• by Dan Darnell , May 6, 2010

It boggles the mind, but serious search advertisers use millions of keywords to cast the widest possible net online. The paid-search marketing industry thrives on keyword generation. It keeps hundreds of companies and thousands of people busy every day, churning out more and more keywords -- "head" terms, "tail" terms and everything in between.

More keywords must be better, right?

Wrong. With traditional search marketing tools, too many keywords in too few ad groups results in wasted investment and missed opportunities. Adding more and more keywords without tying each one to a tailored ad and landing page drives down quality scores, raises bid costs and lowers conversion rates.

Today, the best practice recommendation in the industry is to have 10 to 20 keywords per ad group. But even 10 to 20 is too many. The goal should be one keyword per ad group.

We all need to shift our mindset: Less can be more. The goal should be to create relevant experiences for the consumer, not to minimize our work by trying to figure out how many keywords we can cram into an ad group.

Relevant experiences are created when the consumer searches and finds what they are looking for. The consumer experience extends from the keyword searched to the ad viewed to the Web page landed upon. When any one of these elements is disconnected from the consumer's expectations, they look elsewhere and businesses lose potential customers.

To prevent consumers from becoming lost, advertisers need to create tailored ad copy and landing pages for each and every keyword in their portfolios to guide them on their search. While this may seem impractical, campaign data shows that having focused ad groups, ad copy and landing pages dramatically improves quality scores, placement and conversion rates.

While emerging technologies -- including automated ad copy generation and dynamic landing pages driven by machine learning -- will make it possible for a company with millions of keywords and existing ad structures to change its ways, savvy online marketers looking to take advantage of the benefits of one-keyword ad groups can follow these five steps to get started.

1. Know Your Keywords - Figure out which keywords generate most of your clicks or conversions. Most people treat all of their keywords the same, but all keywords are not created equal. It is critical to weed out the underperformers in order to minimize ineffective spending.

2. Identify One Keyword per Ad Group - Put each of your most important keywords in its own ad group. I actually mean ONE keyword per ad group. Resist the impulse to add even a second keyword.

3. Create Ads for the Keyword - Create ad copy variations and test different variations on the message to identify the most productive ads. Don't be surprised if different ads work for different groups. Even small changes in keyword expression, such as turns of phrase or singular-versus-plural forms, can attract different audience profiles.

4. Develop a Unique Landing Page per Keyword - Create landing pages that tie closely into the keyword and ad content. Again, test multiple versions to figure out what works. Once again, don't be surprised when you have different landing pages for concepts that seem very similar.

5. Optimize Continuously - Continuously monitor, test and optimize these new focused ad groups by testing new ads and landing pages. Don't forget: these are your most important keywords. Be sure to remain vigilant and keep this content well-tuned to changes in consumer preferences, seasonality and competitive forces. The optimization process never ends. If it stops, clicks and conversions will degrade, sometimes very quickly.

Try it. Create a focused, one-keyword ad group on one of your most important keywords. If you do it right, you'll begin to see a mental picture of what could happen if you could leverage the approach with all of keywords -- even your "tail" terms. Then you'll see the future of high-relevance search marketing.