Conversion Rates Don’t Vary Much with Ad Position, Says Google’s Chief Economist at Google
We have used a statistical model to account for these effects and found that, on average, there is very little variation in conversion rates by position for the same ad. For example, for pages where 11 ads are shown the conversion rate varies by less than 5% across positions. In other words, an ad that had a 1.0% conversion rate in the best position, would have about a 0.95% conversion rate in the worst position, on average. Ads above the search results have a conversion rate within ±2% of right-hand side positions.The bottom line: conversion rates don’t vary much by position.
What this means for our clients — we optimize your ads so that they show on page one 99% of the time. While other companies bid for high positions this causes your ads to be rationed or leads to your campaign hitting your budget cap early in the day. Most PPC campaigns have budget limits. If your campaign has a daily limit that it routinely hits you are wasting money. Our campaign limits are rarely hit because we bid your keywords with advanced distribution (not standard distribution that rations your ads).
