Microsoft adCenter Keyword Research Tool Review
By Craig Cahill | Published 02/7/2008 | All The Reviews |
adCenter Keyword Research Tool Review
Overview
When Jay got back from the Vegas PubCon conference in December he said, "You should see the new Microsoft keyword research tool that was demo'd". I know for a fact that he's seen and tested a lot of keyword tools, so I was impressed by how impressed he was. He also mentioned that it has a really long name - AdCenter Add-in Beta for Excel 2007 with Ad Intelligence - and he wasn't joking.
When I checked the features of this "AdCenter Add-in Beta for Excel 2007 with Ad Intelligence" I was surprised to see a list longer than its name.
- Keyword Extraction
- Keyword Expansion
- Keyword Suggestion
- Categorization and Monetization
- Free Download
- Excel Integration
The biggest bonus and surprise is that you can download it free. And with the tool operating from inside the Excel program, you get to work in a single environment and organize your data easily. So far it sounds great, but I know it takes much more than a free tool and integration to excite Jay. There must be more?
After only 10 minutes inside Microsoft's new release, I can tell you there is much more. AdCenter Add-in really does make keyword research quick and simple. You can extract keywords from any website, build keyword lists, expand keywords, then plan your strategies accordingly. But the real "wow" factor (and "Jay" factor) of this new research tool is the detailed user-related data it reports.
- Keyword Demographic analysis
- Keyword Geographic analysis
- Keyword Historic analysis
So this is why there's buzz and speculation in the keyword world - some are drooling at the data, and some are questioning where this data is coming from. One thing's for sure though, it's a free tool with a heap of really advanced features. Microsoft say they're being "transparent to advertisers and search engine marketing partners with our data and technologies", and I say this tools backs that up. I'm testing the Beta version, so I expect some minor issues and changes before the final version is released.
Check List
You will need 3 things for the AdCenter Add-In to work.
- Microsoft Excel 2007
- an Internet connection
- a US AdCenter account
Getting Started
Installation is fast and simple. Once you're done, simply open Excel 2007 and you'll see a new tab on the toolbar with the shortened name of Ad Intelligence. It's a clean, organized and very easy-to-use toolbar; you don't even need Excel experience to use Ad Intelligence. The different buttons represent different tools, and tools with multiple options have a drop-down box so you can easily select the sub-option you want (just look for the small down arrow). Simple.
The tools fall into 3 key modules:
- keyword research - build lists, extract keywords, expand keywords
- keyword forecasting - view historical data, future predictions, daily and monthly traffic, geographic and demographic breakdowns
- keyword monetization - provides KPI information on CPC, CTR, impression, position, click and vertical data
Keyword Research
You can start here to generate your keywords using either the Wizard or the individual tools (both include the impressive Keyword Extraction tool which pulls keywords directly from any website). The wizard is an all-in-one tool that quickly builds keyword profiles, and it's a relatively simple 3 step process. The individual tools generate their specific data only, so you can use them over and over again to compare different ranges. All the results are displayed in your Excel spreadsheet which makes life easy. The columns are sortable, data is color-coded, and the tools are only ever a mouse click away. Really the only limit on your research is how much data you're capable of analyzing, because it doesn't take long to fill an entire Excel workbook with numbers, dates and keywords.
The Research tools include: Keyword Extraction (from a website), Keyword Suggestion (Associated, Contained, Similarity) and Search Buzz (Spiky and Trend Keywords).
Keyword Forecasting
This is where Microsoft have really impressed me and outdone rival tools like Keyword Discovery, Wordtracker and even Google AdWords. Ad Intelligence provides real number values (not graphs and relative measures), along with historical monthly and daily data, geographic and demographic data, and future predictions on keyword traffic. This is impressive and powerful information (pending accuracy), and means you can now target your keywords more strategically and with seasonal adjustments. Just how accurate the some of the values are is still a bit unknown, so I suggest you use them as guides and your other keyword tools to cross-check.
The Forecast tools include: Monthly Traffic (Monthly and Daily), Keyword Categorization (Suggested Keyword Category), Geographic (Country, State or City ), and Demographic (Gender and Age).
Keyword Monetization
The Monetization module shows you how keywords are performing in relation to CPC, CTR, impression, position and click data. You can also compare keywords through different vertical categories. For example, if I'm using the keyword "coffee", I can compare the performance of "coffee" in the Health vertical against its performance in the Travel vertical. Pretty handy isn't it?
I did get confused with the colored icons displayed with the CTR and CPC data. But I eventually worked out that these are a standard Excel feature, and not an Ad Intelligence feature. They are Excel KPI icons and do work off the Ad Intelligence data, so they can be good visual indicators. You can adjust the settings and the icons through the Excel main menu (go to Home/Conditional Formatting).
The Monetize tools include: Monetization (Monthly and Daily), Vertical KPIs (Suggested Keyword Category).
Summary
This is one of the best keyword research tools I've seen. ad Intelligence has all the basic keyword tools you need, plus heaps of advanced tools that haven't been available in free programs before.
Officially it's available "for adCenter customers in the US market", but we've had no problems using it as Australian customers. And it does provide data from outside the US (remember the Geographic data I mentioned? Well you can break that down to city, state, country) so it's a very worthwhile tool for every keyword researcher. It's really easy to get started and you get $50 in free clicks for trying.
-----------------------------------------
UPDATE: The "$50 worth of clicks free" offer has now ended.
However, you can sometimes get free clicks if you keep an eye on the main page at PayPerClickSearchEngines.com.
Comments
Comment #2 (Posted by Stormy Knight)
Does it work on Mac
Follow-up by Craig
- Good question Stormy Night. The adCenter forum suggests not with "We don't have a plan for a Mac version yet" and "We will keep monitoring customer requests and evaluate the possibilities".
Head to the Microsoft forum if you want to let them know that there's more than a few Mac adCenter users.
Thank you for the article and the 50, I was about to sign up with ad center, so it's cool. All the best.
Follow-up by Craig - Happy to help Franck. $50 plus a cool new tool is great incentive. I'll be doing some more articles on the adCenter Add-in really soon, so check back for some detailed tips and tricks.