If the scope of your business is limited to one or more specific geographic areas then you would probably like to target some particular areas through the location targeting option available in Google AdWords. But fail to understand this important feature available in AdWords you risk the success of your entire local advertising campaign. In this post we are going to discuss why setting up local AdWords campaign is so difficult and needs thorough knowledge about the geo targeting black hole.
How Google Geo Targeting Works
You can target visitors mainly in 2 ways as discussed below –
1. Area Names – You can just select the countries, regions or the city names you wish to target.
2. Custom Targeting – You can target the required area you wish to cover from a particular given location. For example, if you have a restaurant you may be want to target 50 miles radius from your restaurant’s location point. Covering an area other than circle shape is also possible. You can even exclude areas within your target.
Sounds great, isn’t it? Let’s now discuss how Google determines to show the ads based on the target area specified.
1. By Domain extension – Searchers using a country specific Google domain will view the ads targeted to that country.
2. By Language – Search Keyword language that matches with the Google Preference Setting language given by the advertiser.
3. By IP address – Whenever you connect to the internet you are assigned a unique IP address assigned by your ISP. Google can track your location through your IP and show you ads targeted to that area.
4. By Query Parsing – Query that matches with your ad and targeted keywords in the campaign.
Now you understand how Google geo targeting works and how Google determines which ads to show in response to a query. But is that all you just need to know to run a successful campaign? Not at all – there are some pitfalls you may be probably unaware or not thought before. To get the best ROI from your AdWords campaign you must need to ensure that you are not getting unnecessary clicks and impressions. So what are those Geo targeting problems that can just drain your money? Let’s see -
Geo Targeting Problems
Have you ever thought that your ads can be visible to different countries other than the country name you specified in your campaign? Yes, this can happen if searchers use a Google search domain dedicated to that particular country you have targeted. For example, if you target UK, then your ads would be displayed if someone searches using google.co.uk – regardless of the searcher’s actual physical location or country.
Your ads can also be visible to the users located in different countries or areas rather than the areas you actually target depending on your target language and the searched domain used. For example, if you target France and specify French as your target language, then your ad would be displayed if someone searches using any French term you specified in your target keyword list – regardless of the searcher’s actual physical location or country.
IP address plays a major role in city or custom area targeting. For example, if you wish to target the New York City and 50 km. around the New York City – you would probably expect that you will get visitors only from that particular area, right? But eventually this is not 100% true, and there are big chances that you lose potential visitors and/or get unnecessary traffic beyond that area! Why? Because it depends on the IP address assigned by the ISPs covered a large area. So even visitors located around 200 miles away from New York can be treated as visits from that area and also visitors actually located inside that area can be treated as outsiders.
Now you can understand that how improper Adwords Campaign Management can ruin your money or how you can lose potential customers. Hope this post will help you to setup your campaign cleverly.
