I have recently come to the complete understanding that targeting specific regions of the United States rather than the U.S. as a whole will give you more impressions and higher ad rank. What are your options when targeting the U.S.? The campaign I have set up for this right now, has campaign level geo-targeting on every city in the U.S., by not check-marking the states name, but check marking all city regions listed under the states name for the country U.S. This would be the lowest level of targeting I can find for Google Campaign Geo Targeting. I then set up 50 Ad Groups. (One named after each state). I copied my Ad to all 50 Ad Groups. I copied all my Keywords to all 50 Ad Groups. I then put the name of the state before each keyword. ex: ("alabama purchase thriller dvd") for the Ad Group of alabama, if the keyword phrase were purchase thriller dvd... I'm expecting to get more traffic, higher page rank, and cheaper bids. Can anyone confirm I have done this correctly, or can you offer me any ways to target the U.S. even better? I just have a feeling this is not the best way to do this... Any ideas guys? Thank you, Bryan Roberts
This would probably help drive up your CTR as your ads will be more relevant to your demographics.. so in turn you'll probably end up getting more traffic in the long run..
You can certainly do it this way. Some things I want to point out however. It will depend on what you are selling but most people will not search using their state as a keyword. Most would use their city's or town's name. Since most people search very broadly, such as "thriller dvd", you will get much less impressions. Another thing you should do is not to just copy your ad 50 times. Take advantage that you can now test 50 different ads. Try different variations and see which ones get better CTR. Of course, if you don't get many impressions, it will take longer to make proper decisions. Your ads should also contain the geo keyword, if at all possible. As mentioned, I don't think you'll get more impressions. I also don't think you'll get significantly higher rankings and lower bids. If you have the patience, try it and let us know. Another thing to keep in mind, if I search for "thriller dvd in chicago" for example, and see an ad titled "Buy Thriller DVD in Chicago", I expect to be able to buy it in that city, not online. Your conversions may not be as good. But like I said, let us know.