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	<title>Clicks and Bits &#187; PPC</title>
	<atom:link href="http://www.clicksandbits.com/category/ppc/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
	<link>http://www.clicksandbits.com</link>
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		<title>Whoa. adCenter Bug Costs Millions</title>
		<link>http://www.clicksandbits.com/2007/02/23/whoa-adcenter-bug-costs-millions/</link>
		<comments>http://www.clicksandbits.com/2007/02/23/whoa-adcenter-bug-costs-millions/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 23 Feb 2007 21:53:19 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>sh2</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[PPC]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.clicksandbits.com/2007/02/23/whoa-adcenter-bug-costs-millions/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Search Engine Roundtable (by way of Searchengineland.com) reported about a bug in Microsoft&#8217;s adCenter that advertisers were being dramatically overcharged click prices (example, a 50 cent bid price being charged $280). Microsoft has confirmed the issue and is working to a resolution. My first thought was that this was Microsoft&#8217;s way of making up revenue since I pulled my account earlier in the week. But then again, the example used above pretty much covered my<p><a href="http://www.clicksandbits.com/2007/02/23/whoa-adcenter-bug-costs-millions/">Read more &#187;</a></p>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/012501.html">Search Engine Roundtable</a> (by way of <a href="http://searchengineland.com/070223-140435.php">Searchengineland.com</a>) reported about a bug in Microsoft&#8217;s adCenter that advertisers were being dramatically overcharged click prices (example, a 50 cent bid price being charged $280). Microsoft has <a href="http://adcenterblog.spaces.live.com/Blog/cns!85E824269AB8C30D!290.entry">confirmed</a> the issue and is working to a resolution.</p>
<p>My first thought was that this was Microsoft&#8217;s way of making up revenue since <a href="http://www.clicksandbits.com/2007/02/22/microsoft-adcenter/">I pulled my account</a> earlier in the week. But then again, the example used above pretty much covered my monthly budget.</p>
<p><em>To the Microsoft folks who have been visiting based on my previous post, don&#8217;t sweat me; I&#8217;m small potatoes.</em></p>
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		<title>Goodbye Microsoft AdCenter (or Why Microsoft AdCenter Sucks)</title>
		<link>http://www.clicksandbits.com/2007/02/22/microsoft-adcenter/</link>
		<comments>http://www.clicksandbits.com/2007/02/22/microsoft-adcenter/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 22 Feb 2007 18:40:35 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>sh2</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[PPC]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[Monday afternoon I closed my Microsoft Adcenter account. While many have railed against Microsoft&#8217;s attempt to enter the PPC market based upon poor and unconverting traffic, I was happy with the traffic, costs-per-click, and my conversion rates. However, I was fed up with the constant barrage of emails &#8220;Your AdCenter ads or keywords require changes.&#8221; Any given week, I&#8217;d have 10-20 emails alerting me that x number of my keywords are not meeting editorial guidelines.<p><a href="http://www.clicksandbits.com/2007/02/22/microsoft-adcenter/">Read more &#187;</a></p>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Monday afternoon I closed my Microsoft Adcenter account. While many have railed against Microsoft&#8217;s attempt to enter the PPC market based upon poor and unconverting traffic, I was happy with the traffic, costs-per-click, and my conversion rates. However, I was fed up with the constant barrage of emails &#8220;Your AdCenter ads or keywords require changes.&#8221; Any given week, I&#8217;d have 10-20 emails alerting me that x number of my keywords are not meeting editorial guidelines.</p>
<p>At least they would let me know what campaign the keywords came from, but one would think it wouldn&#8217;t take too much effort to let me know which keyword was disabled.</p>
<p>My real rift with AdCenter though came from my keywords being continuously disabled. It seems they are more than willing to accept my money for a while after initially approving keywords. Then a couple weeks later, boom, 20% of my keywords for a campaign are now &#8216;Rejected.&#8217; Several times I contacted support to get a manual review of my landing pages and keyword relevancy resulting each and every time in the re-approval of the keywords in question. Only to see them rejected again a couple weeks later.</p>
<p>The final straw came Monday in a phone call with support who told me that they can&#8217;t continue to keep manually reviewing my landing pages and keywords because their automated system is obviously detecting anomalies. I was also told that the reason my number one performing keyword (a product name) kept being rejected was because of trademark issues &#8211; a trademark I own, mind you.</p>
<p>So let&#8217;s see, my product name as a keyword, landing on a page with the product name as the URL, and clearly marked as a trademarked term, is being rejected because my trademarked term is violating my trademark. Okay.</p>
<p>Farewell AdCenter, I&#8217;ll keep pumping my money in AdWords and YPN. </p>
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