Google Revamp the Recommended Budget Tool
31st January 2011 Posted in Search
Glossy graphical interface added to old favourite
Whilst checking through one of my accounts today a new icon within the Campaigns tab caught my eye (see red box left). The icon was showing against campaigns that Google had identified as being limited by budget and looked strikingly similar (i.e. identical) to the icon used by Google to launch their Bid Simulator tool.
Intrigued, I clicked on the icon to see what was on offer and discovered that Google have given their Recommended Budget Tool a serious overhaul. Where once we were supplied with a simple figure for the daily budget that would maximise the number of impressions that your ad would receive, Google now provide a summary table and chart comparing actual performance over the past 10 days against a matrix of alternative daily budgets:
The summary table provides an estimate of the number of clicks per day, the estimated cost per day and the estimated average CPC for each of the daily budgets. The chart provides an easy to interpret visualisation of the actual number of clicks or impressions for the current budget versus the potential number of clicks or impressions for the selected daily budget. You can cycle through the different budgets by checking the appropriate radio button (green box) and can select your preferred metric (clicks or impressions) by using the ‘View’ options above the chart (blue box).
For budgets that are larger than the current setting the missed clicks/impressions are displayed on the graph in green and represent opportunities missed due to the budget not being larger. For budgets that are smaller than the current setting the missed clicks/impressions are displayed on the graph in red and represent opportunities that would have been missed had the budget not been set at its current level:
Another useful feature is the ‘Set a different budget’ option. This allows a user to test a greater variety of budgets by dynamically updating the chart and table in response to a bespoke value being entered within the field (red box):
Overall, the functionality provides a user-friendly way in which to easily review how budget constraints may be affecting a campaign and how settings may be adjusted to overcome any undesirable effects.
In addition, the graph could also be used as a quick snapshot to highlight trends in search patterns. For example the graph below shows that on two consecutive Tuesdays (18th and 25th), a number of impressions were missed due to lack of budget (note that weekend days are excluded from the graph as the campaign is not set to run on weekends). Ad-scheduling could therefore be implemented to reduce bids on Tuesdays thereby ensuring that the maximum number of impressions/clicks was achieved for the current budget:
In summary, the revamped Recommended Budget Tool is a welcome addition to the AdWords interface. However, as with the Bid Simulator, it should always be remembered that the estimates are based on the previous 10 days performance and may not necessarily accurately predict future performance.
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