BUS572-5 AdWords Reports

After watching more on AdWords through Google, I have found that there are several ways to analyzing our data.  Many sources have shared that there are ways to geographically modify our ads.  Others have shared that we are able to fully fund a campaign or ad during certain hours and fund less in hours of lower traffic, thus reducing the likelihood of spending more on our ad campaigns that we intended.

One of the greater takeaways from the videos found here is that we will need time to make decisions.  Data is not easily deciphered through a couple or few days of data.  Because the GOMC is only a three week commitment, we will need to make decisions based on little data.  This, of course, assumes that we will have data to analyze.  I will look forward to the end of the first week of running the campaign as this will allow us to determine what part of the week will be more beneficial to our campaigns.  We'll also be able to determine how to modify funding, the timing of the display, perhaps modify the wording of the overall ads and compare our local traffic and national traffic.

Unfortunately, because of the short time we have left, we are forced to make some "preliminary" observations based on a couple of day's data - something the videos stated would be of little benefit.  But the data that is observed will allow us to see our ads as we search for different keywords we created.  We'll be able to test our own assumptions without clicking on our own ad of course.  We wouldn't want to use up our limited funding by clicking on the ads ourselves.  I mostly look forward to seeing how and what will need changed over the next two to three weeks.  Our group will need to take some detailed notes through this process to accurately display our findings towards the end.

BUS572-4 Cookies and Ad Strtegies

This week, I learned more about cookies on websites that I thought was possible.  Though I don't have a full understanding of it, I believe that there is good use for them when it comes to tracking customers stats as far as where they came from, how long they were on your site, did they leave, did the customer stall out on a page, did they get led to a desired location, and things of that nature.

  I can also see a problem with them.  Knowing that a little bit of code can capture A LOT of information, this can be used to a disadvantage.  I'm not keen on the idea of what a cookie can do when it comes to getting my personal information.  These cookies do exist and they are not intended for good.  I'd like to know - if a cookie can track what I do, can a cookie be tracked for what it does?  Can we capture the information that a malicious cookie obtains to track down the owner of that cookie?  If so, will the person it leads to be the creator who intended the cookie to do bad?

I also learned that given a good strategy and game plan, Google Adwords and Google Display Network can be used to run entire campaigns.  This can be used to regenerate interest in an old product, breath life into a failing product line or even direct people's attention to a noteworthy cause.  Again, this could be something that I could read more on for next week, but I'd like to know just how well this type of strategy could fit into what we want to do.  We want more than anything to get a product name out for people to find The Thrifty Wargamer.  Will this strategy fit with our goals?  That's what will need to be researched.  I believe it can, just not sure how or what the cost related to the idea would be.  Wow, there is so much to learn and so little time in a class that meets every other week in a 14 week window.

I think that the skill I learned from our article this week from Ghose and Yang found here is that positioning really does matter, and not like we thought it should.  Businesses, according to the article can be more profitable if their ad is located in the middle of the search page instead of at the top.  This blows away my thinking that we need to have the best and first in everything when really, the middle is where the serious shopper or searcher is going to do business.  This means that a larger percentage of clicks will lead to actions we desire - like purchases.  This could completely change the way we price and move our ad around on a search page.

I look forward next week to relax, read and discover more strategic, and legal, things I can do to better my team's ads.  We should have some feedback this week to do some analysis.  I look forward more to that part of the course than anything.