How To Improve Your PPC Quality Score

AdWords PPC campaigns enable website owners to advertise their products or services to niche customers on the world wide web. To ensure that the adverts get seen by your niche customers, AdWords uses a method known as 'quality score' to guide them.

What is Quality Score?
The quality score scale is 1-10. 1-5 is low, whilst 7-10 is high. As an advertiser you will want an average of 7-10 across your adverts to make a success of your PPC campaign.

Factors that are Influenced by the Quality Score

Search Engine Position - The position of your advert in search engines is determined by the quality score. Poor quality adverts will struggle to feature on the first page.
Bid Costs - The cost of a click on your adverts also depends on the quality score. Poorly scored ads may cost less but are ultimately ineffective. Highly scored adverts however, may cost more but have a much higher conversion rate.

Display Network Ranking - In the AdWords settings, there is the option to opt into Google's advert display network. If you decide to do this, it is imperative that you adverts are highly scored as they will face stiff competition from other advertisers and the higher scoring ads will get the prime positions on the display network websites.


Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI) - Adverts which achieve a high scoring will respond better to dynamic keyword insertion. DKI is an option within AdWords which inserts the searched for keyword into the advert copy when it is displayed.

Seven Ways to Improve PPC Quality Score

1. Keyword and Advert Relevance
The copy of the advert, landing page and keywords used to trigger the advert should be relevant to each other.
For example, if the keywords are associated to 'WordPress themes', the landing page contains information relating to 'Blogger themes' and the advert copy doesn't contain any of the keywords, then don't be surprised when the whole campaign fails.
A tried and trusted method is to choose niche, exact match keywords or phrases that relate to the landing page. Use the Keyword Tool to research your keywords and gauge competition. The result you're after is when someone performs a search for 'WordPress themes', your advert appears at the top of the page with well written copy which leads to high quality clicks through to your site.

2. Content Quality on Landing Page
Search engines expect the quality and consistency of the landing page to match that of the keywords and copy of the advert. If your adverts are triggered by keywords surrounding 'blog themes' and the landing page contains information about 'blog hosting', then the quality score of your adverts will decrease as a result.
Your landing page should reflect the same products or services that are promised in the adverts. The content of the landing page should also be high quality, containing responsive images and copy and be easy to navigate. Please see the checklist below for easy to implement tips on landing page improvements:

• Clear and Concise Contact Information
• Simple Purchase and Checkout Procedure
• Easily accessible testimonials and customer comments
• Clear privacy policy, disclaimer and TIC documentation
• Clear money back guarantee policy
• No sponsored links or advertisements

It is imperative that the landing page has direct relevance to the displayed adverts.

3. Keyword Relevancy in Search Engines
Keywords are tagged as 'high', 'medium' and 'low' density and you'll find that some keywords have no search value at all. AdWords advises on the value of keywords and if you fill your campaign with low value keywords your quality score will suffer.
Therefore, take care when choosing your keywords. Make sure they are actually being searched for.

4. Select the Right Device
If you are promoting a mobile app with your AdWord campaign then it is reasonable to want the majority of your adverts to be shown on a smart phone. If your website is not optimised for hand-held devices then clicks form these sources will just be wasting money. Use the setting to target the correct device.

5. Geography
Although the details are rather vague, search engines say that the geographical location of an advert and the target audience impacts on the quality score. From personal experience I have found that adverts targeting the US and UK yield better quality scores.
If in doubt though, do not select a particular location in your settings and your adverts will be shown worldwide.

6. Click Through Rate (CTR)
CTR measures how many times your adverts are clicked on compared to how many times there are displayed. If an advert is shown one hundred times and receives just one click its CTR is 1 per cent. This is poor performance and the quality score will be affected accordingly.
The CTR rate cannot be checked before a campaign goes live, so you will need to monitor the campaign and tweak poorly performing ads as you proceed. Your CTR rate is also compared to your competitors, make sure you are aware of their adverts and how they are performing.

7. Managing Keyword Groups
Each keyword group should have a collection of around 10 to 30 linked words or phrases. This will increase your quality scores and assist with disciplined management of the campaign. By using several keyword groups you'll be able to target different landing pages and optimise your advert copy. These factors will all impact on the quality rating.
AdWords can be very intimidating to the beginner. Even professionals can sometimes find it hard going at times. Therefore, it is important to research each and every facet of PPC AdWords before launching a campaign to ensure that your PPC quality score is as high as possible.

If you would like to learn how a PPC campaign could help your online business, contact the HROC digital dept and speak to our PPC Birmingham based team. They have years of hands on experience with PPC AdWords management and would be able to advise on the best strategy for you. Contact them by clicking here.

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