Adwords Positioning

[ArizonaLandForSale]

Couple of questions... First, my Google Adwords account says my average position is 5.4 for a particular keyword, but when I search for the keywords I don't see my ad until page three. Why?

Second, what has been everyone's experience with regards to the best position? I've heard that if you're not in the top three you want to skip positions 4 & 5 and aim for 6. Is that right?

One more question... Why do my adwords and my analytics say I've had a different number of clicks??

[Lucid]

Average position: that's how averages work. If one impression shows your ad in 2nd and the other in 9th, that's an average of 5.5. Why impressions so far apart? Many reasons. Geography, day-parting.

Best position. You have to test. For almost all the campaigns I manage in all sorts of industries, the top three is where you want to be. More people click on the top listings just like organics. They also tend to buy more.

Adwords and Analytics count different things. Adwords counts clicks, Analytics counts unique visitors. As soon as you have returning visitors, the numbers won't match.

[ArizonaLandForSale]

Originally Posted by Lucid

Average position: that's how averages work. If one impression shows your ad in 2nd and the other in 9th, that's an average of 5.5. Why impressions so far apart? Many reasons. Geography, day-parting.

Best position. You have to test. For almost all the campaigns I manage in all sorts of industries, the top three is where you want to be. More people click on the top listings just like organics. They also tend to buy more.

Adwords and Analytics count different things. Adwords counts clicks, Analytics counts unique visitors. As soon as you have returning visitors, the numbers won't match.

Your comments on average position makes perfect sense. Thank you!

I was under the impression that analytics counted both return and unique visitors, although I've always had a hard time believing the number of unique visitors..

[John Hocking]

The top 3 positions will get the most clicks and cost you the most.

The top 2 to 3 positions are also shared with other search partners outside of Google and will give you more reach.

They also tend to get more clicks but not all are customers, so you cost per customer could be much higher.

From my own experience, positions 4 to 6 give the best cost to sales ratios. If you are on a tight budget, I would start there and when you get a better since of your conversion cost, you can bid higher.