Emotions tend to run high when involved with any type of bidding. Be it a fine piece of art, classic car, or a keyword. Many people cannot let go of the human emotion when they are trying to outbid the person next to them. All common sense is out of the door. They turn the bidding into a full out competition. Winning is the only option their ego will allow. This is a very well known phenomenon in the auction house and eBay setting. How many advertising professionals realize that they are partaking in the same type of competition?
The advertiser is not always the one to blame.
If you have the luxury of working in an organization with a big online marketing team, then perhaps the individual is responsible for her own accounts. Blame away! But, in many cases there is one person in the company who controls all PPC and online marketing. If this person was in control 100% of the time, emotional bidding could be blamed on him as well.
However, in many of my experiences there is an outside influence…coming from the inside…from behind a nice desk….in the largest office in the building. Yes, it is our beloved CEO / business owner. This woman built the company from scratch and knows the product inside out. When she searches Google for a product that she sells, she wants (needs) her company to show up before all of her competitors. She’s invested too much time and energy to be “beat” by her competitors in the PPC game. It’s purely an emotional ad position competition.
Fact: An ad in the number one position does not necessarily mean it’s the number one performing ad.
The next step our CEO takes is walking down to the one man team that manages her company’s PPC bids. She will demand that her company is in the number one position for all of her favorite keywords. Some PPC managers will listen and do whatever their boss says and blindly raise bids; others may put up a fight. I’m telling you now, put up a fight.
How to fight the CEO and not lose your job:
Bidding for position is important. And testing the number one position should be part of your everyday practice. Sometimes it pays off and sometimes it’s a hole in your wallet. You won’t know what works if you don’t test. But if you blindly aim for the number one position every time, you’re not effectively doing your job as a PPC bid manager. So when your boss asks you to make sure your ads are number one in the search engines, put up a fight, an intelligent fight. All you have to do is show your boss the numbers. Numbers don’t lie.
Win the fight with a 1 stat: Ecommerce Conversion Rate based on Ad Position. The stat is already available to you in Google Analytics if you have your AdWords account properly linked. You can easily show your boss which position your ads earn the most conversions. That should be enough information to show your boss that you know what you’re doing. And at the same time it should earn you the respect you deserve for being an intelligent PPC manager.
