choose your words carefully: travel edition

Choose your words carefully: Travel edition

How word choice can make or break pay-per-click search ads

Microsoft Confidential Microsoft Confidential

Don’t say “free” in a car rental PPC ad – or its evil cousin, “upgrade”.

What other surprising word combos make travel searchers click somewhere else?


The researchers at Bing Ads recently tackled a couple of big questions about performance for PPC travel ads.


What combinations of words in the title and description get the highest Ad Quality ranking?*

Does this change depending on what device the audience is using?

*Ad Quality is a calculation which factors in both the clickability (the likelihood of an ad being clicked, agnostic of position) of the ad and other indicators of ad quality. Ads with better ad quality not only have a better CTR, they get rewarded with better ad ranking and lower CPCs than other ads with lower ad quality.


We analyzed

150,000 ads running on the Yahoo Bing Network.

Microsoft Confidential


These ads generated 50 million impressions.


1 ad on the Yahoo Bing Network reaches

163 million searchers

5.6 billion monthly searches on Yahoo Bing Network


We limited our study

to June 2013 to have the richest data to work with.



Then we broke the travel vertical into 4 categories.

Flights and airlines

Hotels Car rental Cruises


Critical insights we uncovered:

1. Travel searchers are very specific – and focused on accomplishing their task. Destination, dates and activities are often already determined by the time the searcher begins the hunt for airline tickets, hotel and car rental. Writing PPC travel ads with specific location names is key.

2. User intent as it relates to device is critical. Putting together different ads for mobile and PC is a must, as users on PCs are more likely to be attracted to official sites, while mobile users want to take action from a “book now” interface.


Mobile is big for Bing travelers

When compared to Google, the Yahoo Bing Network audience is:

20%

15%

more likely to access travel content via mobile browsers at least once a week

more likely to access travel content via mobile browsers 2-3 times in a month

more likely to access travel content via mobile browser ever in the last month

Source: comScore Plan Metrix Site Audience Profile, January 2013. Composition Index compared to baseline internet users

13%


Here’s how to read a heatmap

Ad description

Ad titl

e

Great Good Insufficient data Poor

Air

Airfa

res

Airlin

e B

rand

Airlin

es

Bo

ok

Call

to A

ctio

n

City

Deals

Dest

inatio

ns

Dis

count

Fare

s

Fin

d

Flig

hts

Fly

Guara

nte

ed

Hug

e/B

ig

Lo

west

No

nst

op

No

w

Off

ers

Off

icia

l Site

Onlin

e

Price

s

Save

Tic

kets

To

day

Tra

dem

ark

Tra

vel

Web

site

Yo

ur

Air

Airfares

Airline Brand

Airlines

Area

Book

Call to Action

City

Deals

Discount

Fares

Find

Flights

Fly

Lowest

Nonstop

Official Site

Online

Save

Tickets

Trademark

Travel

Website

Our study results show that a travel ad with “airlines” in the title and “deals” in the description has high Ad Quality.


Airlines and flights: Ad performance heatmap

Air

Airfa

res

Airlin

e B

rand

Airlin

es

Bo

ok

Call

to A

ctio

n

City

Deals

Dest

inatio

ns

Dis

count

Fare

s

Fin

d

Flig

hts

Fly

Guara

nte

ed

Hug

e/B

ig

Lo

west

No

nst

op

No

w

Off

ers

Off

icia

l Site

Onlin

e

Price

s

Save

Tic

kets

To

day

Tra

dem

ark

Tra

vel

Web

site

Yo

ur

Air

Airfares

Airline Brand

Airlines

Area

Book

Call to Action

City

Deals

Discount

Fares

Find

Flights

Fly

Lowest

Nonstop

Official Site

Online

Save

Tickets

Trademark

Travel

Website

Ad description

Ad titl

e



Airlines and flights: Top word combos

PC Mobile Tablet

Title Description

City Official/Official Site

Tickets Official/Official Site

City Find

Travel Flights

Tickets Find

Title Description

Find Today

Find City

Book Flights

Flights Airlines

City Lowest

Title Description

Deals Travel

Deals Find

City Travel

Travel Flights

Fares Air

Key insights

- The word “find” in the ad description ranks high when used with almost any travel-related words in the ad title, from “airfares” to “[city name]” to “deals”.

- PC users are much more interested in ads that include “official site” than either mobile or tablet users, which is indicative of the different intent depending on device. PC users have a bigger screen and are more willing to navigate a large, official site. Mobile users go directly to action, clicking on ads that include “book” and “flights”.


Car rental: Ad performance heatmap

Ad description

Ad titl

e


Airp

ort

Bo

ok

Bra

nd

Call

to

Act

ion

Car

Car

Siz

e

Cheap

Deals

Fre

e

Gre

at

Hire

Lo

w/L

ow

est

No

w

Off

Off

icia

l

Onlin

e

Price

Po

int

Quic

k

Rate

s

Rent/

Renta

l

Rese

rve

Save

Savi

ng

s

Sp

eci

als

To

day

Tra

dem

ark

Up

gra

de

Weeke

nd

Weekl

y

Yo

ur

Airport

Brand

Call to Action

Car

Cheap

City

Deals

Discounts

Free

Great

Hire

Off

Official

Online

Price Point

Rent/Rental

Savings

Specials

Trademark

Upgrade

Weekend

Weekly


Car rental: Top word combos

PC Mobile Tablet

Title Description

Off Low/Lowest

Weekend Specials

Weekend Online

Weekend Quick

Weekend Price Point

Title Description

Rent/Rental Specials

Brand Specials

Car Specials

Price Point Specials

Car Weekend

Title Description

Weekend Specials

Weekend Online

Weekend Quick

Trademark Deals

Weekend Price Point

- Consumers won’t be duped: The words “free” and “upgrade” in any car supplier ad will not be good for clicks.

- “Weekend” is king of the keywords regardless of device when it comes to car supplier PPC ads. For mobile, “specials” is especially hot.

Key insights


Hotels: Ad performance heatmap

Ad description

Ad titl

e


Best

Bo

ok

Bra

nd

Call

to A

ctio

n

City

Deals

Do

wnto

wn

Fam

ily

Fre

e

Gre

at

Guara

nte

ed

Ho

tel

Lo

west

Luxu

ry

No

w

Off

icia

l

Price

Po

int

Rate

s

Renta

l(s)

Reso

rts

Ro

om

(s)

Save

Suites

To

day

Tra

dem

ark

Vaca

tio

n

Best

Book

Brand

Cabin

Call to Action

City

Deals

Downtown

Great

Guaranteed

Hotel

Luxury

Official

Price Point

Rates

Rental(s)

Resorts

Save

Suites

Trademark

Vacation


Hotels: Top word combos

PC Mobile Tablet

Title Description

City Save

City Room(s)

Rental(s) Save

City Official

Rates Rates

Title Description

City Brand

City Guaranteed

City Great

City Call to Action

Trademark Rates

Title Description

Rental(s) Save

Call to

Action

Room(s)

Rental(s) Rental(s)

Vacation Today

Deals Today

Key insights

- “Luxury”, in either ad title or ad description, gets low marks except when used in combination with a hotel brand name. This is in line with shifting spending habits across the US since the economic downturn.

- “Family” in the ad description attracts a lot of attention when used with either a brand name or a price point.


Cruise ships: Ad performance heatmap

Ad description

Ad titl

e


%

All-

Incl

usi

ve

Bo

ok

Bra

nd

Call

to A

ctio

n

Cru

ise(s

)

Deals

Exc

lusi

ve

Gre

at

Larg

est

Lo

catio

n

Lo

w/L

ow

est

Luxu

ry

New

No

w

Off

ers

Off

icia

l

Price

s

Rate

s

Sail

Sale

Save

To

day

To

urs

Tra

dem

ark

Vo

catio

n

Yo

ur

%

All-Inclusive

Book

Brand

Call to Action

Cheap

Cruise(s)

Deals

Exclusive

Great

Largest

Location

Luxury

New

Offers

Official

Sale

Save

Tours

Trademark

Vocation

NoVar


Cruise ships: Top word combos

PC Mobile Tablet

Title Description

NoVar Call to Action

Cheap Cruise(s)

NoVar %

NoVar Your

Sale Today

Title Description

Cruise(s) New

Official Deals

Cruise(s) Sale

Trademark Now

Trademark Location

Title Description

All-Inclusive Deals

All-Inclusive Cruise(s)

Deals Largest

All-Inclusive Call to Action

Cruise(s) Sale

Key insights

- Two high-ranking words for ad title in the cruise suppliers category indicate a savvy market who knows what to expect in this category: “all-inclusive” and “sale.”

- Regardless of device, ads indicating a bargain (“sale”, “deals”, even “cheap”) get a lot of attention in this category.


Before you pour this awesome info into your search ads, consider

three important things:



ONE Test. Then test again. Test some more.

Testing is critical to understanding your ad copy performance across devices, categories and time periods.



TWO Use ad extensions like Sitelinks.

Understand the value of Sitelink lift and the impact it could have on an entire account. Implement and spread to all your ads.


THREE Scale your execution to all your ads.

Develop a framework for understanding the clickability of your ads and executing top performers on a large scale.


Now that you know what makes a strong PPC travel ad, consider this:

15 million searchers exclusively used the Yahoo Bing Network to conduct travel searches. This audience is not reached on Google.1

More cost-effective paid clicks within Travel are found on Bing, 23% lower in cost than Google.2

1 comScore US qSearch (custom), March 2013 2 AdGooroo, Yahoo! Bing PPC Performance Metrics, What Search Marketers Need to Know About “The Other Search Engine,” March 2013

choose your words carefully: travel edition

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