A new report from AdGooroo suggests that though Google has increased its levels of search engine marketing revenue despite a decrease in the number of active advertisers.
The competitive intelligence agency’s Q4 2009 Search Advertising Report, titled “thinning the herd”, reveals the effects of Google’s purge of Adwords users last year. On December 3rd 2009, AdGooroo estimates that some 30,000 users of the PPC search ad service were permanently suspended – about 5.3% of its active advertiser base.
“While this typically signals a negative impact on revenues, AdGooroo also tracked increased competition for ad placement, resulting in higher ad prices for Google and unusually high clickthrough rates” said agency founder and CEO Rich Stokes. “Google seems to be taking advantage of a strong Q4 to make some quality improvements”.
In the report, AdGooroo says that the company traditionally performs well in quarter four which may have informed their decision to suspend AdWords users who were in breach of their policy permanently. It portrays Google as being more than able to “afford such a quality purge right now”; the top 80 US retailers spent 12.5% in Q4 than in Q3 and spend for nearly all categories was up.
Adgooroo also reports that over 2009, Google remained the main target of search engine marketers and PPC agencies. Despite small fluctuations of between one and three percent either way throughout the year, Google began with an 80.9% share of advertisers in December 2008 and finished with an 81% share in December 2009. Conversely, Bing’s share dropped from 16.4% to 11.6% despite other reports suggesting a steady growth in its share of search users. Yahoo had the greatest growth in advertiser share, from 19.4% to 26.7%.
Included in the final pages of the report was a list of the 25 most expensive keywords by search engine for December 2009. Searches for financial and legal advice topped Google, though unexpectedly the most expensive term was “mesothelioma”. This reflects other expensive keywords such as “asbestos law suits” and “asbestos law firm”.
On Yahoo, insurance was the main topic driving keyword prices. “Lloyds TSB insurance” was the most expensive term, and the third most was the phonetic misspelling ‘Loyds insurance’. Insurance was also a popular topic in Bing’s highest reported cost-per-click keywords. Although “low apr student credit card” was the most expensive keyword, 21 queries related to insurance were listed.
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