Seeing Double: Yahoo, Bing Search Ads Show Duplicate Copy In Headlines And Ad Text
Change effecting top line ads said to boost click-through rates.
Maybe I've missed this, but what's with Yahoo/Bing repeating D1 in both the headline and text? #ppcchat pic.twitter.com/2MVhNmmEuN
— Matthew Umbro (@Matt_Umbro) January 9, 2015
Last week, an astute Matt Umbro noticed that search ads on Bing and Yahoo were showing description line one of the ad copy in both the ad text and ad titles.
When the first description line is formatted with punctuation at the end, Bing Ads typically shows that as a Long Ad Title in top line ads. What’s new now is that that copy is being shown twice: in the long ad title and then again in the ad copy itself.
Eric Couch, who recently joined the paid search team at Microsoft from Hanapin Marketing, told Umbro that the new duplication has proven to produce higher click-through rates.
Just heard back from @ecouch11 at @bingads – duplicate D1 is indeed intentional and has shown significant CTR gains… #ppcchat
— Matthew Umbro (@Matt_Umbro) January 9, 2015
Reached for comment, a Microsoft spokesperson told us,
“We are constantly evaluating opportunities to increase click volume for our customers around optimal Long Ad Title treatments while retaining the advertisers message. While individual advertiser results may vary, in general we are seeing Bing Ads Long Ad Titles treatments improve ad CTR by 10-15 percent”.
It’s not clear if the change went into effect broadly before last week, but you may want to look back at your CTRs to see if you can see an impact on top line ads and make note of the change.
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