Comments on: Google AdWords Session Based Broad Match?

By: Chris Nielsen

Chris Nielsen — Wed, 12 Jan 2011 19:56:59 +0000

I just found out about this “session-based” match yesterday and in looking into what value was gained I found very little. There were conversions, but not all conversions are equal and the triggering keywords highly suspect to say the least. We are doing to do a further analysis to see more details. I was very surprised to do some searches on this issue and find so little information about it. If they are proud of the feature and feel it adds true value to seracher and advertiser, why not let everyone know?

By: bkv

bkv — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 21:52:04 +0000

Brain, here’s the deal it’s not the negative KW that triggered the ad’s it’s the other kw used as modifiers that are triggering the ad’s. So, in short Adding neg-kw won’t stop it. Ex: someone types in “amazon gifts and gold”. Lets say “amazon” is neg-board matched, after some number of searches by one of these so called fraud detection systems (Search Monitor), every 15 minutes, what happens is the “session-match” kicks in and use’s the “gifts” and/or “gold” which are not neg kw and shows your ad’s. Then you are tagged as bididng on the TM “amazon” which you are not.

Interesting!! but accutually happens only because the Fraud detection software cause’s it to happen!! If you and your clients are not experincing this yet, you soon will as every advertiser moves to protect their TM since Google announced they no longer will.

The short is with the Session-match and these faulty TM detection systems we are all going to feel the pain if others are not educated!

Thanks for the forum!!

By: Richard Fergie

Richard Fergie — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 16:21:42 +0000

Wow, this post has certainly started to liven up!
@BrianCarter Thanks for mentioning me on Search Engine Journal.
@bkv Sounds like you have a bit of a problem. As far a I’m aware negative keywords should override session based broad match so I don’t see how your ads are appearing. Can you replicate Search Monitor’s results? Can you ask them to send a screen shot of your adverts against a trademarked term?

By: bkv

bkv — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 15:49:51 +0000

Brain, do you know when session based search went live? Two, do you have any clients getting tagged by “Search Monitor”? These guys claim to identify TM infringement. We know for a fact we are not bidding on TM of partners and have added all neg-KW as requested yet we continue to come up on Google, Yahoo. We are one of the larger players in our space., and think its because Search Monitor search’s every 15 min. This cause’s the Search Engines to use session-match to pull our ads based on other kW in the search query than the TM KW.

This will continue so you may want to keep your eye on it, for your own clients.

By: Brian Carter

Brian Carter — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 13:06:30 +0000

Yowch, you’re going to have to call Google on that one. I’ll ask my reps if it’s possible. Try calling 866-2-GOOGLE.

By: bkv

bkv — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 21:45:18 +0000

Please help I’m seeing session based search for keywords that have been broad negitive matched. How is this possible? I have partners thinking I’m bidding on trademarks when I not. In fact I have taken the extra setup of adding the Trademarks as neg- matched as extact and broad. They show up under Search Monitor whom performs search’s for those TM every 15 minutes and I believe causing the trigging of our ads. Help!!!

By: Bart

Bart — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 08:35:59 +0000

It’s an outrage they don’t provide an option to turn off this broad session based query. It actually costs money and we didn’t ask Google to use those keywords.

By: Brian Carter

Brian Carter — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 17:30:26 +0000

Hey Richard, thanks for the post! I followed up with more data like this here: http://www.searchenginejournal.com/adwords-broad-session-based-match-type/12891/

By: Andy Fox

Andy Fox — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 12:05:06 +0000

True. I am not able to locate the farthest of relations between my keyword & the query that triggered it !

By: Joe Mescher

Joe Mescher — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 17:48:08 +0000

Would you believe “Puppies for Sale” can result from a simple auto search query?

Perhaps my favorite was “South African Tree Forts” registering a click for, again, a car related search query.

(Solution…Negative Keywords? Eliminate Broad Match? Depends on your situation).

By: Clement

Clement — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 17:33:06 +0000

A precision to explain why the CTR is so high: most of the session-based queries have a very low impression volume, and in the Search Query report, only the queries that have generated at least one click are included. This implies that the CTR seems artificially high – because this is in fact the *CTR of queries that have generated a click*, not the overall CTR, which should take into account impressions gathered on clickless queries. By the way, this same phenomenon explains the ridiculously high CTR that have always been witnessed on “Other Unique Queries” of the same report.