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I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots

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Re: I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots

#61

Post by reddalo »

jLaForest wrote: post #30
dave_sid wrote: post #28

Google ads are a con. Meta ads are a con. If someone tells you you’re just not doing it right yet, they’re probably trying to sell you something.

This was also my experience wasting $1500 on Google ads

The main problem with Google Ads is that Google tries to squeeze money out of you in all possible ways.

I think the only sane way tu run a Google Ads campaign is to:

- only enable Google Search ads (i.e. disable all third-party publishers -- this may be a bit extreme but it's good if you're advertisting a niche product that people are actually searching for)

- only use "exact match" keywords ("broad match" is so broad that Google will show your ads in completely unrelevant SERPs)

- disable AI Max

- disable all automations

- reject any of their "optimization" tips

- set a max CPC even if they say it's bad for you

In other words, reject everything they suggest you to do. Maybe I'm wrong, or maybe this only works for my use case, but that's how I've been using Google Ads succesfully without wasting money.

Re: I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots

#63

Post by dzohrob »

dave_sid wrote: post #28

Google ads are a con. Meta ads are a con. If someone tells you you’re just not doing it right yet, they’re probably trying to sell you something.

idk, i’ve spent six figures on meta ads in the last few months and gotten tons of real users for my app. how is that a con?

Re: I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots

#64

Post by G3nD »

bluegatty wrote: post #56
G3nD wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are pretty much all ecommerce brands wasting their money on Meta ads? Seems hard to believe.

yes, they are wasting money, they know it, but caveats: famous saying 'i'd cut my ad budget in 1/2 if i knew which 1/2 to cut' 'attribution' is the holy grail of hard thing in marketing. so they know for sure the channel spend is iffy. but it's hard to measure, esp. for brand and indirect campaigns. so as a 'starting point' - it's a very 'noisy channel problem'. the next wild idea is that ads come from a marketing bu…

So the gigantic incumbents with retail distribution being inefficient makes sense to me. What about the long tail of D2C brands that live on Meta ads? AFAIK, they live and die by their ROAS. I would have to believe that these companies just don't really exist to buy that Meta ads are a "con".

Re: I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots

#65

Post by DANmode »

pseudonymidy wrote: post #59

Your post led me to install your app and play through 10 puzzles. The post doesn’t even show the app! What’s the name for this sort of marketing? I really like the interface you’ve built for completing the puzzles. Very clean - it’s very nice to not be bombarded at every screen.

Knowing your audience, and captivating them at grassroot level or in an unexpected place, without making it feel scummy (sometimes)?

Guerrilla marketing.

Re: I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots

#66

Post by paimapi »

n0us wrote: post #45
harry8 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can’t Google do this? Surely their data is better than yours. They get paid for adverts to bots don’t they? Unrelated?

Taking a blind guess here because I have never worked at Google, but I would assume there is one organization that has the data, and another organization that can block IPs from clicking on the ads and consuming the spend. There is a byzantine process preventing that second org from getting the data along with a lack of motivation because it would decrease ad-spend, which is one of their key metrics. Org2 which deals…

it's also just flat-out unsexy from a product/MBA-brained perspective to push for something that will negatively impact metrics for your users. I ran into this when I was advocating for onboarding a third-party provider that would filter out automated/spambot email clicks thus decreasing the north star metrics our users had for engagement (even though it was truthier and would provide more accurate targeting and some of our most senior people had been advocating for for years)

the only reason I got the go-ahead for the effort was because one of our upstart competitors who was handily eating our lunch had implemented this years ago, started advertising based on it, literally pointed to the fact that we didn't do this yet, and then this was followed quickly by all of our other competitors implementing this, too. at this point we were well inducted into the illustrious halls of companies who stopped giving a shit about their core product with leadership blaming everyone but themselves for the fact that we were churning faster than we were net-new-ing

and even then it was a half-assed, resource-starved implementation that got dumped on regularly. have left the org since and couldn't be happier

Re: I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots

#67

Post by wyre »

dzohrob wrote: post #63
dave_sid wrote: post #28

Google ads are a con. Meta ads are a con. If someone tells you you’re just not doing it right yet, they’re probably trying to sell you something.

idk, i’ve spent six figures on meta ads in the last few months and gotten tons of real users for my app. how is that a con?

How has been the return? 6 figs is a lot if your users aren't earning you that money back.

Re: I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots

#69

Post by tough »

pseudonymidy wrote: post #59

Your post led me to install your app and play through 10 puzzles. The post doesn’t even show the app! What’s the name for this sort of marketing? I really like the interface you’ve built for completing the puzzles. Very clean - it’s very nice to not be bombarded at every screen.

I'd say "Content marketing" [1]

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content_marketing

Re: I spent $220 on Google app ads and 60% of the installs were robots

#70

Post by dam_jackalopes »

dave_sid wrote: post #28

Google ads are a con. Meta ads are a con. If someone tells you you’re just not doing it right yet, they’re probably trying to sell you something.

Eh, I think you're correct in most cases but they work relatively well for our property leasing office. There's a convergence of factors at work there though; small number of high priced products being offered to a relatively small number of people in a certain geo location.
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