• GrokDotCom , Friday, December 7, 2007 3:02 PM

Big, successful brands (and their SEM teams) aren't immune to making mistakes when it comes to paid search, and the blogosphere continues to catch their blunders.

This time it is Target, and Daniel McGuigan uses screenshots to show how the retailer snags perfect PPC placement for a product, only to have the ad link consumers back to the main homepage instead of the product's own landing page.

Since the ad copy actually featured the correctly targeted URL, this technically isn't an inexcusable offense. But McGuigan notes that most shoppers aren't going to remember that URL they saw in the midst of their session -- nor should they be forced to. If they're not in the mood to dig around Target's homepage, they'll likely hit the back button and check out another ad.

That equals a lost conversion and a worthless click -- and while it's a relatively minor mistake for Target, smaller retailers can't afford to lose customers due to oversights like this.

Read the whole story at GrokDotCom »