Making Sense of Google Adsense/Adwords

[joe_socal2000]

I have been looking at various key words in Google adwords and trying to learn more about this business you all are in. I am kind of confused about some things. I have noticed that quite often I will click on a keyword that supposedly has X number of monthly clicks and pays X amount per click and open it up in the Google search window.

When I search google for that phrase, I won't see one ad at the top of the search results or along the right side. For example, let's look at "basket weaving degree"?


Supposedly, there were 22 local monthly searches with an approximate CPC of $21.16. When I google that phrase...There are no ads. I realize it is a small number of local searches, but I have seen it with other phrases that have more searches, too.

What gives?

 

[Tom K.]

Maybe there are no advertisers targeting your location or maybe they turned off their ads during the holiday/winter season. Or maybe Google knows you are not an ideal lead. For that low a number of searches perhaps it is too easy for Google, especially if the cpc is that high they are too well aware. I would be very surprised to see ads for your example search phrase, "basket weaving degree".

 

[joe_socal2000]

Maybe there are no advertisers targeting your location or maybe they turned off their ads during the holiday/winter season. Or maybe Google knows you are not an ideal lead. For that low a number of searches perhaps it is too easy for Google, especially if the cpc is that high they are too well aware. I would be very surprised to see ads for your example search phrase, "basket weaving degree".

Tom:

I am not sure I am following you at all, so please be patient with me.

How or why would google assume that I am not an ideal lead? I agree with you that I would be surprised to find any ads for that search phrase. That is why I am confused. Why would that phrase have a $21.16 value?

But, I want to get to the larger point. I used "basket weaving degree" as a quirky example, but I have seen lots of more common phrases listed with a CPC value and then when I go to search that phrase in google...no ads at all for anything appear in the search results.

I guess it is possible that advertisers turn off their ads, but it seems highly unlikely that that reason holds for each example I have come across over the last couple of days.

 

[Biggie]

Hi

it seems you did not check "exact' match (where it says "match types" in left column on screen), prior to query.

[basket weaving degree] Low 36 36 - $6.32

it's important to note:

the cpc amount is not what you may actually receive as payout, should a visitor click on an adsense link, and the global/local monthly searches do not equal actual number of visitors those terms will deliver to your site or domain.


imo...

 

[Tom K.]

Advertisers can also specify physical location and day/time when their ads are served. It should be noted that if you use any Google product (i.e. search, +, etc.) then Google can track your Web surfing activity and know whether you are truly interested in the ad or just testing the waters.

 

[joe_socal2000]

Tom and Biggie:

Thank you for taking the time to reply. Very interesting stuff.

Let me come at this from a different angle. When I do a google search for a specific phrase and google doesn't display any ads in the top three spots or along the side, is this valuable information that can be acted upon in some way? Obviously, the basket weaving was a rather silly example, but I have seen this numerous times on legitimate searches.

In theory, couldn't I just place a one cent bid for those spots under those search terms and have my ad displayed whenever those search phrases are entered?