Can You Get A Low Adwords Quality Score For Not Bidding High Enough?

Exactly, that's why I like to be in the top positions on cheaper words. This way you at least get some conversions and can build your way up to the expensive words.

i usually bid high first to establish a high ctr,i aim for at least 5%-10%ctr,ad pos 1-3,do this for at least 4-5 days and then you will have established a great qs,then lower your bids until your profitable.

Low bid price is a bonus of high quality score. The better the quality score the lower your minimum bid can be.

To improve your quality score, make sure that your ad title, ad body, keyword phrase and landing page an in alignment.

The best way I have found is do one keyword phrase per ad group.
Try to get the keyword into the ad title and/or ad body,

The bonus here is that Google will highlight the matches in the ad and this will help your CTR.

Optimize your landing page for this one keyword phrase.

I know this is more work but I will help your quality scores.

Yes, CTR is the single biggest component of QS, about two thirds in fact. But you're forgetting one thing: QS is calculated by position. Sure your CTR normally will be higher in a higher position, comparatively speaking. But competitors with better ads at that position will get a higher QS.

Think about it. If what you say is true, then reducing your bid will get you lower position, your CTR will be lower and so will your QS. It doesn't happen that way. You can get any QS at any position. I can show you QS of 10 in 11th position. That's because my ad is superior than competitors at that position. It will likely be a QS at higher positions. The reverse is also true: an ad with QS of 5 in 10th position will have a QS of 5 in first. So create ads that get good QS first, preferably ten. Then if you want higher positions increase your bid to get there.

Hi Clayton,

Lucid is right. Your bid price does NOT affect your
quality score at all. They are independent of each other.

Let me explain:

You are right that CTR is indeed the
dominant factor behind quality score.

No doubt about that.

But Google recognizes that ads in higher ranking tend
to get higher CTR than ads in lower rank.

In order to calculate a fair and precise quality score,
the quality score is normalized so as to remove
the influence of ad position on the CTR.

In this way, ads can compete fairly for position
based on quality and bid, where advertisers are
rewarded with better ad positions when they
deliver high quality ads to searchers. I actually use to think that way.

And it's also true many people follow this "strategy".

But as mentioned, due to the reason above,
this "strategy" is actually a false one.

In fact, when I first found out about this, I was
kinda taken aback. Because I always thought that
high ad position => high CTR => high QS.

But alas - it's not true.


If you really want high QS,
then ensure the following:

- Give highly relevant ads (e.g. keywords in title)
- Give compelling ads (e.g. state benefit etc)
- Relevance between keyword-ad-landing page
- High quality landing page

Google only cares about one thing -
that is offering the highest quality
experience to the user.

It doesn't matter if an advertiser can throw
in money to bid the highest. If his ad isn't
relevant, his quality score is going to be bad.


Here's further proof:

Go to Google Adwords official blog where
they talk about ad quality and how they
measure quality score:

=> Inside AdWords: Improvements to Ads Quality

If you need further confirmation, you can
contact your Google Adwords support, and they
will tell you the same thing too.

Hope this clears things up.

Cheers,
Jag

Hi Claytons,

It's not really a chicken and egg thing.
It's pretty clear cut.

Google's principal concern is that you
give high quality and relevant ad.

At Google Adwords page I just shown you,
it says this:

In fact, this sentence can be found right
above the Google quote you gave.

You can be be in higher position as
compared to your competitors who
are bidding higher than you because
you have a better quality score.

CTR IS and undeniable the biggest
component factor affecting quality score.

But it's not influenced by bid position.




Let me give you an equation to
make this clearer:

Ad rank = Bid x Quality Score

This is the general equation given
on Google Adwords help page.

And QS is affected (generally) by:

• CTR
• Relevancy
• Landing page quality

If you want to rank higher, bid high.
Or get the quality score high.

Smart marketers work on their
QS so they don't have to pay
unnecessarily high fees TO Google.

And that's what Google wants too.
Because if you see ROI, you will
stay with Google in the long term
and they will benefit too.

Again, if you want to be absolutely sure,
just do a check with Google Adwords support,
and they will tell you ad position has no
influence on quality score.

Focus on getting more persuasive ads,
tighter and more relevant keywords,
ad groups to landing page, and higher
quality and relevant landing page.

Cheers,
Jag

The people above who say the bid doesn't matter, fail to appreciate that Google's position by normalisation isn't 100% accurate... certainly in my experience, which is a lot.

What you would expect, is that regardless of what you bid, the CTR has to be above a certain % for that position in order to keep your Quality Score or improve it. However, this doesn't always seem to be the case and my feelings on this is because Google don't have it as accurate as most people think.

The best advice I can give is this: If you can't afford to bid on a keyword to be in the top few positions, then leave that keyword for now and maybe come back to it another time. If you can afford it, then bid high and get a high position - in a few days/weeks time (depending on the impressions and clicks the keyword receives), drop the CPC around 10% each time, but nothing major. If the keyword is converting and your conversion cost/ROI is something you're happy with, then don't alter the bid at all... just leave it and improve the ads, via split testing.

So if you were bidding 0.25 and the keyword was proving to be too expensive, I'd drop the CPC to something like 0.23 and then leave it again for a few days. Also make sure you're split testing - if you aren't, you're shooting yourself in the foot.

Every keyword that has a low click through rate will have a lowered quality score and an accompanying increased min bid. An ad appearing on page 4 due to low bidding or poorly written ad copy, even at position 1 can produce a low ctr. It's said a keyword's ctr history sticks with it for the duration of the adwords account.

Some advise to bid higher during the initial honeymoon trial impressions, then lower the bid after establishing a click through track record.