Bing and Yahoo! Search: Optimize Your Campaigns

As more and more Yahoo! advertisers transition to using Microsoft adCenter, you may find that there are more competitors bidding on your keywords which could impact the position of your ads. During the transition period, it will be helpful to monitor your bids frequently, to stay on top of any changes to your ad’s position as a result of new competitors bidding on your keywords. You may find it necessary to adjust your bids to maintain your desired position. If you choose to do so, be sure to regularly review your results to maintain your ROI goals.

Here are some tips to help you optimize your bidding strategies:

1. Set up separate ad groups and bids based on your search network distribution option. You have three search network distribution options with Microsoft adCenter: 
   • All Bing and Yahoo! search networks and  syndicated search partners (the default setting)
   • Only Bing and Yahoo!  websites
   • Only Bing and Yahoo!  syndicated search partners.
   By creating unique ad groups based on distribution, you can bid differently for clicks from each network and better manage your ROI. This is especially useful if you prefer to bid more competitively for ad placements on Yahoo! Search and Bing websites than syndicated search partners. In addition, you can also designate up to 500 sites (at both the ad group and campaign levels) where you do not wish your search ads to appear, using the enhanced website exclusion feature. Note: Yahoo! Search and Bing sites cannot be independently selected for exclusion.
2. Know the value of a click. One way to optimize your bids is to understand the value of a click for your business. By multiplying your gross profit per conversion and conversion rate, you can determine the value per click. This value per click can be the maximum you’d like to pay to meet your ROI goals.
   Example: If your gross profit per conversion is $40, and your conversion rate is 5%, the most you would want to pay for a click to break even is $2.00.



Gross Profit per Conversion	X	Conversion Rate	=	Value per Click
$40	X	5%	=	$2.00




You can also make informed bidding decisions by using the Bid Estimation feature in Microsoft Advertising Intelligence to provide you with historic bids, traffic estimation, and other helpful information that you can use as a starting point for developing your bids. While it will initially only have Bing historic data, over time Yahoo! Search data will also be available in this free Microsoft Office Excel 2007 add-in.

3. Bid by match type and add more specific “tail” terms. Set keyword bids by match type and bid more competitively for keywords that matter most to you. For example, you may want to bid more for exact match keywords that represent your core products and services to help you reach qualified searchers. Additionally, Microsoft Advertising Intelligence can help you expand your keyword lists to include misspellings, plurals, and “tail” terms – keywords that are very specific or niche oriented that generate lower search volume but help you target more precisely – to take advantage of expanded keyword opportunities on Yahoo! Search and Bing. And tail terms are often much less competitive than more popular keywords, making them potentially a good value.

Learn more about preparing your budgets and bids.

When developing ads, ask yourself if they are compelling to your target audience and if they give consumers confidence that if they click your ad, they will receive the type of information they searched for. Keep the following tips for effective ads in mind as your develop your online and mobile ad copy.

1. Create one clear objective. Focus on only one call-to-action for your consumers.
2. Focus on benefits. Describe the benefits of your product or service as a whole instead of individual features.
3. Be brief, be bright. Use powerful, concise, attention-grabbing words or phrases to convey your message.
4. Test your ads. Try out different ad copy and keyword combinations, and modify your campaigns as you learn what works best.

Learn more about writing effective ads.

The relevance of your landing page and ad to your visitor’s search query is important in determining whether or not your ad will show in the search results pages on Yahoo! Search and Bing. The following tips can help you improve the quality of your landing pages – ultimately helping to improve your ad’s position in the search results:

1. Take users to a landing page they expect. For each ad, be sure you're sending potential customers to a landing page with content that's relevant to their search keyword. If they don't quickly see what they were expecting, there's a good chance they'll abandon your site. If your ad offers a discount or promotion, make sure that’s listed on your landing page. Additionally, mobile landing pages should include relevant information for users as they search on the go, like a phone number and address. An easy way to send customers to a more relevant landing page is to use dynamic text (A word, phrase, or other information that is inserted into the title or text of an ad to customize it in response to a specific search query.) to direct them to the appropriate page within your website based on their search keyword. You may want to consider the use of promotional pages for keyword buys, when applicable.
2. Include keywords in landing page text. To help ensure that your keywords are approved, be sure to include all of them on your landing page. By including your keywords, you'll also increase the relevance of your landing page for those keywords, which can improve your ad's position and possibly boost your CTR. Note that site crawlers do not "read" text that's embedded in images or JavaScript, so your keywords must appear as text within one or more of these HTML tags. To allow Microsoft adCenter’s editorial crawlers to review your landing pages check your robots.txt file to ensure any servers hosting landing pages for your ads do not block “adidxbot” or “MSNPTC/1.0”.
3. Make sure your landing page loads quickly and has functional navigation. Many people abandon a website that isn't displayed within a few seconds. If the load time of your landing page is slow, try reducing the number of graphic images or taking other appropriate measures to help it load faster. You should also ensure the landing page has functional back and close buttons. For instance, a back button that takes a user to an ad would cause the landing page to be seen as deceptive.

Learn more about improving landing page performance.