A reader who just joined the Vitruvian Way Café just asked a question on the forum about how to target pages on the Display network. Nobody is searching for keywords, so how do you tell Google on what pages to show your ads?

My forum reply:

For Display campaigns, you can target pages in many different ways. The most basic is to select keywords. Then Google goes out and finds pages in the Display network that contain content about those keywords. You know when you do a search and you see something at the top about “35,000,000 results in 1.09 seconds” – some of those pages run AdSense, and your ads will appear on some of those.

You can also select pages on the Display network directly, by adding them to “managed placements.” If you like the way a site is performing for you, add it to managed placements so you can be assured of continued exposure. Also, you can adjust the bid of a managed placement, but not for a keyword-triggered automatic one.

Audiences

There are other ways to target pages on the Display network, like audiences (a particular demographic plus interests, whom you can show ads to even on pages unrelated to the subject of your ad). In the screenshot below, I’m targeting people whom Google has identified as being fans of martial arts movies. They’ll see my ads even if they’re on a site devoted to iPad cases or workflow software.

 Topics

And topics, which cover broad subject areas. For example, you can select the entire Arts & Entertainment topic, or drill down into Movies, then Action Movies, then Martial Arts movies. In the following screenshot, I’m targeting pages about martial arts movies.

Targeting Leverage Beyond AdWords

One of the benefits of using Audiences and Topics is the powerful metrics you can get quite quickly and cheaply, which you can use to improve any Facebook advertising you might be doing. (You can also do it in reverse, using Facebook ads to identify strong veins of interest in the Google Display network.

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Some good educational opportunities coming up in the next couple of months. In chronological order:

1. Perry Marshall's AdWords Elite Summit – streaming and DVDs

My friend, colleague and mentor Perry Marshall's AdWords Elite Summit in Maui is looking to be a must-attend for top AdWords players. How seriously am I taking this? Perry invited me a couple of months ago to be a speaker, and I couldn't, due to a long-standing client commitment. As soon as I could, I ordered the live streaming video and DVD set of the event. That was hard, to pay for something that was offered for free ;) But as someone who plays in the AdWords Big Leagues, I couldn't afford not to.

If you play in the AdWords Big Leagues, or aspire to, and you're not jetting to Maui next week, do yourself a favor and order the videos. Perry's kindly hooked my affiliate link up with a $100 coupon, already applied:

https://m171.infusionsoft.com/go/HJMauiDSC1/SC94217

The coupon expires on Thursday, Feb 25 (that's two days from now).

2. Camp Checkmate – Live, Durham NC, April 1-2, 2010

I'm a fairly low-key guy, but if we were in the same room I'd be shaking you by the shoulders telling you that Camp Checkmate is the most powerful marketing experience you'll ever find, and that you should do whatever you can to attend. 

Unlike the other events, this is not an informational seminar. It's an experiential workshop, where you come away with a completely revamped marketing message, as well as the skills to compete in just about any market. (I gave a small taste of the workshop – 6 minutes worth – to Perry Marshall's roundtable members last month, and they were over the moon about the results they got even in that short time. See the link below for a video roundout of their reactions.)

Stay tuned for more information over the next couple of days. This is a small group event (30 people max). The floodgates open as soon as I get the sales letter up, so if you want to get in ahead of the rush, and you don't need a ton of persuasion that spending 2 days with me in a small group workshop environment is worth it, go to the link below to get the ball rolling. If you go there, you may discover a shopping cart mistake that may make you very happy. I'm fixing the mistake tomorrow morning, first thing. But if you spot it now, definitely take advantage!

http://askhowie.com/camp-checkmate-unveiled

3. The System Seminar – Live, Chicago IL, April 9-11, 2010

I've attended just about every System Seminar since they began in 2002, and it's no exaggeration to say that my training there has been the foundation for my online marketing career. The first two events were the most powerful for me, as they focused on fundamentals.

Ken McCarthy, who runs the seminar, has put together a speaking roster that reflects a "back to basics" focus on copywriting, positioning, traffic generation.

If you sign up through this link, you're invited to be my guest on Saturday night, April 10 at a small group dinner with me and some of the sharpest minds in marketing: Perry Marshall, Drayton Bird, Timothy Seward of ROIRevolution, and Ben Moskel (the "super-affiliate"). 

Ken always puts on a razzle-dazzle pre-seminar series of expert interviews and articles, which you should get even if you have no intention of attending this year. The link below gives you access to all that, as well as entice you to attend the main event.

http://thesystemseminar.org

What I Can't Explain: The Energy Field of the Live Event

When you see a sales pitch for a live event, you'll always get a long bulleted list of "what you'll learn" and "what you'll now be able to accomplish." That's terrific – ultimately we attend events and develop ourselves professionally to increase our knowledge and capabilities.

But something else happens at the RIGHT live events that's simply magical, that can't be explained, and that can't be described adequately to someone who's never experienced it. 

You come under the sway of a powerful, positive, optimistic, proactive and generous energy field.

And for the time you're there, you reorient your behavior, self-image, and actions to attune with this field.

And if you're diligent at networking, you form relationships with people that sustain the field long after you return home.

Take stock briefly: how much time do you spend in the presence of a positive, optimistic, proactive and generous energy field? Does that describe your work environment now? Is everyone raring to go, focusing on how to better themselves, serve others, and take full responsibility for outcomes? If not, how does that affect you on a day-to-day basis? Are you curious to see how your entrepreneurial spirit can soar in the presence of warm, supportive thermals of energy?

Of course, I'd love it if you came to Camp Checkmate (if you can't make Durham in May, there's always Chicago in June – stay tuned).

But any time you can put yourself in an "elite" situation, where people self-select for self-improvement, you'll benefit. If the content is appropriate to your needs. And if the organizer has "heart" – a spirit that resonates with your own. 

While ebooks are useful and home study courses are valuable and teleseminars are empowering, a live event can be life-changing. I've experienced it many times, and I want the same for you.

Wishing you health, happiness and prosperity,

Howie

Last fall I presented at the very first European AdWords conference, AdWords Days 2009, in Cologne Germany. Here's a trailer for AdWords Days 2010, which takes place 1-2 June 2010, also in Cologne.

My presentation was in English, which considering the only German I know is the Ode To Joy from Beethoven's 9th and "die Kuh gibt Milch" (which I learned from EasyGermanForKids.com), is a good thing.

Brad Geddes also presented (I still have occasional hand cramps from all the notes I took during his fabulous talk) in English, and the rest were in German.

The trailer begins with me deep in metaphor-land, describing in detail how I get into the shower in the morning. Unfortunately, I never get around to saying how this relates to AdWords and traffic generation. Anybody able to guess what the connection is in my warped mind?

Anyway, here's the trailer. The rock music background rocks, so turn up those speakers!

Two noteworthy pieces of mail today, both of which rocked my self-image:

1. My AARP card (for gosh sake, I’m not even 44 yet – where do these people get their mailing list?)

It would have to be a pretty big discount for me to whip that thing out at Whole Foods or Costco or Priscilla’s! Talk to me in 7 years, AARP!

2. Three copies of AdWords Für Dummies – the long-awaited German translation of AdWords For Dummies. I heard a rumor that in Bad Godesberg, the line at the DBH bookstore stretched all the way from the checkout counter to the little rack of Godiva chocolates and greeting cards right next to the checkout counter.

It’s a weird feeling, looking at this book I supposedly wrote, not being able to understand a word. I haven’t felt this way since I found my PhD dissertation while cleaning the house looking for my squash racquet. 

The other thing is, the Google gift card on this book is 25 Euro, which is like $7000 post Lehman and AIG. That makes AdWords Für Dummies an attractive investment instrument. Plus a great baby shower item, graduation present, and Bar Mitzvah and communion gift.

Me, I’m opening a Swiss bank account and filling it with AdWords Für Dummies and Godiva chocolate. When that AARP card kicks in, I’ll be sitting pretty.

Last week I appeared (sonically, anyway) on the Internet Radio show, Online Marketing with RSS Ray.

Through the miracle of JavaScript, you can listen to it here:

Holy cow, I thought I was pretty savvy about the Internet. And then I go and click a link in an email that looks like it comes straight from Google AdWords, but actually is trying to get my credit card info and suck my account dry.

Check out the email and see if you can blame me:

Looks real, doesn’t it?

But when I checked out the source code, I discovered that the live link actually went to a fake website, not AdWords. Had I looked closely, I would have noticed the typo on the last line: "any your ads and campaigns…" And the repetition of the second and third lines. And maybe half a dozen other clues. But as Paul Simon sings, "A man sees what he wants to see and disregards the rest."

So please be smarter and more deliberate than me when clicking links in emails supposedly coming from AdWords.

I use a lot of Google tools. Google Docs. Gmail. Google Calendar. Google Earth. Picasa. Google EarWax Remover. (OK, I made that one up.)

And of course AdWords.

So don’t get me wrong – I think Google makes some of the best stuff on the Internet. And most of it’s free (actually, subsidized by AdWords). So I’m sharing the screenshot below in amused fondness.

Get it? Google email service, Gmail, decided that the official Google AdWords Blog email, to which I subscribe, is SPAM!

That’s pretty hilarious, for my money.

The moral, if there is one: don’t feel too bad when your business does stupid things. You have good company. It’s more important to be personable than perfect. It’s more important to connect with your customers on an emotional level than to execute flawlessly.

I couldn’t resist sharing this one, literally a case of apples and oranges. Or, more precisely, an apple case among the oranges. Can you spot the one ad that doesn’t belong here?

Did you see it? If not, here’s the solution: Ultimate iPhone Cases, fourth ad down on the right. (Some day I’ll learn how to annotate my screen shots…)

Here’s how I generated this search result:

I’m working on updating the online DVD that I give away for trying my Ring of Fire AdWords Success Club. I was working on a short video expaining how to look at the search results page before writing your ad. First I searched for "iphone cases," but I couldn’t get inspired to talk about the differences between the ads. So I next typed "florida oranges," expecting that high end fruit delivery would provide more grist for my commentary.

Did it ever! I’ve never seen that kind of artifact before, a search result lingering into another search. Unless… cases.com is actually advertising under the broad phrase "florida oranges." Too coincidental, I think.

If anyone has an explanation for this result other than Google hiccup, please post it to comments. I’m intrigued…

A reader wonders: Can you tell me what the harm is in putting in more key words than less key words since a person only gets charged for the clicks on Google when someone actually clicks on your ad?

Howie answers the wondering:

There are two potential problems with huge keyword lists:

1. The Quality Score Problem:

If you have a lot of very low CTR keywords, they will tarnish your entire account’s quality score. Google has an opinion, not only about individual ads and keywords, but about your whole account. After you’ve been running AdWords for a while, Google develops an opinion of you, and either gives you the benefit of the doubt or not whenever you throw something new onto AdWords.

2. The 80/20 Principle Mountains of Junk Problem:

If you have thousands of keywords just for the sake of having more rather than fewer, you run the risk of losing sight of the 5 really important keywords that should get 95% of your care and attention.

If your keywords are relevant to specific ad groups, and you keep track of which keywords are converting and which aren’t, and when you need to pause/delete them, and you set up your campaigns so your best keywords are treated like the Hollywood Stars they are… then large keyword lists are not a problem, and can be very profitable.

A reader wonders:

In my "broad" keywords list of about 150 words, Google is giving me the message:
 
Overlapping Terms
If your keyword list has two or more similar keywords, the Traffic Estimator will divide the potential traffic between the overlapping terms. Estimates for such keywords may be less accurate due to this overlap. 
 
My question is:  Are broad "Overlapping Terms" ok to use or will I waste $ in the long run?

Here’s what I think:

The "Overlapping Terms" message is not a terrible thing, but in the long run your goal is to figure out what the phrase and exact match keywords are, and get more traffic from them and less traffic from broad match keywords. Google is just telling you that sometimes two different keywords may be triggered by the same search, so it can’t predict in advance where to send the traffic.

You definitely will waste money if you can’t, ultimately, pinpoint your profitable keywords and eliminate the rest, or at least adjust their bids to bring them into the positive ROI range.

And here’s your horoscope, if you’re a Leo:

A stranger you meet on top of a mountain will compliment your dog. Despite this, you will still burn dinner.