or just download it from http://mail.google.com/videochat
Now if only they would take on the likes of gotomeeting or webex….

So big congratulations to Steve!

It also means that WebSavvy becomes just the 19th AdWords Qualified Company in Australia (at least 2 staff qualified & managing over $100,000 every 90 days) so yay for us

What does that mean for you? It means you’re getting expert help & advice from an Aussie company with Aussie staff (not an outsourced staff member overseas frantically reading a new book on AdWords while managing your account!)

Not a client yet? Drop us a line & let us know how we might be able to help.

The world is watching on & wishing you well.

Good luck.

Check out his site & be sure to link/comment if you know of a great blog with great content, that needs more readers.

Thanks! Mike

What does this mean for you?

High Quality & Relevance will be even more important than before. You need to check your Quality Score ratings & maybe deleted any Keywords that don’t get at least 7/10. (maybe even higher). High Quality means you can leapfrog over Ads paying more money than you! Quality is key to a really great ROI.
How do you get those Quality Scores higher for the keywords that remain (or for those that you need to bid on, but that aren’t yet performing)?

Basic SEO can help a lot… do you have:

• plain english URLs that relate to the keyword (you’re not sending people to the homepage are you?)
• unique title & description tags that match the keywords
• H1 & H2 tags that match the keywords in the AdGroup AND ideally match the promise made in the Ad itself
• the right keyword density (around 3%)
• professional design
• inbound & outbound links - with relevant anchor text
• links to more content from the Landing Page… not a one-page ‘are you in or out?’ page. provide great content!

& of course in the account itself:

• just a few, closely related keywords in each AdGroup
• at least 2 Ads that include those keywords for each group
• only use keywords directly related to your business - at least until you have great CTR numbers & a history with Google

PS - Using AdWords Editor can give you a quick way to get a feel for the Quality Score numbers for all keywords at a glance. Just import your account & look at the min bid column. It hasn’t changed to the new ‘fist page minimum’ bid yet & can still be used as a guide to just how ‘poor’, ‘ok’ or ‘great’ your keywords are.

Take a look at the results below - I think you’ll find them very insightful…

First, you’ll need to choose the metrics to display. Find the drop down box at the top of the Campaign Summary screen & choose the appropriate selection (’Split:Google search/search partners/content network‘ will show you all three lots of stats - but of course you should already have your search & content campaigns running separately .. don’t you!)

Now for the first time you can see clicks, impressions, cost, average position & conversion data for the Search Partners (AOL, Ask etc)

Take a look at one campaign we’re currently running for a small client - these are the numbers for the weekend just gone… we’ll be turning off the search partners option for this campaign from now on! The difference is more than I would have thought.

Now it’s your turn. Go to your account now & check this for your own accounts. You may be amazed at what you find.

Or, if you prefer, just start AdWords Editor on your computer & choose the ‘backup then update’ option when prompted.

Remember you can use this great (free) tool to:

• quickly copy entire campaigns (maybe you want separate campaigns for search & content networks, or for different countries)
• easily search & replace keywords across multiple AdGroups & Campaigns
• instantly adjust bid prices for thousands of keywords in just a few seconds

Some of the new changes are:

Keyword Opportunities - another way to let Google help you generate more keywords & (you’ll love this) a mix ‘n’ match feature called Keyword Multiplier that allows you to combine lists of words for more phrase ideas.

Some much needed View improvements - making it easier to resize/choose columns & date ranges (try autosize!)
Copy the ’shell’ of a campaign or group - make copies without the contents … sounds weird, try it!

Better import (& export) options - the HTML version is much better & you can now choose specific AdGroups to export to csv (hey - it’s useful for some of us…)
It’s a great tool - grab your free copy today.

The biggest change here is the missing ‘minimum bid’ data. No longer will you see 5c or 3c or 13c next to your keyword.

Another change (coming very soon) is the introduction of ‘first page bidding’ instead of a minimum bid (more on this soon).

A sneaky trick - if you still want to see this data (rather than the 8/10 score above) is to use AdWords Editor to manage your account. The minimum bid is still active in version 6.0.1 of the program… no doubt that will disappear in the next version - so get a copy now.

So I do what any normal Aussie does in this situation: call in a favour & jump on Google.

The favour was to an excellent graphic designer (if you need a website designed, artwork done etc let me know & I’ll put you in touch with Karl - he doesn’t want me to link to him here).

Google was to find a 24 hour business card printing service. What follows are two examples of how to sell & how not to sell online. And once again the winner is the little business not the big corporate.

I know there’s a Kinkos around the corner from me, so I jump on there site & fill in the online quote form. It’s not specific to a store - but I figure with my postcode they can figure it out.

Imagine my surprise when I get this email back:

I am currently on annual leave from the 22 - 25th of August, please leave me an email & i’ll get back to you.

Quote  requests have been redirected to Leonie to distribute to sales rep.

Thank you
Sendy

I kid you not. When Sendy goes on holiday, all online quoting appears to stop! Unbelievable. But true.

A better way to get customers:
Now compare that to the guys at ePlot

• instant online quote - that changes as I change my specification. Transparency wins online!
• a local address & phone number that gives me the assurance I need that I can walk around the corner & see them if I have to - or in my case cycle round there tonight to pick up my finished cards!
• quick & easy upload of artwork (thanks again Karl!)
• quick & easy payment. OK so PayPal was the only option, but at least it was an option (see Yaro’s take on PayPal here)

The lesson? Make it easy for your prospects to start the process - and make sure the process works all the way through to delivery. Oh & maybe a vacation autoresponder isn’t the best method to use (anyone at FedEx Kinkos reading this - feel free to get in touch & we’ll talk about how we can help

Sendy - I hope you had a great vacation.. there’s probably a fair bit of email awaiting your return!