Inside The Big 3 Search Engine Marketing Desktop Editors

Still managing your paid search marketing accounts through the online interfaces? If so, you’re about to discover more efficient ways to work offline with Google, Yahoo and Microsoft desktop tools and revolutionize your paid search account management.

Desktop tools download complete paid search accounts into an offline management tool for easier editing. Bulk updates, searching within the campaigns and copy/paste functionality are all much easier in a desktop tool than the online paid search interfaces. Additionally, offline editors provide a risk free method for making account edits, once changes are made in the tool, marketers have the ability to check their work, search for common mistakes, use the tool to validate the changes and provide instant feedback on issues before uploading to the live paid search account.

Google AdWords editor

The first desktop tool released by a search engine was Google’s AdWords Editor. AdWords Editor likely has the most robust features set of all desktop tools and pioneered the feature to cut and paste between the editor tool and Excel. The ability to export or copy campaign information into Excel, for faster and easier editing and reorganization, and then re-import or copy into the desktop tool for upload to the search engine marketing account is a massive efficiency gain for search engine marketers. The ability to copy and paste account information within the tool is also a major time saving feature.

Additionally, AdWords Editor has options to view account statistics for whole or parts of the account. Ad text testing benefits greatly from this feature as marketers can view stats on ad performance and make quick additions and deletions in the editor.

Keyword research tools are also available in AdWords Editor, streamlining the process of adding keywords to the proper AdGroup with a simple drag and drop. Also duplicate keywords are easily found through a feature in the Tools menu.

There are many more features within the AdWords Editor of varying usefulness to search engine marketers, the best way to learn more is to download the tool and starting playing with it. Yahoo and Microsoft’s desktop tools contain most of the core AdWords Editor functionality with some unique features.

Yahoo Search Marketing desktop

One major disadvantage of Yahoo’s desktop tool is that it does not have the functionality to copy and paste between Excel and the desktop tool. This failing cuts down significantly on the usefulness of the desktop tool. Copy and paste functionality works within the tool, for example, you can copy and paste an Ad Group. Exporting and importing account information is also available, but more cumbersome than the direct copy and paste ability of other desktop tools.

The other significant failing of the Yahoo Search Marketing Desktop is the complete lack of negative keywords management. Negative keywords don’t even appear in the account information in the tool. Nor are keyword research tools available.

In general, the Yahoo tool is clunky compared to Google or Microsoft, there’s limited inline change functionality, most changes need to be made in editing panes. Response time of the tool is slower, particularly in downloading account information. If you have a good Yahoo account manager willing to post updates, or you are comfortable with the online importing and exporting available, at this point, those are likely more efficient processes than the desktop tool.

NOTE: Yahoo PR sent this after this column was published:

We believe Kelly may have referenced an older version of our tool …. We would like to clarify our current feature offering available to our advertisers.

• Bulk editing-Easily make mass changes to settings such as statuses, match types and budgets, all within an intuitive interface.
  • Increase or decrease multiple keyword bids.
  • Save time by exporting your view of keywords, ads, ad groups and campaigns into Excel.
  • Revert selected changes for better peace of mind.
  • Cut, copy, or paste campaigns, ad groups, keywords and ads.
• Campaign transfer-Import your third-party campaign data in one easy step.
• Account performance statistics-Retrieve status and statistics for your account’s impressions, clicks, CTR, cost, ad quality scores, along with
  other information.
• Keyword research-Find relevant terms that may help increase your ROI based on URLs or your seed terms.
• Find/replace & search functionality- Find and replace text in ads, keywords, ad groups and campaigns or use filters to search for specific account information.

Also, we plan to release a new version of Yahoo! Search Marketing Desktop in Q2 2010. The enhanced tool will let advertisers:

• Manage excluded keywords: Make changes in bulk and add more of them from third-party accounts or through our keyword suggestion engine.
• Easily switch between accounts: Quickly manage multiple accounts for easier comparison, duplication and more.
• Download specific accounts and campaigns: Save time by downloading only what you need.

To download our current version of Yahoo! Search Marketing, please visit
https://advertising.yahoo.com/desktop

Microsoft adCenter Desktop

For those familiar with Microsoft Office products, the AdCenter Desktop is remarkably similar in design and function. Toolbars and icons are consistent and customizable, making the desktop tool user friendly for first timers.

Kudos to Microsoft for having the only desktop editor with built-in find and replace functionality, saving marketers the process of leveraging Excel for simple find and replace tasks. Additionally, the AdCenter Desktop accepts imports of campaigns in a variety of search engine marketing formats including Google AdWords and Yahoo, which makes for easy campaign portability and re-use between search engine marketing accounts.

Will desktop editors replace online SEM management?

As search engine marketing becomes increasingly complicated from an account management perspective, offline desktop tools provide a simpler view and more robust editing functionality than traditional online paid search management interfaces. More search engine marketers will be leveraging these tools and migrating away from online interfaces to realize the efficiency gains.