SEM topics like ad auctions, keyword planning and conversion tracking.

Age Targeting in Microsoft Advertising (Bing Ads) Explained

Did you know that performance metrics by age are readily available in the Microsoft Advertising (formerly Bing Ads) user interface? Unlike Google, Microsoft Advertising does not require the advertiser to set up this targeting setting in advance in order to access this information. Advertisers can also drive traffic to or away from certain age groups using bid adjustments available. In today’s blog we’ll go over the basics of Microsoft Advertising’s age targeting feature and how it differs from that of Google Ads.  Age Group Segments in Microsoft Ads Like Google, Microsoft segments their audience into various age brackets. Unlike Google, Microsoft also segments their audience into the 13-17 age bracket and can provide basic performance metrics on this age group. Note that Microsoft Advertising does not allow advertisers to target this age group.  Below are the age brackets that Microsoft provides insights on: Ages 13-17Ages 18-24Ages 25-34Ages 35-49Ages 50-64Ages 65 and aboveUnknown Note that the Unknown age group encompasses traffic that does not have age data available. Availability of Age Group Data in Microsoft Ads It is worth mentioning that age group data is available for most of your Microsoft Ads traffic in the Microsoft Ads user interface. This is beneficial for advertisers that want readily accessible age group data without having to apply the age groups in observation mode as users would in the Google Ads interface. You can find the age group performance metrics through the following steps in the Microsoft Advertising UI: You can find the age group performance metrics through the following steps in the Microsoft Advertising UI: 3. Under the dimension select, select Age and gender. Following these steps, you will now be able to see the age and gender data for your Microsoft campaigns. Targeting and Excluding Age Groups in Microsoft Ads Microsoft Advertising provides advertisers performance metrics on age groups and makes them easily accessible in the Microsoft Advertising UI. It also allows advertisers to add bid modifiers to those age groups to help drive traffic to or away from select age brackets. As mentioned before, Microsoft does not allow bid modifiers on the 13-17 age group. You can drive more traffic to a particular age group by adding positive bid adjustments to the age group you want to target. For example, if you wanted to drive more traffic to the 65+ age group, you can apply a positive bid modifier of your choice to this age group.  To exclude particular age groups from your campaign targeting, you would need to make negative bid adjustments on the age group, up to a -90% bid adjustment. Microsoft does not allow negative bid adjustments beyond -90%. If you want to drive traffic to only a particular age group, you would not only add a positive bid adjustment to this age group but negative bid adjustments of up to -90% to all other age groups. For instance, to drive traffic only to the 65+ age group, you would apply a positive bid modifier of your choice to this age group and add negative bid modifiers to all other age groups. You can access the age group targeting settings through the following steps in the Microosft Advertising UI: All campaigns> Settings > Advanced settings > Targeting > Demographic Below is what you should see when you access the age targeting settings: You now have the basic information on age targeting in Microsoft Advertising to change the age targeting settings in your Microsoft campaigns. You can use these tips too pull the age group performance metrics and to make changes where you see fit to help improve your campaign performance!

Tracking Template vs Final URL Suffix

Personally, when I first began my digital marketing career, nothing confused me more than tracking. I quickly understood account structure, learned and developed marketing concepts, even built a couple web pages through WordPress. However, when it came to tracking, it took a bit longer for me to process. You can imagine the confusion that came with learning about tracking templates and URL suffixes since they are so similar. In this blog entry I will expand upon the definition of each and best practices in order to use both! What’s the difference? Ultimately, these are very similar in function: information appended at the end of the URL that allows for better tracking. However, if you are using a third-party tracker it is extremely important to know the difference. With both a tracking template and a final URL suffix, you are able to better utilize a third party tracker alongside necessary tracking information for your website. Best practice is to:  This organization relates to parallel tracking and the best structure for the whole process to run properly (more on parallel tracking here). Information that determines the content of the page is of utmost importance to the user experience whereas tracking doesn’t really affect the user experience at all, therefore information that determines the content of a page needs to be in the final URL to load the landing page as fast as possible. In that sense, this structure creates the best user experience possible. What is a tracking template? A tracking template allows you track the source of ad clicks and important information about it (device, network, keyword, etc.). The tracking template starts with {lpurl} which returns the final URL that you have set in the ad. This is then followed with a ‘?’ along with the name of parameters you would like to track. Multiple parameters can be tracked by separating them with ‘&’ between each parameter. For example: {lpurl}?source={network}&device={device}&keyword={keyword} Would return the final URL plus the source, device, and keyword that led to the click. Note: You may need to use {unescapedlpurl} instead of {lpurl} if you’re using a third party tracker. More info on 3rd party trackers can be found here. What is a final URL suffix? A final URL suffix is very similar to a tracking template. A final URL suffix goes after the final URL and allows you to track the source of ad clicks and other information about it (device, campaign name, keyword, etc.). For example: src=google&kwd={keyword} Would be appended at the end of the final URL and return the source as google, along with the keyword that led to the click. Note: You would not need to add a ‘?’ or ‘&’ before the first parameter. Google Ads will include this automatically!This isn’t necessarily the most fun topic to discuss; tracking templates and final URL suffixes won’t drastically improve your marketing campaigns, but broken tracking will definitely ruin your data! Without accurate data to support your marketing efforts and learnings, you really are just shooting around in the dark – nobody wants to waste their time and money doing that. If you’re interested in learning more about data analytics, I highly encourage you to explore our analytics related blogs here.

Search Lost IS (Rank) Explained

As a search marketer, you have more than likely come across a metric in Google Ads called search lost IS (rank). This is the search impression share lost due to Ad Rank, or the percentage of time your ad was not shown to Google searches that matched your keywords. You may wonder, “How is this metric calculated for my campaigns?”. In this blog we will explain how search lost IS (rank) is calculated by Google and ways you can improve your Ad Rank. What is Ad Rank? To begin, we need to understand what Ad Rank is. Ad Rank is a score that determines your ad position relative to other ads. According to Google the rank is calculated using a combination of the following: How do I find the search lost IS (rank) for my campaigns? Reports in the Google Ads interface will show you your search lost IS (rank) based on various components such as campaign, ad group, keyword, and audiences. If you do not see this metric in the Google Ads interface, you will need to modify the columns in your report to include search lost (IS) rank: You can find search lost IS (rank) in the competitive metrics option: If you decide to add search lost IS (rank) to your reports, we’d also advise adding metrics such as search impression share and search lost IS (budget) to your report. The search impression share indicates your impression share and the search lost IS (budget) indicates the impression share lost due to budget. These metrics will give you a better sense of how strong your impression share is in the ad auction and what portion of your impression share can be improved by adding more budget. Note that your search impression share combined with your search lost IS (rank) and search lost IS (budget) will  add up to 100%. How do I reduce my search lost IS (rank)? Reducing your search lost IS (rank) means improving your Ad Rank score. We’ve summarized a few tips that can help you increase your Ad Rank so that your ads can have a higher ad position: You now have the knowledge to lower your search impression share lost to ad rank. Use these steps to improve your ad rank and increase your search impression share on your Google Ads campaigns!