Google Adwords ads - some now appearing at the bottom of the page

Hi fellow therapists,

If you are already an Adwords customer, you may have been looking at the Google search results lately going "where is my ad?" You may want to scroll down and look for it at the bottom of the page.

According to this November 2nd post on Google's Inside Adwords blog Google has decided to move ads for some searches (seems like local service searches, mostly) from the right side to the bottom. It appears ads that were able to have a high enough CTR/bid for that keyword will still show at the top of the page. This will only impact the ads that were showing on the right side of the screen.

They claim this will often result in an INCREASE in click-thru rate. I don't know that I believe that will be true, but I don't have any data yet to back it up.

I do believe it will cause an increase in worried emails to Your Google Guy :-)

I'll be watching this to see what the impact of this change is.

Best, Peter

About That Adwords Click-To-Call Email

Hi Folks,

Getting a lot of questions about the announcement from Google about an enhancement to their Click-To-Call service. This is one that let's you actually call (from your computer) based on an Adwords ad.

Two things, first for people who I've worked with - this doesn't affect you. This feature is not something I use for therapy businesses. So, as with many Google things, just delete that email and enjoy your weekend.

For those out there, this only impacts you if you have ads with your phone # in them, or are using a very advanced feature called "Call Extensions".

I don't think that having the phone # in an ad is useful for us as therapists. For some businesses (let's say a locksmith, or a tow-truck) where you really don't care *who* provides the service, you just want it *now*, I see this as a useful thing. But, unless your ideal client really can pick a therapist from a 25-character headline, and 70 characters of ad copy, then I have never seen it as a useful thing.

In my counseling experience, I've found people who want a generic counselor to be difficult clients that don't stay long, don't do much work, and often have trouble paying.

As a client of other practitioners (therapy, massage, acupuncture, etc.) I cannot imagine calling from an Adwords ad. I'd need to go to the therapist's website (or some other web page about them) before wanting to call.

As always, you can count on me to have an opinion :-)

Now go get back to the weekend! Best, Peter
Google Adwords for Therapists

Will Adwords Spending Help My Organic Results?

I was just browsing Google's own Adwords blog, and came across this. Since this is a question (and a misconception) of a lot of the therapists I work with - I thought I'd post it as is.

Myth # 1: Spending money on Google AdWords will influence my website’s ranking in Google's free search results.

Fact: Google AdWords and Google’s free search results are entirely independent of one another. Spending money on AdWords won’t impact your ranking in Google's free search results. Similarly, cancelling your AdWords account won’t lead to your website being banned from Google’s search results

I usually try to explain this as the way the NY Times treats editorial (news) and advertisements - they keep a firewall between the two so they don't influence each other. While that may not be the way some local magazines and free weekly newspapers run (where the biggest advertisers mysteriously often are featured in stories, too) it is the gold standard for ethical publications. I should know, I was on my college newspaper :-)

Wired on Google Adwords

The latest issue of Wired has not only a great piece on the history of Google Adwords but one of best explanations of the bidding process I have seen.

Really a "can't miss" article if you are interested in Adwords.

Best, Peter

Splash Page = Bad News

Hi folks,

Just a quick note. I did an initial consult today with an academic admissions counselor for possible Adwords work. His site is pretty, but there was a rub - he has a splash page.

A splash page is a home page or landing page that has no real content on it - it's just a good-looking image (be that Flash, or a static image). It's the more modern version of the old sites that said "Click Here to Enter" (ugh I hated those!).

The problem with splash pages is two-fold: 1) no/low information, and 2) any information is not machine-readable.

I explained to the site owner that if we pointed Google Adwords to his home page, it would quickly judge it not be relevant, and would punish him greatly (via a "Poor" Quality Score).

This same advice goes to those of you doing DIY SEO.

OK, that's it for today! Best, Peter