Google Tag Manager

Google Tag Manager allows you to conveniently manage tags (such as tracking and marketing optimization tags) on your site. You can add and update AdWords, Google Analytics, Floodlight and non-Google tags from the Google Tag Manager user interface instead of editing site code. This reduces errors, frees you from having to involve a webmaster, and allows you to quickly deploy tags on your site.

Using Google Tag Manager provides several advantages over using individual tags.

• Add, update, and remove tags without making any changes to your HTML. This reduces the likelihood of errors and lets you deploy new tags immediately without assistance from a webmaster.
• Google Tag Manager fires your tags asynchronously, so your pages often load more quickly than they would if you were using individual tags.
• Workflow tools help you know whether your tags are working as intended.
• It’s easy to see which tags are being fired on your site, and where they’re being fired.

How It Works

Google Tag Manager works via a single tag, called a container snippet, that you place on all your website pages. The container snippet replaces AdWords, Google Analytics, Floodlight, and other tags on your site. (For a list of supported tags, read Tags.) Once a container snippet has been added to your site, you update, add, and administer tags from your Google Tag Manager account.

Your Google Tag Manager account allows you to administer the tags for one or more websites. Although you can set up multiple Google Tag Manager accounts from a single Google account, you’ll typically only need one Google Tag Manager account per company. Read Setup and Workflow to learn more.

Setup

To manage your tags using Google Tag Manager, you’ll need to:

• go to google.com/tagmanager to create a Google Tag Manager account (or to access an existing account).
• create a container for your site in the account,
• add the container snippet to your site, while removing any existing tags on your site.

You’ll then be ready to add tags to your site via the Google Tag Manager user interface. For more information, read Setup and Workflow.

Setup and Workflow

To manage your tags using Google Tag Manager, you’ll need to:

• go to google.com/tagmanager to create a Google Tag Manager account (or to access an existing account).
• create a container for your site in the account,
• add the container snippet to your site while removing any existing tags on your site.

You’re then ready to add tags (for example Google Analytics and AdWords Conversion Tracking tags) to your site via the Google Tag Manager user interface.

Creating an Account

The account is the top-most level of organization in Google Tag Manager. Typically, only one account is needed per company. Tags for all the company’s websites can be be managed from this single account.
You can create and/or administer multiple Google Tag Manager accounts from a single Google account. This allows you to conveniently manage website tracking and campaigns for more than one company. Each time you sign in to Google Tag Manager, you’ll see the list of the Google Tag Manager accounts to which your Google Account has access.

1. From the All Accounts page in Google Tag Manager, click New Account.
2. Enter an account name and timezone, and click Save.

Creating a Container

As part of creating a Google Tag Manager account, you’ll be asked to create a container. A container holds all the tags for a specific website, so it’s best to name the container after the site. For the site example.com, you might name the container "example".
Create a new container whenever you start managing tags for a new website. To create a new container:

1. In Google Tag Manager, select an account. The Containers page appears.
2. On the Containers page, click New Container.
3. Enter a container name and click Save.

Adding the Container Snippet

A container snippet is provided for each container. Copy and paste this snippet to the top of the section on every page on the site. Be sure to remove tags (e.g. Google Analytics, AdWords Conversion Tracking, etc) from the site pages at the same time.
To find the container snippet:

1. In Google Tag Manager, select an account. The Containers page appears.
2. Click the desired container in the list. The Tags page appears.
3. Using the left navigation, go to Container > Container Settings.

Adding, Updating and Publishing Tags

When you first create a container, it will be empty so you’ll need to add tags. Begin by replacing any tags you removed from the site in the previous step. For example, if you deleted an AdWords Conversion Tracking tag from the site, add it back in Google Tag Manager. Once a container has been created and the container tag has been added to the site, you’re ready to add and update all tags from the Tags page.

1. In Google Tag Manager, select an account. The Containers page appears.
2. Click your site’s container in the list. The Tags page appears.

To add a tag:
Click New Tag. Select the tag type (for example, Google Analytics) and specify rules for when the tag should fire. Read Tags to learn more. 

To edit a tag: (for example, update the rules for when the tag should fire)
Click the tag in the list. Make changes on the Edit Tag page. Read Tags to learn more. 

To delete a tag:
Click the tag in the list. On the Edit Tag page, click Delete this tag.


3. Preview your site. Previewing gives you an opportunity to perform quality assurance (QA) on your site. You can make sure the site looks and behaves as you expect and, using the debugging option, see which tags fire as you browse and interact with the site. 
   From the Tags page, click Create Version. A page appears that summarizes all the tags, rules, and macros in the container. Click Save and Preview. Read Previewing and Debugging to learn more.


4. Publish the changes live to your site.
   Using the left navigation, go to Versions > All Versions. In the table, select the version you saved when you previewed your site. Click Publish.

Remarketing with Google Analytics

Google

Update Your Analytics Tracking Code to Support Display Advertising

 

If you choose to enable Remarketing with Google Analytics, then the update to the Analytics tracking code involves replacing only a single line of the code. Once you have made that change, Google Analytics collects the information it normally does, as well as the DoubleClick cookie when that cookie is present. The DoubleClick cookie enables remarketing for products like AdWords on the Google Display Network.

This change is compatible with both the synchronous and asynchronous versions of the tracking code. This modification does not impact any customizations you have previously made to your code.

When you make this update to your tracking code, you also need to update your privacy policy.

To implement remarketing, replace the bold text in this example:

<script type="text/javascript">
var _gaq = _gaq || [];
_gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-xxxxx-y']);
_gaq.push(['_trackPageview']);
(function() {
var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true; 

ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + 'google-analytics.com/ga.js';

var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s);
})();
</script>

with the bold text in the example below:

<script type="text/javascript">
var _gaq = _gaq || [];
_gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-xxxxx-y']);
_gaq.push(['_trackPageview']);
(function() {
var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true; 

ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://' : 'http://') + 'stats.g.doubleclick.net/dc.js';

var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s);
})();
</script>

 

Precision Match and embedded match keywords

Precision Match

Advertisers can choose how to target individual keywords and URLs with 4 precision match options: Complete URL, URL without Query String, Query String only or Search Engine. For examples of each, let us assume you have the target "loan" in your target list.

Complete URL. This is our default precision match. If your target appears anywhere in internet address visited by a user, then a match will occur. Ex. www.domain.com/page.html?query_argument=whatever

URL without Query String. A match will occur only within the URL portion of an internet address. Ex. www.domain.com/page.html?query_argument=whatever

Query String Only. A match will occur only if your target appears in the query string portion of a URL.
Ex. www.domain.com/page.html?query_argument=whatever

Search Engine. Your target will only match if it was initiated as a search in a search engine.
Ex. www.searchengine.com/results.html?search_query=search string


Exclusions

Advertisers can EXCLUDE keywords or URLs from triggering in a given campaign. This can be quite useful to prevent non-profitable pops.



Example: Your destination might be www.myloans.com. Your target list my include the target "loan". You probably don�t want your destination to trigger if someone would navigate directly to www.myloans.com. Therefore, you would add www.myloans.com to your exclusion list.

Window Type

Advertisers can show their destination as a Landing Page (750x550) or as a Creative with specific width and height.

Pop Type

Advertisers can choose to have their destination shown as a Pop-Up or Pop-Under.

Embedded match is an AdWords “match type” which allows you to target variations of a keyword, without advertising against the keyword itself (really, embedded match is a combination of two different AdWords matching options, but we’ll get into more detail on that shortly). In this tutorial, you’ll learn:

• How embedded match works
• Why it's important to your search campaign
• How to use the option to reduce unnecessary spend

So, What Is Embedded Match, Anyway? 

As mentioned above, embedded match uses a combination of matching options and can be considered a hybrid of exact negative match and broad match. Google explains, "[embedded match] allows you to prevent your ad from appearing in relation to certain phrase or exact matches."

For example, let's say your business sells Apple iPod accessories, but not actual iPods. You may broad match on "iPod" to capture people looking for these accessories, but you'd want to exclude "Apple iPod" because it's not relevant to your business. In this case, "Apple iPod" would be an embedded match keyword.

Why Are Embedded Match Keywords Important To You?

Embedded Match Keywords are important because they prevent your ad from displaying for less relevant searches, thus reducing unnecessary spend and even improving AdWords click through rate (CTR). Embedded Match Keywords provide you, the search marketer, with more control over your search campaign. With this control, you can let your competitors vie for the popular keywords while you bid instead on more specific, lower priced keyword terms with better conversion rates.

Embedded match keywords allow you to continue advertising on these specific, well performing keywords, while preventing your ads from displaying for similar general queries that tend to have a lower return on investment (ROI).

How To Use AdWords Embedded Match

Despite their benefits, most marketers find themselves unable to capitalize on embedded match because of the work involved to find, examine and apply embedded match to appropriate keywords. Blogger Brad Geddes goes so far as to describe it as "the least used feature of Google AdWords." It's tedious to go over your keywords and single out certain general terms in order to apply an embedded match status, and to make things even harder, not all general terms are proper embedded match candidates.

A far better option is to group, bid on, and create ad texts for the keyword variations themselves. Luckily, that's exactly what WordStream does.

Keyword Grouping and Embedded Match Keywords

Let's first look at WordStream's Keyword Grouping Tool. This tool automatically groups keywords by relevance, so you're left with small groups of similar keywords underneath a more general term.

Embedded Keywords and The Long Tail

One of WordStream's most distinguishing properties is the ability to act as a Long Tail Keyword Tool to find and manage specific keywords with high relevance and better conversion rates. Focusing on and optimizing the long tail serves the same purpose as implementing embedded keywords--you stop bidding on the general, highly competitive and expensive keywords, and direct your time towards keywords that are more appropriate for your business. Popular keywords, great embedded keyword candidates, are easily visualized in WordStream's keyword explorer, as are long tail queries that make up the majority of search queries.

An Easy Alternative To Embedded Match Keywords

WordStream goes a step beyond embedded match, allowing you to have greater control and specificity in your campaigns which results in better campaign performance at a lower cost. Why bid at all on the general phrases that may or may not produce a qualified lead when you can bid on specific keywords that you know your website is relevant for--all at a lower cost!

If you're interested in maintaining even more control and specificity in your pay per click accounts, learn more about

Exact-Match Domain (EMD) Algo

Google EMD Update Appears To Have Had A Substantial Impact  
Monday, 01 October 2012 21:01
On Friday, Google’s Matt Cutts revealed that Google was rolling out a new algorithm update geared at reducing “low-quality” exact match domains in search results. He indicated that “the EMD algo” affects 0.6% of English-US queries “to a noticeable degree”.
Just to clear up any confusion from the start, he also said it was unrelated to the Panda and Penguin updates.
While 0.6% of English-US queries may not sound like an incredible amount of results impacted, there are already tons of people claiming to have been hit by the update.

Shared Budget in Adwords

New! Now you can replace individual campaign budgets with one large, shared budget. Here's how:

1. Create a shared budget 
Pick an amount that's large enough to cover the campaigns you'll apply it to.

2. Apply it to campaigns 
Select some campaigns that will draw from this new, shared budget. You can add more later.

Shared Budget

 

Campaign 1

 

Campaign 2

 

Campaign 3

 

 

 

 

A shared budget doesn’t take effect until you apply it to specific campaigns. You can apply a shared budget here or when you’re editing the campaign’s budget in the Settings tab.

 

 

 

 

Actual daily spendYour daily spend varies and may peak at 20% above your daily budget to help your campaign reach its potential. 

Monthly charging limit
If your daily budget is Rs.10.00 throughout the entire month, you will not be charged more than Rs.304.00 for the month (Rs.10.00 daily budget x 30.4 average days per month). 

Official Google Panda Update Version 3.9 On July 24th

Last night, at 7pm EDT, Google announced they pushed out a refresh for the Google Panda algorithm.

We had some rumors of a Panda refresh a couple weeks ago but Google said there was no such update. Truth is, looking at the forums, even as of this morning, there are very few complaints despite what I would normally see during a Panda refresh.

A Googler

• ✔

@google

New data refresh of Panda starts rolling out tonight. ~1% of search results change enough to notice. More context: goo.gl/huekf

25 Jul 12

• Reply
• Retweet
• Favorite

This time, Google said this Panda refresh impacted about 1% of the search results, which is actually pretty significant. Not as significant as 11.8% when Google first launched Panda in February 2011 or as significant as Google launching Panda in Koera and Japan with 5% but still, for a refresh, it seems significant.

So this surprises me that I don't see more complaints in the forums.

That being said, the previous Panda refresh was Panda 3.8 and about 30 days before this update. SEOs are patiently awaiting a Penguin refresh, the last and first refresh we had was on May 25th, so we are due an update there.

One last concern for me is that we are out of numbers. 3.9 and now what? :)

Here are the past Google Panda updates:

• Panda 3.9 on July 24th
• Panda 3.8 on June 25th
• Panda 3.7 on June 9th
• Panda 3.6 on April 27th
• Panda 3.5 on April 19th
• Panda 3.4 on March 23rd
• Panda 3.3 on about February 26th
• Panda 3.2 on about January 15th
• Panda 3.1 on November 18th
• Panda 2.5.3 on October 19/20th
• Panda 2.5.2 on October 13th
• Panda 2.5.1 on October 9th
• Panda 2.5 on September 28th
• Panda 2.4 in August
• Panda 2.3 on around July 22nd.
• Panda 2.2 on June 18th or so.
• Panda 2.1 on May 9th or so.
• Panda 2.0 on April 11th or so.
• Panda 1.0 on February 24th