Two Big Takeaways from Google’s Big Quality Score Reveal

On June 24, Google released its latest whitepaper, “Settling the Quality Score,” which highlighted key components in Google’s Quality Score algorithm. In it, Google makes a huge push for device targeting and explains the benefits of maintaining an overall healthy campaign. As a result, advertisers seeking to improve quality scores now need to revamp their strategies and shift their focus to what Google has deemed as “important” in assessing ad quality.

It’s all mobile

The mobile experience is now a key component in the Quality Score paradigm. According to Google, advertisers should “think about mobile targeting and [their] mobile landing page experience” as part of optimizing ad quality. Advertisers should try targeting users on mobile devices with mobile-friendly ads and landing pages. Although Google does not require a separate mobile site, landing page content and navigation should ultimately be mobile-friendly.

History matters for quality score

Google also suggests that advertisers maintain the overall health of their campaigns to ensure higher quality scores for new keywords. Apparently, Google does not evaluate new keywords from scratch, but instead deduces quality scores based on the quality of related keywords, ads and landing pages already active in your account. In other words, if Google thinks your existing landing pages and keywords are in “good shape,” then chances are your new keywords will receive a pretty high quality score, similar to those of your existing keywords.

That said, it is important to maximize search impression share on relevant searches, “especially in areas where your ads have the potential to be high quality.” With a strong history, high quality ads and a maxed out impression share, your campaigns are guaranteed to achieve their highest quality score potential.

Download Google’s full “Settling the Quality Score” whitepaper.