PPC Management for Firefox (beta)

Posted by in AdWords, General PPC, PPC Analysis, PPC Management Guide

ppc management for firefox logo

Why This Firefox Addon Rocks!

This toolbar will display today’s basic key performance indicators at the bottom of your browser.

Double Click this toolbar for your stats to update – it may take 60 seconds to update depending on the size of your account. The data you see will be for today only.

Right click to see the tool menu and drill down into your account level statistics.

Clicks: Total number of clicks accrued today

aCPC: average Cost Per Click today

Cost: Total spent today

Conv: Total number of conversions accrued today

C/C: Cost per Conversion today

Requirements

-FF 2+ preferred while we’re confident this works from 1.5-3.0.*

-AdWords Client Center

-AdWords API Tokens

Tip: Your statistics might take 60 seconds or more to load depending on the size of your account. If you still do not see data, you may need to restart FF and test your credentials again.

How to Install This Firefox Addon

Upon download, Firefox should automatically recognize the extension and install it.

If you get any errors:

Right click the logo, click ‘save link as…’, after saving you can scan it with any Anti-Virus program, then open Firefox. In FF, click file -> Open File -> Find the file and open it -> Install

How To Use PPC Management for Firefox

Credentials

Login Email: Your Client Center login email address

Password: Your Client Center login password

Developer Token: AdWords API Token found in your Client Center (My Account->AdWords API Center)

Application Token: AdWords API Token found in your Client Center (My Account->AdWords API Center)

Client Email: The email address of the account in your Client Center that you want to see stats for

Save your credentials, then test! Load is kind of a pseudo button for now… :)

Tip: You might need to restart FF after saving your credentials for the tool to work properly!

Keyword Estimates Tool

This tool is very similar to the Estimates tool you find in AdWords.

You don’t have to enter a Max CPC if you want to see the absolute maximum you can expect to pay with the highest possible bid ($100).

Keyword Tool (AKA Kewyord Suggestion Tool)

Search Volume and Competition are on the old scale…1 to 5 where 5 is very competitive or very high search volume and 1 is limited competition with a very low search volume relative to other keywords in that space.

In the future we will incorporate the new real number estimates currently available at Google.

Site Keywords Tool

Enter your landing page in the Site URL field and click Generate Suggestions to see what keywords Google thinks the page is targeted towards.

Account Statistics Tool

You can drill down to the keyword level statistics to find out how your account is doing for the day!

Double click your way through and new windows will open displaying the next level of statistics. For example, double click on a campaign to see the ad groups of that campaign in a new stats window. Then, double click an ad group to see the keyword stats!

Privacy and Security

We are confident that this tool is secure and your privacy is protected. QualityScores will not and will never ask for or gather the information you enter into this tool. All of your credentials are stored on your local machine, not our servers. All AdWords API calls are made via https. This project is in beta right now so there aren’t any guarantees that a site you visit might have malicious material that could crack this…or one of your buddies could borrow your computer and get your credentials, etc. Please send any privacy concerns back to us asap so we can add it to our development time line as a priority!

ppc management for firefox logo

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PPC Management: Keyword List Expansion + Negative Keywords

Posted by in PPC Management Guide

The QualityScores PPC Management series will cover a variety of regular management activities in depth. This series will be posted every month or two. We chose Keyword List Expansion and Negative keywords as our first topic because of the recent quality score changes in Google. Refining and managing your keyword lists is going to be even more vital to your success than it has been previously.

We hope you like it, comment on it, link to it, point fingers at it, poke it, and help us grow this guide – it will be dynamic. We will strive to keep it updated with the best comments and input while giving credit where credit is due!

Enjoy!

Table Of Contents

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Hooray! Detailed Keyword Data Is Available Again!!!!

Posted by in Analytics, News, PPC Management Guide

A buddy just emailed me to say that his Google Analytics advanced filters were working again to expose the detailed search queries of AdWords visitors!

You can find detailed instructions on exposing your keyword data in this post:

PPC Management: AdWords Keyword Data Exposed With Google Analytics!

I looked into it and it looks like Google fixed their advanced filter problem (at least for these filters) on March 5th.

Yes, I will eat my words and gladly admit that I overreacted in this post. :)

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UPDATE: ROI Revolution Updates AdWords/Analytics Exact Data Script

Posted by in AdWords, Analytics, PPC Management Guide

If you are using the new javascript code for Analytics, you should head over to ROI Revolution and download the latest exact keyword data tracking script so you can enjoy exact search terms that will show up in the user defined field in Analytics. ROI Revolution posted the update yesterday so it’s nice and fresh! :)
QualityScores posts related to this update:

AdWords/Analytics Keyword Data Fix – Thanks Jeff!

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AdWords/Analytics Keyword Data Fix – Thanks Jeff!

Posted by in Analytics, PPC Management Guide

Per ROI Revolution’s request, here are the credits for this post – at the top instead of the bottom:

If you have any questions, you can find the source that Jeff found and shared with us here – credit rightly belongs to the Unofficial Google Analytics blog at ROI Revolution for authoring the fix. <—Bold was added for emphasis…I already had that sentence written at the bottom of the post. ROI Revolution may credit others in that post…
This fix was found and shared with us by Jeff because he saw that we documented some problems that were caused by the extra wide use of the tip found here. <—- If you read that post you will find out exactly where we found that tip at the bottom of that post…

Jeff James kindly stopped by the blog to tell us that he continues to receive his specific keyword data through a script fix that captures the specific keyword data from the cookie. I was on to that but I was trying to take the data from a different part of the cookie and I suck at writing javascript…I guess I should always leave quick fixes up to the pros – after all, I have to admit that I’m not a programmer but I can fake my way through some of it – clearly not all of it. ;)

Thanks for finding and sharing this fix Jeff!

Here is the fix:

Download/Save this file: ga_keyword.js

Don’t forget to upload the file to the proper directory/location on your website and change the code below accordingly!

Rewrite your analytics code so it looks like this on your landing pages or throughout your entire website if it’s easier:

<script src="http://www.yourwebsite.com/ga_keyword.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
<script src="http://www.google-analytics.com/urchin.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
_uacct = "UA-XXXXX-X";
urchinTracker();
sleuth();
</script>

sleuth(); displays the exact keyword data under the cross segment option User-Defined Value.

So, after implementing this fix, you should see most of the exact keyword data under the cross segment menu. I recommend taking this route but you can find the cross segment menu in almost any detailed page of Google Analytics:

Traffic Sources -> Keywords -> Under the text that says “Search Sent * Visits via * Keywords” you will find a drop down that has the word “Segments:” next to it -> At the bottom of that list you will see “User-Defined Value”…click that and there you have it, your newly exposed exact key term data from Analytics!

I hope Google doesn’t poop on this fix too… :)

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Google, You SUCK and I WILL Find Another Way!

Posted by in Errors, General PPC, PPC Management Guide

My natural inclination is to share. I like sharing information, personal stories, problems, news, tools, life, etc. It’s just who I am and I think that’s one reason I love this industry…

That was until I felt the wrath of Google over the past week!

I saw it coming I guess – it happens in the SEO industry…or it used to happen until Google smacked any SEO that shared a secret by patching/fixing/closing the “gap”. And it still happens every once in a while.

What the heck am I referring to? I’m referring to this cycle:

secret cycle

I can understand and see the value of this cycle for certain things that help people fraudulently take advantage of a system – of course that needs to be stopped…it’s killing the stuff that really helps IMPROVE relevancy, users, systems and businesses that simply makes my blood boil.

This month Google changed their auto-tagging function so it would render the “AdWords keywords exposed” tip useless for a short time! We’re talking with Google right now but in the mean time…the stats may not reflect exactly what you expected for a while (since January 15th?). I’ll write a separate post about the details of what I have done, what I’m testing, and where I think the issues is because I simply can’t place my thumb on the right solution although I’m confident we’ll come up with it soon!

Enter Evolution

This is why there is a secret “10%” of SEO knowledge out there…and I’m now convinced that we are probably going to hold back on our ultimate PPC secrets that we planned to expose which will contribute to the idea that there is a secret 10+% of PPC knowledge that is not and will not be exposed.

Evolution changes everything:

evolution

I believe this new innovative/creative evolution is what drives the success or failure of a PPC marketer or an SEO.

So…my questions to Google are:

Why won’t you let us easily see every exact query that comes through AdWords?

Wouldn’t it drive advertisers to be more relevant? Better ROI for businesses and therefore increased confidence and budgets for AdWords?

Are you or are you not striving for the most relevant results to a search query?

Why do I think Google Sucks?

Because their behavior with this particular issue is not consistent with their perceived “willingness” to help small business owners make more money and get better ROI with AdWords!

Summary

Google SUCKS and I will find another way to improve the community’s ROI quickly and effectively – this time I’m going to discretely release the solution…probably via RSS messaging and email. :)

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