Highlights brought to you by Search Lately @SMGSearchUK this week include:
Ad Extensions Get Conversion Data At Last Phenomenal Mobile Growth Reports Google April Fool’s Day 50 Google March updates for Search Google Launched the First UK TV Ad
Browse last week’s Search Lately for more details and initial reaction from industry experts on recent hot topics.
Ad Extensions Get Conversion Data At Last – 4th Apr 2012 Google have now launched conversion data for ad extensions, surprisingly under a cloud… There seems to be no mention yet of this added feature on the Google blog, despite being a feature of considerable worth for PPC practitioners across the industry. This new feature means that you can now see conversion data for sitelinks by campaign and the split between headline and sitelink conversions. This means that advertisers can further understand the impact of sitelinks on their accounts.
This is not limited to standard sitelinks, but also extends to other sitelink formats such as location sitelinks and click to call sitelinks. While this is limited to aggregated data within campaigns, meaning the data is not yet available for individual sitelinks, it should only be a matter of time before this functionality finally arrives. While many advertisers have been able to report on sitelink effectiveness using 3rd party bid management tools, being able to see this information directly in Google Adwords will be of great benefit. More details: searchenginewatch.com/article/2165522/Google-AdWords-Ad-ExtensionsGet-Conversion-Tracking
Phenomenal Mobile Growth Reports – 4th Apr 2012 Investment in mobile paid search has sky rocketed since last year as tablet and smartphone penetration grows! Budgets reported by Ignition One for Q1 2012 grew by an astonishing 221.1% as mobile search now accounts for a whopping 12.3% of total search advertising. 67.4% of mobile paid search budgets in Q1 were spent on tablets, further emphasising their dramatic growth recently. These are undeniably massive figures with mobile clicks also rising by 246.1% YoY! Smartphone usage also continues to expand YoY with tablet penetration only in its infancy. It is therefore absolutely criminal that some advertisers are still not spending enough time or money optimising for these devices. Mobile is the device of the future with more and more people (especially youth) searching and shifting away from desktops to primarily mobile devices. Advertisers need to adjust and evolve with consumer needs now, or risk falling behind in the pursuit of next generation consumers. More details: www.mobilemarketer.com/cms/news/research/12500.html econsultancy.com/uk/blog/9527-the-growth-of-mobile-commerceinfographic
50 Google March updates for Search – 2nd Apr 2012 Every month Google release a list of information detailing what tweaks they have made to Search. This doesn’t concern the Panda update but instead minor tweaks that aim to improve general usability issues related to search. This month they have made 50 changes among which are live sports results snippets being displayed in search results for UEFA matches and NBA games which won’t have an effect on many people’s search habits, however, embedded within the list of changes are some that carry significance, especially that related to anchor text whereby Google have ‘turned off a classifier related to anchor text’. In another listed change, Google also mentioned that they have improved their systems so that they can determine how relevant an anchor text is to a particular query or website. It will be interesting to see in the coming months how these changes to the way Google classifies anchor texts will impact upon search results. Maybe Google isn’t so interested by what keywords are found within the anchor text anymore but are actually placing more importance on where the link is coming from and pointing to. – Alex Pye
More details: insidesearch.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/search-quality-highlights-50changes.html
Google April Fool’s Day – 2nd Apr 2012 A day full of jokes and laughter brought to you by Google included the release of click-to-teleport extensions, 8-bit Nintendo style maps, futuristic binary language designed for android, optimise for rotary phones & underwater image search in China. Many more April Fool’s that you may have missed can be found in the links below… Be sure to be entertained this Friday!
More details: searchenginewatch.com/article/2165162/Google-April-Fools-Day-Pranks2012-8-Bit-Maps-Chrome-Multitask-Mode-More www.google.com/adwords/extensions/teleport.html www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/253469/scitech/technology/google-sapril-fools-joke-nintendo-style-8-bit-google-map mail.google.com/mail/help/promos/tap/index.html www.howtogomo.com/goro/d/ searchenginewatch.com/article/2165162/Google-April-Fools-Day-Pranks2012-8-Bit-Maps-Chrome-Multitask-Mode-More
Google Launched The First UK TV Ad – 30th Mar 2012 Google has historically conducted the majority of its advertising business online, which is hardly a surprise when you consider the kind of audience it demands using just its own network of websites and display advertising pages. However, the search giant has launched its first ever Google Plus UK
TV ad in a bid to try and improve its Google+ uptake figures in a country where it is failing to hit the mark currently. The ad was called “‘Google+: Tom” and is a commercial to promote Google+. The response to the ad was in general pretty good. Many tweeted about it and liked the ad. Only a few were not happy with the ad and found it boring, slow or even nauseating. – Blair Liu More details: www.stateofsearch.com/googles-first-ever-uk-tv-ad-how-was-it-for-you/ www.manuallinkbuilding.co/blog/industry-news/google-launches-its-first-uktv-advert/