Ad Rank and Impacting Factors – Learn All About Them

Online advertising is highly based on science. Here we will lift the lid on Ad Rank and Impacting Factors for you – mastering this will help you reduce your CPC’s (cost per clicks) and get better results from your ad spend.

When you construct a search ad, specifically, a lot of its success depends on algorithms. A series of indicators and calculations will impact the extent to which your ad reaches its intended goals, such as impressions or clicks. The good news is that you can learn these factors and adjust ads to receive a better ad rank. Let’s start with the basics.

The value of the ad rank

The output element of the ad rank is easy to understand. After algorithms evaluate your ad, they assign a value to it, which influences the ad’s position on the search pages. This is the ad rank. If your ad shows up first, your ad rank for that specific search entry is number one.

Your ad rank is a foundational value of your search advertising campaigns. It determines the likelihood that potential customers will see your promotional message for your search words.

The higher your ad rank is, the higher the chances are that it will be seen and clicked. Your cost-per-click, i.e. the price you pay to receive one click, will further be determined by your ad rank.

If, by contrast, you’re confronting with a low impressions share, this can be caused by one of two reasons: a low budget or a low rank. Accordingly, the search lost IS rank indicates the time your ad does not appear due to poor ad rank.

You can be eligible to receive a certain amount of impressions on a keyword but your ad rank factors will determine how well it delivers. Fortunately, you can make these factors work for you, instead of against you.

Factors that impact the ad rank

Overall, ad rank is calculated using the following elements:

• bid amounts;
• ad rank thresholds;
• the auction competitiveness;
• the ad quality;
• ad formats;
• and the context of the person’s search.

Bid amounts, the auction competitiveness, and ad rank thresholds

As expected, the bid amount counts towards your ad rank. Yet, to even enter a bid auction for a certain position, you need to bid a minimum amount. This number is partly determined by the auction competitiveness: the number, bids, and quality of competitor ads for the same keyword.

Furthermore, to enter an auction, your ad needs to meet some ad rank thresholds, which are determined by the ad quality, position, user attributes, topic and nature of the search, and related auctions.

Ad quality

Even if competitors bid higher, you can outrank them through better auction-time ad quality. Google PPC marketing prioritises ads that offer more relevant information and better user experience.

As such, the algorithm assigns a higher quality score to ads with better CTRs, landing page experiences, and relevance.

Ad formats

The ad format’s robustness can also determine its visibility and engagement ability. In 2016, Google changed the impact of ad formats, including extensions and mega headlines, in the ad rank equation. Higher ad location is now correlated with better format options. Nevertheless, marketers can only enjoy these benefits if they enable and update specialised extensions.

Moreover, the impact of ad extensions is taken into account. This is calculated based on the CTRs and relevance of the special format ads used.

Context of search

The context of searches, such as the person’s location and time of the search, the device used, and the nature of search terms will also influence the ad rank.
In the end, while bidding will help you, all these extra attributes of your ad will likely be just as important as bidding in increasing your ad’s rank.

If you would like to get better results from your Pay Per Click advertising you should book in for your very own 100% free Goggle Ads Audit today!