• by Tameka Kee , June 12, 2007

A number of AdWords clients were shocked yesterday to find that the minimum bid for specific keywords had doubled and even tripled--while the Quality Scores of those words slipped from "great" to "poor."

Posts to blogs such as webmasterworld.com listed minimum bid changes from 5 cents to $10, with clients questioning whether it was specific characteristics of their sites (such as minimal text, large amounts of white space or specific images) that were the cause--and if so, whether Google had intentions to issue a relevant Quality Score update advisory or specific guidelines.

According to Google, a keyword's Quality Score is determined by its click-through rate, and the overall relevance of the ad text, keyword, and landing page. The company acknowledged that recently, minor updates to Quality Scores were made based on advertiser landing page quality.

"The vast majority of advertisers will not be affected by this change, since they already link to quality landing pages," a Google spokesperson said. "In addition, advertisers who have improved the quality of their landing pages over time may see lower minimum bids." It appears that the advertisers who saw an increase in their minimum bids were providing a "low quality user experience," and while some analysts say that this is a further step toward weeding out link farmers and other sites created to game the system, others caution that affiliate marketers may bear the brunt of the changes.