Constantly changing and ever on the move, Google has been seen Beta Testing a new ad extension on their results page.  Check out a sneak-peak here:

Not only are you presented an opt-in within a paid listing ad, but it is also pre-populate it with your Google AdWords Login!  Upon logging out and revisiting the same SERP, the field no longer contained my email address.  This new addition to the ad extension suite of options has yet to become standard in all accounts.  Since it is in Beta, there is not much more information available to us at this time.

I for one do not see the value this offering can provide in comparison to the extensions currently available.  A person who would provide their information to sign-up for a newsletter would probably have to be convinced to do so based on the content of the site relative to their interests.  I have a hard time believing a person would use this feature and then continue on elsewhere without visiting the actual site.

What do you think?

• Under what circumstances would you find this feature helpful?
• Would you personally submit the form if you were presented this option?

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Google is stepping up their updates for the adwords editor.  Hit the link to read all about it.  http://www.google.com/support/adwordseditor/bin/answer.py?answer=1409692. The editor is nearly at the point where all account modifications & management can be performed off-line.

Here is a breakdown of the newest features:

• Campaign experiment Support

• Location extensions support

• Background download:  One or more accounts can now be downloaded in the background while you’re working on another open account.

• Additional campaign settings:
  • Enhanced CPC (enabled/disabled
  • Delivery method (standard/accelerated)
  • Ad Rotation (optimize for clicks/optimize for conversions/rotate)

• Destination URL links:  Test your destination URLs when you click the icon

• Unlimited number of search conditions:  Advanced Search now allows you to add an unlimited number of search criteria

• Additional image ad dimensions:
  • 320×50 (now valid for mobile image ads as well)
  • 300×50
  • 425×600
  • 300×600

• Item status and disapprovals:  AdWords Editor now displays item status in the Status column and allows you to manually pause or enable an item by editing the status icon. In addition, you can now see specific ad disapproval reasons by mousing over the disapproved status.

• Updated first page bid estimates:  AdWords Editor v9.5 supports the updated first page bid estimates

AdWords Editor

Here is a great article outlining some of the things the FTC is going after Google about.  We hope that in the least we will  get a glimpse beneath Google’s Shroud of secrecy surrounding their Quality Score rating system.

Jump over to ClickZ for the article: http://www.clickz.com/clickz/column/2086712/ftc-regulation-google

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If you are not leveraging Google’s Ad Extensions in AdWord’s, you should take a look at why you should.

What are Ad Extensions?

“Ad extensions expand a standard text ad with one or more lines that provide additional information such as an address and phone number (location extensions and call extensions), more page links (ad sitelinks), and product images (product extensions). Sitelinks allow advertisers to include additional page links on qualifying text ads that appear on Google.com and Google Search Network partners. This extension is available globally on ads that meet our quality requirements. The most common campaigns to qualify for the Sitelinks feature are high-quality campaigns that contain keywords and ads specific to your brands.” – Google,  https://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=141826

To access Ad Extension go to your drop-down arrow at the far end of your Adwords tabs  (which include Campaign, Adgroups, Keywords, Ads, Networks, etc..) and select Ad Extension from the 2nd check-box.

With this new tab you now have access to Phone Extensions & Site-link Extensions as well as being able to link your AdWord’s account to to your Google places (Location Extensions), Google Merchant Center/Products (Product Extensions)

For the sake of this post, we will only be focusing on Sitelinks.

Select a campaign and add a new sitelink.  You are allowed 1-10 additional links which may appear below your ad.

For Example:

(Names have been replaced with XYZ for privacy reasons)

Notice how this ad “pops” with the additional line of text and also encourages the searcher to refine their results through your ad & show direct-link related offerings.

Does it work?  You be the judge:

(May 2011)

Those are some fantastic CTR results with very little effort to create – You can even add them in the Google AdWords Editor.

Other sitelink ideas:

• Services > Specials > Contact Us
• Men’s > Women’s > Children’s
• Brands > Part# Search > RFQ
• Debt Calculator > Programs >Testimonials

ad extensions, Google AdWords, sitelinks