adCenter Spring 2009 Upgrade: Campaign Management Updates

The adCenter Spring Upgrade is complete, and this is the first in a couple of posts about the new features you'll see. This one covers campaign management updates in adCenter online. Be sure to check out the other Spring Upgrade feature reviews: Account Management Updates, adCenter Desktop (Beta) Updates, and Content Ads Updates (U.S. Only).

Better Targeting Options

First off, a change to your targeting options. Now you can apply customer targeting and incremental bids for your entire campaign with new campaign-level targeting, and then further refine targeting at the ad group level. (Note: Your ad group-level targeting settings will override those at the campaign level.) This is a feature we've seen requested from our community customers—please let us know what you think in our discussion forum.

Greater Bidding Flexibility

We're introducing an improvement to adCenter bid management as well. Now you can set default keyword bids for your ad groups, and use nondefault bids to override the default when you prefer. Setting default bids for all keywords reduces the complexity of bidding individually and also makes it faster when adding new keywords. You can use the nondefault bid to override the default on high performing keywords or, in the case of seasonal keywords, return to the default once the season ends. If you have both search ads and content ads (U.S. only), you can set separate default bids for each.

Note: The nondefault bid overrides the default bid in your ad group. Nondefault bids are clearly displayed in bold in your keyword table for easy reference.

Improved Keyword Research Tools

With the Spring Upgrade you'll also find improved keyword tools on the Research tab. These can help you build a more effective keyword list and, as a result, help boost your campaign performance. Now you can:

• Use new filters to refine your list of suggested keywords.
• View performance and demographic data by keyword.
• Add selected keywords to your negative keyword list.
• Bid on keywords and review estimated performance data.
• Review keywords and bids and add them to an ad group.
   

Here are a couple of updates to help you manage campaign and ad group settings more easily.

• A new Targeting settings page enables you to easily set all of your targeting and incremental bid options within one place.
• A new Exclusion settings page lets you specify exclusions at the campaign and ad group levels.
• Customizable campaign data tables: Your campaign, ad group, ad, and keyword tables are updated with a new look and feel, including the option to hide columns you don't use, similar to Microsoft Office Excel.

To view our Feature Guide and Video Tutorials and learn how to use these new features, visit our What’s New in adCenter page in the Microsoft Advertising Learning Center (U.S.) or the U.K. What's New Page.

Feedback or questions? Please visit the adCenter Forum. And, if you haven’t done so already, become a friend of ours on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to keep up with the latest Microsoft Advertising news, tips and tricks.