Discussion- Week 3

1. What is the difference between CPC or CPM bidding? Explain which bidding strategy might be appropriate for your client? Why? You should refer to the client you identified in the first Assignment although Google might be able to pair you with a different non-profit (see my announcement message for Week 3).

The difference between CPC or CPM bidding is that CPC is the amount of revenue a business is willing to pay for each click on their ad. CPM is a bid amount that one’s business is willing to pay based on impressions. I think for my team’s client, the CPM might be more useful. My reasoning is because when thinking about exercising, yoga isn’t always the first thing that comes to mind for everyone. If our non-profit bid a set rate, they would be guaranteed to have people see there ad, and even though they may not click it, it will spark the idea in their head. Especially if the ad uses catchy words like “destress” or “detox your brain” they may think “hm maybe I should try yoga out”. Ideally you would hope the ad would target people in the area so that when they google “yoga studios near me” Holistic Pathways would come up as a top result.

There are 5 keyword match types. Please give an example of each match type. You should refer to the client you identified in the first Assignment although Google might be able to pair you with a different non-profit (see my announcement message for Week 3).

The five keyword match types are broad match, modified match, phrase match, or exact match. Broad match is when a user can search something and as long as it has one of your key words, your business or ad will appear. This will result in the most impressions. For my client, an example could be yoga, or studios. The term is very broad but the ad could definitely pop up as being somewhat relevant. Modified match is when two terms or keywords are linked together (with a plus sign in google ads) to tell google that these words always need to appear together. That way, searches are more accurate and narrow, but the ad is still getting many impressions. An example of this could be yoga studio. The consumer could also search “Studio of Yoga” and the ad would still appear under this keyword match type. Phrase match is when keywords have to be searched in the same order they were entered in when creating the ad. There may also be words in front of the linked keywords but the linked words never come out of order. An example of this could be “yoga studio near me” or even “best yoga studio”. The keywords “yoga” and studio” would need to stay in that order. I would think this would narrow down the targeted audience even more, leaving room for potential consumers. Exact match is when the exactly same keywords are searched. However Google did change this so that if a consumer searched plural or something abbreviated, they would still find what they were looking for. An example of this for my client would be “yoga studio in Gorham”, that way, the studio would always come up when locals searched for it.

What are some benefits of segmenting your data by “Top vs. Other”? Please refer to the Google Ads tutorial.

The benefits of segmenting your data by “Top Vs. Other” is that your ad is most likely to be selected first if it is at the topic. Humans first instinct is to click the first result because they think it will match their organic search. However, this is not always the case. If the keywords match up, it is possible your ad will be first on the page. Being in the “other” position means that the ad will not receive as many impressions because people seem to trust only the first few pages that occur on a Google search.

Evaluate the following two landing pages? Which landing page do you like better? Why? Can you suggest an improvement? 

These two landing pages are completely different because one is a login and one in a confirmation page. I like the background of the pages because it gives off the impression of the school and the campus life. I think this could intrigue and give off new students a feel of what it is like at USM. I also think that having the message “Thank You! We’ll be in touch soon” is nice to have so that the person doesn’t feel like they are left hanging without anyone assisting them. I think I like the second better for that reason. I think the first page (login) could definitely have a different look. Maybe something with more of the campus community. This could be our mascot, student, or a faculty picture. Since it is the page where potential students first visit, it should be intriguing and not under estimated. A great idea would be to include students at a campus event or something like that. I think showing that USM does have a great campus community is key because I know it is one of the reasons many students choose other schools.