According to Barry Schwartz over at Search Engine Land, Google is about to release a new algo update to determine who gets to be chief of the top spot in AdWords. It’s always been more of ‘who wants to shell out the most’ type of position, but now they’re supposedly allowing better performing, more targeted ads to get the top spot without having to bid the most.
Regardless of what they may say, it will be silly to think it isn’t going to take big bucks to run in that top spot. I see the whole thing as a ploy to keep people spending their money and trying to be competitive. If you’re competing with 10 other sites that have crazy budgets and your business is a fraction of theirs, outbidding will never happen. This can cause the smaller budget advertisers to get complacent and not try to do better. Tell them they have a chance of being top dawg without paying top dollar and they’ll stay on top of it. Just my opinion, of course.
5 comments ↓
I’d agree with that…it’s always going to be about the money. I mean, they’re Google….that’s what they do…MAKE TONS OF MONEY.
It makes perfect sense because it’s a cheap incentive for them to improve the quality of their sponsored ads. People will optimize the hell out of their Google ads if they think it might earn them a better position.
And then what happens? The ads convert better so people will dig deeper into their pockets to spend more and more. And then the bid prices keep going up and up and up. And eventually Google will buy the planet earth.
…and the more I think about it, I wonder if Google will actually ever try to own a planet. That’d be some great marketing, wouldn’t it?
It started with Google Earth, isn’t it? haha
I have never had much success with Adwords.
Ads always being delisted for low performance and bad ad quality, minimum bids for keywords (like $1.00 + )… such a pain.
The old overture platform was the bomb. Not sure yet if i like the ‘Panama’ thing.
…Google Earth… hahahaha! awesome.
Please tell me that I am dreaming. Google will not optimize for money, but instead for content?
Personally, I feel this is a short term strategy to get the little guy to think he has a chance.
I mean eBay adwords ads for fungus and rot on top, and at the bottom a black mold remediation company.
How many of you go to eBay to get mold and rot?
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