Way back in 2001 AdWords introduced conversion tracking as a means of measuring what happened after someone clicked on your ad. This was a fantastic way of understanding the effectiveness of a campaign and determining which keywords, ads and campaigns worked best to assist future planning. This original conversion measurement metric was not sophisticated, it simply reported whether an ad click resulted in any type of action on your site. This metric is known as “converted clicks.”
There have obviously been many improvements made to the function of this tool in measuring and attributing conversions but to simplify the process “converted clicks” will shortly be shelved and replaced with “conversions” becoming the way to track actions for your business.
Most advertisers already use “conversions” for their primary reporting and bidding metric because they can process and report on multiple events or multiple clicks including cross-device conversions which makes it incredibly powerful. “Converted clicks” conversely can do none of this so in an age when we consume and process data more than ever before, “converted clicks” will be retired in September 2016.
For those already using “conversions” for bidding and reporting no action is necessary but for those using Enhanced CPC or Target CPA if your primary bid metric is set to “converted clicks” you should plan to update to “conversions” by September 21st.
“Conversions” provides everything you have been used to with “converted clicks” but much more besides. However, don’t forget to download any historical “converted clicks” reporting stats to assist your ongoing campaigns.
If you don’t manually make the change by September 2016, your account will be automatically set to “conversions” for you but remember campaigns may perform differently after this upgrade if you haven’t configured it for yourself.
These are the steps you need to take:
- Update your conversion action settings – check that each “conversions” column is configured to evaluate the actions that matter most to you and your business.
- Sign in to Adwords
- Navigate to the conversions actions page
- Click the notification box at the top labelled “converted clicks is going away”
- Change your bid settings from “converted clicks” to “conversions”
This change should soon help you achieve your business goals with additional options and flexibility. Thank you Google.
