As part of our commitment to making AdWords as effective an advertising program as possible, we've outlined some site-building guidelines to better serve our users, advertisers, and publishers. We've found that when our advertisers' sites reflect these guidelines, two important things happen:
The money you spend on AdWords ads will be more likely to turn into paying customers.
Users develop a trust in the positive experience provided after clicking on AdWords ads (and this turns in to additional targeted leads for you).
Furthermore, following our site guidelines will help improve your landing page quality score. As a component of your keywords' overall Quality Scores, a high landing page quality score can affect your AdWords account in three ways:
- Decrease your keywords' cost-per-clicks (CPCs)
- Increase your keyword-targeted ads' position on the content network
- Improve the chances that your placement-targeted ads will win a position on your targeted placements
Below we've outlined the three main components of a quality website: relevant and original content, transparency, and navigability. Note that these guidelines aren't exhaustive, nor do they replace any of our Editorial Guidelines, which your ads need to comply with in order for you to advertise with AdWords.
Please be aware that there are some types of sites that we've found provide a consistently poor experience for our users. These sites will receive low landing page quality scores. Learn more.
Relevant and Original Content
Relevance and originality are two characteristics that define high-quality site content. Here are some pointers on creating content that meets these standards:
Relevance:
Users should be able to easily find what your ad promises. Link to the page on your site that provides the most useful information about the product or service in your ad. For instance, direct users to the page where they can buy the advertised product, rather than to a page with a description of several products.
Originality:Feature unique content that can't be found on another site. This guideline is particularly applicable to affiliates that use the following types of pages:
Bridge pages: Pages that act as an intermediary, whose sole purpose is to link or redirect traffic to the parent company
Mirror pages: Pages that replicate the look and feel of a parent site; your site should not mirror (be similar or nearly identical in appearance to) your parent company's or any other advertiser's site
Provide substantial information. If your ad does link to a page consisting mostly of ads or general search results (such as a directory or catalog page), provide additional, unique content.
Transparency
In order to build trust with users, your site should be explicit in three primary areas: the nature of your business; how your site interacts with a visitor's computer; and how you intend to use a visitor's personal information, if you request it. Here are tips on maximizing your site's transparency:
Your business information:
Openly share information about your business. Clearly define what your business is or does.
Honor the deals and offers you promote in your ad.
Deliver products and services as promised.
Only charge users for the products and services that they order and successfully receive.
Distinguish sponsored links from the rest of your site content.
Your site's interaction with a visitor's computer:
Avoid altering users' browser behavior or settings (such as back button functionality or browser window size) without first getting their permission.
If your site automatically installs software, be upfront about the installation and allow for easy removal. Refer to Google's Software Principles for more guidelines.
Visitors' personal information:
Unless necessary for the product or service that you're offering, don't request personal information.
If you do request personal information, provide a privacy policy that discloses how the information will be used.
Give options to limit the use of a user's personal information, such as the ability to opt out of receiving newsletters.
Allow users to access your site's content without requiring them to register. Or, provide a preview of what users will get by registering.
Navigability
The key to turning visitors into customers is making it easy for users to find what they're looking for. Here's how:
Provide a short and easy path for users to purchase or receive the product or offer in your ad.
Avoid excessive use of pop-ups, pop-unders, and other obtrusive elements throughout your site.
Make sure that your landing page loads quickly. Learn ways to improve your load time.
Turn to Google's Webmaster Guidelines for more recommendations, which will improve your site's performance in Google's search results as well.
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