When Google rolled out the "Optimize Campaign" feature I gave it a shot out of curiousity. One suggestion it made was that I should include "www." in my Display URLs. I was not because my client has a long domain name. Well, I decided to test it with some other accounts. I created duplicates of every ad. So I have two versions of each ad, one has the "www." in the Display URL and the second one doesn't. I also let Google decide how to display the ads. Here are my results after 3 weeks. Google served the ad with the "www." more than the one without. Usually a 55% to 45% ratio. As for the CTR, it was inconclusive. The "www." ads would sometimes have a better CTR even though they were served less. Other times, the "www." ads would have a lower CTR. So does anyone have a better or more long term test of this? Whether you have done this test or not, do you include the "www." in your Display URL or not?
Only that I had a similar result to you - I don't usually include the www. because it makes that line too long, gave the campaign optimizer a try, and it suggested I add it, so I tried it on a couple of adgroups and can't see that it makes any difference at all. I wonder why they suggest it? they miust have some kind of statistical data that says it works better, but I can't think why it would.
You should focus more on stuffing your ads with keywords than the www. I usually do a subdomain that is the keyword. Like productxreview . domain . com
I've tested this a few times, and not found any significant impact on the clickthrough rates in general. So I tend to leave it off if the URL is quite long, so that I can put the keyword or something similar at the end...
I haven't seen it make a huge difference. I usually leave it off if the url is long...include it when the url is shorter.
If creating a display URL that appears to be going to an interior page, i leave www on, if the URL is short enough. It seems more credible when it is an interior page, rather than a cute marketing tactic (consumer's mind). Display URLs in which separate words are capitalized, display the www, and have a slash going to an interior page, for some reason...annoy me. Display URLs without www with CapitalizedSeparateWords/CapitalizedInteriorPage annoy me even more. Examples below. www.AnnoyingURL.com/Annoying MoreAnnoyingURL.com/Annoying www.notsobadurl.com/ok notsureifrelevanturl.com/maybe Of course, I'm not my clients' customers and everything should be based on split testing like you attempted. When those deem negligible in CTR, put yourself in the customer's shoes and go with your gut. Google will let you display a sub domain, even if your ad is not going to a sub domain, but an interior page. The same rules apply, it can not be misleading. This has worked very well for one client. It seems it would work best for companies that do not have industry KW rich names or it is not obvious by their name what they do. Example: KW-KW2.CompanyName.com
I find that longer domain names need to include some capitalization so they are easier to read. Especially, if the domain name does not include a bold keyword.
It does pay to leave out the www to shorten it, however people are so used to seeing www before the web address so I would keep it.
It depends on the campaign... it makes sense to test both & see which works better, there's no reason not to test your ads.