SMX Overtime: Starting fresh with new match types and account structures

Senior Paid Media Manager Adam Seybold of DEG Digital was one of the SMX West speakers for the “Starting Fresh with Match Types and Account Structures” session. Attendees asked questions about SKAG variations, dynamic search ads and bidding strategies so Adam took the time after the event to answer a few of them for us.

How do you address plurals and variation in SKAGs? Do you create a separate plurals ad group?

Addressing plurals, variations and misspellings within an account featuring a SKAG-led architecture is determined by the volume of activity on those types of unintended searches. If the plurals, variations and misspellings account for 20 percent or more of the activity on a keyword, then it should be optimized and added to your account. However, if it’s lower than 20 percent I recommend letting the activity occur since the “juice is not worth the squeeze.”

How would the seller of the red t-shirt on Google shopping keep it off the searches for the blue shirt?

Query-mapping shopping campaign ad groups to relevant searches are how you eliminate the disconnect between what a user searches on Google to what product an advertiser serves on that search. If you, the advertiser, sells both blue and red men’s t-shirts then the creation of both a “blue men’s t-shirts” and “red men’s t-shirts” ad group is recommended. From there, negating the keyword “blue” from the “red men’s t-shirts” ad group and vice versa are how to close the loop and direct traffic properly in your account.

Where should Dynamic Search Ads fit within an account’s structure?

Dynamic Search Ads can be used flexibly to fit the needs of the advertiser. For a majority of retail e-commerce advertisers, DSAs (dynamic search ads) allow the mass amount of products available online to be turned into keywords for targeted keyword mining. Also, for advertisers with a large brick and mortar footprint over 500 locations, those location detail pages can be easily turned into bidding against “brand + location” searches on Google.

Is there a preferred bidding strategy if you breakout your high-performing exact match keywords?

No, but the use of automated bidding supplied by Google Ads gives the ability to bid against certain dimensions that are not possible under max CPC bidding. Account architecture with an audience strategy is way more valuable than a manual bidding strategy in 2019.

What structure and bid tips for searches from either first-time visitors or repeat visitors?

Do it! Use of first-party data is critical for search engine marketing in 2019. Create ad groups specifically for each audience that you want to optimize for your campaigns. It’s recommended to create ad group labels as well for each audience applied to the ad group for ease of reporting and management.