What you should measure on your PPC - Part II.

In Part I, I said that when looking at the CTR, Campaign B apparently performs better than Campaign A because its CTR is 10% while A's CTR is only 5%. However, looking at the Table on the left, Campaign A actually got 5 conversions, but Campaign B got 4 only. So, which on is better? This time, the answer is Campaign A.

So, what is a conversion? In Google Adwords, a conversion is registered when an ad click leads to an event that you consider valuable. Depending on the business, a conversion can be defined as: a purchase, a signup or registration, a request for more information, a page view, a demo download / game play. Becasue here I use travel industry as the example, so a conversion is defined as a purchase.

Google tracks conversions by placing a cookie on a user's computer when he/she clicks on one of your AdWords ads. Then, if the user reaches one of your conversion pages, the cookie is connected to your web page. When a match is made, Google records a successful conversion for you. PS: The cookie Google adds to a user's computer when he/she clicks on an ad expires in 30 days.

Let's get back to the performance issue. Is Campaign A really better than Campaign B? In Part III, you will have a different answer.