I thought that SEA worked like SEO but with the difference that company had just to pay to appear on the add results and that the company who had paid the most is just appearing in first. I didn’t know that position was determined by a « Quality Score » for each keywords. 

I would have liked to know more about the different steps companies have to go through from the moment they decide to pay to appear on google Ads. (e.g. I’m a new online business and want to promote my website on Google in paying, what I have to do?  Do I just need to go on Google Ads, choose my budget, my keywords, create my campaign? Does Google warn me if the results are not good and that I have to make improvements?) 

I would also like to know how new small businesses can differentiate themselves from big companies that have specialized poles for SEA ? 

Something that would be very interesting to know is how does Google make sure the algorithm/calculation can´t be manipulated by bigger companies or the government? Is Google aware of that, do they care? Do they change factors regularly in order to assure accuracy? Are there special organizations that monitor Google, or are there specific regulations on this, internationally or nationally (e.g. from the government)? 

Otherwise, there would be a danger of power monopoly by Google and therefore an indirect influence on company’s success/power and the purchase behavior of consumers.

If people know the ins and outs of the algorithm used by Google to evaluate QS, this may lead users to try manipulating their score. This would allow them to improve their QS which would lower their actual CPC, thus reducing their advertising costs.  This would be a tempting reason for companies to engage in some black-hat strategies. In my opinion, Google made the right decision by not publishing their algorithms to prevent this kind of activity, although having the algorithm would make life a lot easier for marketers. 

But SEA is not just about paying for good visibility. It is also necessary to choose keywords and to know the market well to position yourself correctly and I was quite surprised to learn that money isn’t the key for everything in this area

The lack of control and transparency that advertisers behold over the locations and on screen positions of their ads also surprised me. The area of advertising is more ambiguous than I thought. In such a capitalistic world I was fascinated to learn that money can only get you so far in advertising. It all comes down to the quality and experience of your landing page. Although google do not publish their algorithm for how to achieve a high quality score, I would be interested to have an in-depth look at what steps different company’s follow to boost their own individual QS. 

I like the idea of sitelinks that websites can have at Ad position one to three. I would like to know more about how Google chooses which sitelinks from a website’s selection show up for a user’s search. I also found the process of how to find your optimal keywords quite interesting. It is good to see that Google offer services such as Google Analytics and their keywords tool for websites to improve their performance. I would like to find out more regarding how websites will optimise their keywords for voice search. Voice is an emerging method of search and people may use different keywords seeing as it is a more conversational process compared to mobile or desktop.

First, I found really engaging the CTR, especially that CTR is different in every industry. It really surprised me that dating sector is currently the top one in terms of CTR.

Also, it was really interesting for me to know the importance of a high quality score for positioning with Google Ads. I didn´t know that with a high QS you will get a higher position, and also a lower CPC. I understood that Quality Score is one of the keys of SEA.

For me, the most difficult part of this topic was the copy, and I think is also one of the most difficult parts of SEA and SEO. It really surprised me the amount of things that you need to take into consideration in order to make a good copy for your ad.

By last, it was very captivating the Google Ads extension sitelinks, just because I find them really helpful when I am googling something. Now I know their importance because they can give you a bigger presence on the page, and the CPR remains the same.

In summary, for me SEA was the most interesting topic that we have learned so far. But, I have the feeling that it is a very difficult field, and that if you want to be a professional on this, you will need to study and work a lot every day, because it seems to be something that change frequently.

In addition, if I have to make any recommendation, I would like to know more about SEA tools like Google Analytics or TagCrowd, which I think are of great importance for every student or expert in this matter.

When seeing the result listings for advertisements performance can change with a slight bit of wording alteration, was surprising to me and I only would have considered once taking this module. This shows the importance of detail when creating your website. 

I think it is important to note that this topic is forever changing and the importance of constant research and keeping up to date would be important in this topic in a working company. 

Regarding paid search, I find it very interesting to know the complex mechanisms that allow companies to show their ads in search engines and on third-party sites [e.g., Google display network (GDN)]. Specifically, I was surprised by the auction model and the great importance that Google and other companies such as Amazon or Bing give to relevance since, despite the large amount of money that advertisers can pay, they will always place in the first positions those ads that have better quality, that is, valued keywords, appropriate extensions (location, telephone ...), creativity, etc. In addition, and due to this competitive bidding system, I was surprised by the exorbitant cost that a click on an ad that contains the most valued keywords implies for a company, such as the top CPC of $1090 in the legal industry.

Finally, and despite the great influence of Google in the digital age, I would like to know more about the mechanisms and tools necessary to develop advertising campaigns on Bing, YouTube, Amazon, Yahoo or other regional search engines such as Baidu or Yandex. Moreover, I would like to know how companies can adapt their campaigns to different devices and to the revolutionary AI systems of visual search (Google Lens) or voice search (Google Assistant).

I also found interesting how landing pages work and how important it is to connect the links well to get your visitors/customers “land” correctly. 

Finally, we saw that CPC is increasing, why has this happened? Is it possible that it will decrease again? 

An area of Search Engine Advertising I would like to learn more about is how voice search may alter SEA in the future. This is intriguing to me as voice search may change search behaviours meaning that ads may have to create paid ad campaigns around voice search.  

Furthermore, I am very intrigued by the quality score that Google is setting up. Indeed, we have seen that Google puts a number between 1 and 10 for each keyword to determine its relevance. So I would like to know how Google judges that one keyword is more important than another? Are there any criteria?

What stood out to me in particular was the variation in cost per click (CPC), cost per action (CPA), and click-through rate (CTR) for different industries. 

Fixating on click-through rates for a moment, the dating industry had a significantly higher click through rate for search advertisements than other industries, and real estate had a significantly higher click through rate for display advertisements than other industries. This is an interesting finding, especially when considering the specific industry for the type of advertisement (Ex. dating for search or real estate of display). While it may seem surprising, and almost random, at first glance, it actually appears to be quite logical after some thought.

In relation to dating, search advertising is oriented to intrigue human emotions and desires, likely through simple words (Ex. “meet singles in your area”). Contrarily, if the same dating advertisements were done through display, it would come across as crude or skeptical. This explains why the dating industry has a significantly higher click-through rate for search ads, rather than display ads. 

Similarly, In terms of real estate, words cannot accurately describe the desired aesthetic that the advertiser is trying to convey. This is far better done through an eye-catching display ad, which explains why the real estate industry has a significantly higher click-through rate for display ads, rather than search ads.  

This ties back in to the fundamental questions that any advertiser will need to ask themselves regarding questions concerning their objectives, audience, brand, and industry, in order to determine the optimal form of advertising to reach their goals. 

It would be interesting to know how the quality score is calculated. Are all the companies equal or can big companies influence this score with their power?

I would like to know more about how to use certain tools like the google ads keyword tool or see how the google analytics account work but at the same time the google ads certification can help us.

Finally, one of the emerging trends to watch is : unlocking the power of Artificial intelligence and I would really like to know more about what it involves.

I was surprised that the CTR is not this important, I clearly thought that it was the key to the success of a website, and I appreciated the explanations on this point, allowing me to see more clearly in a part that had become blurred at the beginning of the reading.

The thing that follows from this is that companies have every interest to focus on quality and not number, it is useless to have many clicks, it will be more interesting to look at the time spent consulting the site or the number of redundant visits.

I was unaware of the various factors that influence a companies ‘AD Rank’. For example, a combination of the expected click through rate, the landing page experience, ad formats and ad relevance are some of the factors that influence where your AD appears. I was surprised by how money is not the dominant factor. There is much more to the formula of a successful digital marketing strategy.

Search Advertising is a powerful tool however I would be really interested to know more about small business’ in regards to this. Is it logical for a small company to engage in this competition when they are competing against larger companies. How can they differentiate themselves amongst the large and growing market. 

I was also both surprised and would love to learn more about search engines and how they vary on different devices. Google will show results based on how well they display on mobile devices and this would be something I would like to learn some more about. 

Voice assisted search and the impact this will have on quality ratings and rankings is another factor that I think will change the game in regards to search advertising and I think learning some more about this will be really exciting.

Search Advertising is such a powerful tool. It offers excellent results when the combination of factors are implemented. However the world is constantly innovating and these factors will inevitably change so we must continuously learn what we can do to optimise our results.

I have been particularly captivated by the functioning of how ads’ positions are determined, which works on the basis of an auction system determined by what the advertiser is willing to pay. But what really surprised me was how Quality Score decisively influences in the final position of the ad, here Google, in my opinion, does very well by giving priority to quality and user experience, and that not everything works based on money "You pay me more and therefore I put you in the first place". 

In this way, both the advertiser and the user get a win-win situation, where the advertiser saves money and the user saves time, as it is useless to place irrelevant advertisements in the highest positions if the user is not tempted to make the conversion. 

On the other hand, with increasingly personalized ads, I would like to know to what extent we are exposing our privacy and to what level of intrusion would be acceptable, in order to get more relevant and quality ads. I think it is important to discuss the issue of privacy and technology, because I personally find it shocking how much data big corporations such as Facebook or Google have about us, not only about our contact details but also about our tastes, the places we visit and what we do in our daily lives. 

I was surprised by the fact that we don’t entirely know how Google’s quality score is determined but only have an idea of what it involves. I learned that historical performance is one of the 6 key factors which influence it but can be a negative and limiting factor to newer businesses who are trying to get their SEA campaign started. This can positively influence them to improve all other aspects of their quality score but gives them an immediate disadvantage in the ranking process. Should Google make an exception to new businesses who have no record of historical performance instead of constantly favouring the more well-known, traditional companies?

In addition to this, has this factor of historical performance discouraged businesses to try something new, original and potentially risky as part of their campaigns in order to not damage their quality score if it’s not as successful as other campaigns? This could actually reduce creativity and originality among marketing campaigns, negatively impacting both businesses and consumers. This is definitely a topic which caught my attention and I would certainly be interested in learning more about it.

On the other hand they do not make public what really is at the center of their valuation and algorithms: Factors influencing the quality score and determination of CPC…

But they do not just keep low on these areas, but when confronted they argue that they keep these formulas secret to ensure that pages and internet traffic stays as natural/organic as possible.

As the biggest player in online marketing they seem to not only understand how to make their platform an attractive marketing tool, but also excel at selling their lacks of transparency as an act of protectionism.

And authorities, who have widespread control over traditional media, fail to make google take responsibility and force them to finally publish what has great effects on our life as consumers and business owners.

Until then our best guess is what practioners publish in their research papers. The kind of qualitative/quantitative approaches that they use to tackle would sure interest me.
All of this also applies to Search Engine Optimisation, but as the quality factor seems to favour bigger advertisers/companies it might cause smaller, local suppliers to go unnoticed among their customers and become bankrupt in the long-run. Maybe leaving only a handful of monopolist suppliers.

It was fascinating to learn that CTR wasn’t the key driver or provider of success and understanding how websites are scored on certain characteristics such as CTR, performance, landing page. Learning about the SEA auction-based system was really interesting and was almost hard to believe bidding for keywords etc fascinating.

In conclusion, this is an interesting subject. It was fascinating to be able to link the Google Advertising test to some additional theory. I'd like to hear more about how Google can evolve AI and voice control for SEA, as well as where SEA's future lies.      

 

I would like to learn more about how companies determine the right keywords. I know understand how important it is for the website to choose their keywords wisely but to also use them sparingly in order to avoid overcrowded or abusive ‘stuffing’. How can you determine the right keywords for your website and how might they differ if you decide to branch out and geo target a separate location that may be less well known to you.

One element of SEA which I was most shocked by was the lack of significance of the number of clicks as a metric for success. When considering the success of ads previous to this module, I personally would have considered the number of clicks onto an ad as a great win for the marketer. Although, the number of clicks is nevertheless a metric of success, I can now clearly see the gravity of using your beginning outlined goals and how they have matured within the campaign to measure the impact of your campaign. That and the CTR will provide thorough analysis. 

Secondly, I was very surprised to find out that Google do not take the highest bid offered and in fact it often works out cheaper for the bidder in the live auction. This surprised me as it is a general consensus that companies will strive to achieve the most capital possible and often times surpassing quality in their product/service to do so. By Google using the methods of a QS along with a bid, this allows quality ads run by deserving companies to reach a higher position on the search page even if that is at a lower price than what they were offering. 

I recently listened to a podcast on SEO trends in 2021 by ‘SEO 101” which mentioned the recent news of the Australian government asking Google and Facebook to essentially pay them for news. This came after similar incidences with the French and UK government. What I am interested in finding out is if or how will this effect Google’s live auction format or even their ad campaigns in general. Will we see a complete reform in the way ad campaigns and live bidding is conducted to meet growing concerns by each country? Is it possible that governments are beginning to take back control that they afforded to MNC or will the impact MNCs have on the economy of a country pervade? 

Also, I find very interesting how the differences that consumers have when using different devices are being studied. I am surprised that even though it is something very coherent, there has only been a few studies on it, that actually explain the importance of not only SEA, but how to make the most out of it depending on our brand and our goods/services, since if we not take all the important factors into account, SEO and SEA might not be enough on their own.

Therefore, I would like to know more about little differences that might make a difference, such as the importance of devices, taking into account that the basic metrics and theory has already been explained. In addition, it might be very general, but it would be very interesting to find the exact formula to which google gives the different qualification scores, since it makes a direct impact on how SEA works and how the companies invest their resources such as time and money 

From learning about this topic, i would like to further research more about Keywords. As this is clearly one of the main factors that influence Search engine advertising I would like to learn more about how these keywords are chosen and if companies change and update  them over time if they are not working successfully.