WebProNews

There are many products and services available to help a content network.  The trouble is that access to some of them costs money.  So, as a straight-from-the-Googler's-mouth alternative, ways to improve content network performance were recently discussed on a Google blog for free.

 Google Content Network

"Heather" hit on several topics in a post on Inside AdWords.  We won't repeat every word - you guys are capable following both lines of thought and links - but some of the tips are worth singling out.

Heather began, "After a campaign has accrued a significant number of clicks on the content network, you can run a placement performance report to see where your ads have appeared.  We recommend that you focus on sites where your ads have received a statistically significant amount of traffic (about 50 clicks or more)."

Then, "To increase traffic from sites that are performing well, consider creating a new placement-targeted campaign and selecting CPC bidding instead of CPM.  This strategy allows you to bid more for high-performing sites without increasing your bids for the rest of your content network traffic in existing campaigns."

Or, to peek in the opposite direction, low-performing sites can be scoped out by using Site and Category Exclusion tool to see if there are any patterns.

With any luck, a dedicated application of these principles will save money and draw in new business.  The stock market is taking another rollercoaster ride today, so we think, even for everyone who's doing well, an extra safety net isn't such a bad thing.