You may have noticed the unavoidable reoccurring theme of relevance throughout my posts. There is very good reason for this; Google thinks relevance is extremely important, so much so they measure it. And if they think it’s important as PPC advertisers so should we!
Google measure the relevance of both your keywords and ad copy in relation to the search query that the user enters into Google’s search tool. The metric they use to measure and report this relevance is Quality Score.
The reason why Google cares so much about relevance and quality is that they want to show only the most relevant ads to each users because they will be more likely to click on these rather than irrelevant ads. Google wants as many people to click on ads as possible because the more clicks they generate the more revenue they earn from advertisers.
Google decided to introduce Quality Score because they realised that by displaying the ads based on a simple bidding model (highest bidder wins) they were often showing very spammy ads that not only provided searchers with a bad user experience, but also discouraged them from clicking on the sponsored ads.
Quality Score is not reviewed daily or monthly at a ad group or campaign level, it is calculated at keyword level every time a user’s search query matches the keywords you are bidding on within your account. Your Quality Score has a big impact on the performance of your PPC campaigns as it impacts the following –
- Determines whether your ad will be displayed when relevant search queries are entered
- Impacts the ad rank (position on the results page)
- The actual Cost per Click you pay
Remember, by taking the time to continually review your ads text and make them even more relevant you will not only improve your Quality Score but also prevent wasting money on unwanted clicks from irrelevant users.
