Quality Score is one term which for some people may some vague or taken from the Olympics - but for others, in the web marketing business, especially those who specialize in Pay per Click and Google AdWords Optimization - it’s one KPI we all strive to maximize. Google has announced they are rolling out a change in the Quality Score algorithms, so here goes…

First things first - let’s define:

Quality Score

“Quality Score is a dynamic variable assigned to each of your keywords. It’s calculated using a variety of factors and measures how relevant your keyword is to your ad text and to a user’s search query.”

Source: Google

Quality Score is being used for years. Actually, in the past, it was one of the main differentiators between Google and Yahoo! (previously Overture/Goto.com), where the price was not the main and only parameter for ranking an ad.
back then, Quality Score was a simple multiplier of Bid X CTR, and the order of the ads was determined by that rank.

With time, Google has increased its use and complexity, and last few years quality score is a crucial ingredient which not only determones price, but in many cases determiones wheter ads appear or not!

Google Slap

Google Slap is a term used by Google AdWords advertisers when the Quality Score falls down and the minimum bids rais up to the sky. When no other reasonable explanation is available, advertisers call the phenomenon a “google slap”. Famous Google Slaps uccurs when Google is updating the quality score algorithms, one very famous one occured on March 6th 2008, which evidently cause some considerable consequenses to guys like GeoSign who blew an enourmous amount of $160,000,000 in close to a week!

“Google Slap is a synonym for “I don’t know how to use AdWords so I’ll blame it on something that makes it sound like it’s out of my control.”

Source: GuyFromChicago, published at SEORoundTable.

The Quality Score Change

The upcoming update to quality score will focus on the following:

1. Up to date calculations - will be performed every time every search query occurs

2. Keywords no longer marked ‘inactive for search’

3. ‘First page bid’ will replace ‘minimum bid’

Source: Google AdWords Blog

What it all means?

Well, the bottom line as Evyatar wrote in the Compucall Web Marketing Blog is that life will be better to the professiopnal advertisers, and harder to the unprofessional ones. Practically, well structured campaigns will be able to benefit from more accurate calculatin and more traffic where as bad campaigns will have to pay much more in order to get results. At the end of the day, the consumers will see much better targeted ads, focused on their needs and behavior.