Google announced the rollout of Google Instant on Wednesday to a chorus of questions and concerns from various members of the industry. While most concerns focus on the impact of Google Instant on SEO, I want to take some time to discuss the impact of this change on Paid Search (PPC) programs.

Google Instant is a new feature that will soon be available to everyone. Instead of waiting until you finish typing your query (and pressing Enter or clicking Search), the results for your query will populate while you type. As you add more words to your query, the results will change to reflect this. According to a recent post in the Official Google Blog, there are several user benefits to this new feature:

-Save time: Google Instant is expected to reduce the average search query by 2-5 seconds, since completing your query and pressing the Search button is optional under the new feature. As soon as a user sees a result of interest (regardless of where they are in their query), they can interact with the desired result

-Query Prediction: Google Instant utilizes query suggestion technology (the drop-down giving you suggestions based on what you’ve typed thus far) to predict your intended query and presents results based on this.

-Scroll to Search (my favorite!): If there are several suggested queries you’d like to see the results for, you can just scroll through them using the up and down arrow keys on your keyboard to browse the various results quickly and easily. In the screenshot below, I started searching for “Chicago”, then used my down arrow key to look at the different results, finally settling on the results for “Chicago Blackhawks”.

Considering the number of Paid Search clients we service, we quickly questioned how this would impact our paid search programs, since ads appear in the Google Instant results (even if just for a moment while the user completes their query). We envisioned a scenario where impression volume would skyrocket, damaging our Click-Through Rate (CTR) and Quality Score.

How Will Google Instant Affect Impression Volume, CTR and Quality Score?

Your impression volume will increase, but Google has taken measures to curtail this. In order for your ad to record an impression, the user will have to take one of the following actions:

-Press Enter to execute their search

-Click on Search

-Click on a result

-Click on a prediction/suggestion

-Click on a refinement option (to the left of search results)

-Pause for 3+ seconds

As you can see, the mere appearance of your ad will not count as an impression. However, there is still concern regarding the 3-second rule. If a user is a slow typist or browses the results for a few seconds after typing each word (a behavior we expect as the public tries out the new service), your ad will record an impression. As the impression count is inflated, the CTR for your Paid Search program is likely to decrease, depending on search volume and specific search behaviors.

Your relative Quality Score, on the other hand, is expected to see minimal changes. The Quality Score algorithm has not changed and still includes CTR as a primary metric. However, since the competitors bidding on similar PPC keywords will also suffer from the inflated impression volume, most/all advertisers should be impacted in the same way.

What Should I Change in my PPC Program?

It’s still a little early to make firm recommendations based on this new feature, but here are a few specific areas we’re keeping an eye on over the next few weeks:

-Phrase- and Exact-Matched Keywords: Because phrase- and exact-matched keywords require the entire keyword to be entered, the impression volume for these terms (especially long-tail keywords) is expected to decrease, since users are less likely to complete the query before moving on to a result. If most of your program is based on these match types, you might consider shifting your high-priority long-tail keywords to the broad match type. If you want to limit the impression volume increase from this change, consider a negative keyword list or broad match modifiers.

-Use Google’s Suggestions/Predictions: The list of suggestions offered by Google when utilizing Instant is finite (5 suggestions). Explore shorter variations of the longer keywords in your program and include those if you want to maintain/expand exposure in your PPC program.

-Long-Tail Keywords: Long-tail keywords are considered for every PPC program due to the specificity (and conversion rates) they offer. As people become more accustomed to this new search process, your longest-tail keywords may suffer from negligible volume as users utilize this shortcut in getting to the information of interest.

Google Instant is still in its early stages, and there is no need to panic and change all your keyword match types to broad. In the next few weeks, we expect the impact of Instant on SEO and PPC to become more apparent. With that information in hand, we’ll be ready to address any issues and continue operating successful Internet marketing programs.

Tags: Google Instant, paid search, ppc, search engine marketing

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 9th, 2010 at 3:43 pm and is filed under Internet Marketing Strategy, Paid Search (PPC). You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.