Comments on: Learn How to Track Your MSN adCenter PPC Keyword Data in Analytics

By: Zander Jones

Zander Jones — Mon, 30 Jul 2012 15:59:00 +0000

I’m having the same issue! GA shows “{keyword” as the top keyword in the Traffic Sources section. How can I solve this issue?

By: Kra Yonatan

Kra Yonatan — Sun, 29 May 2011 17:44:00 +0000

Hi,
Is is possible to track the bids themselves?
So I’ll be able to know, for instance, that someone who registered for a website or subscribed to a newsletter cost me something?

By: Campaignsync

Campaignsync — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 03:51:28 +0000

Nice post. Don’t forget that you now must also set the destination URL of your adCenter ads to {param1} in order to get them to use the destination keyword applied to the keyword.

Our tool, Campaignsync, does all of this for you instantly and its’ free. Try it out and let us know what you think.

Thanks!

By: Anand Mistry

Anand Mistry — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 05:10:19 +0000

Hello John,

Can I use bing instead of MSN? Which one is correct?

By: PPCSPy

PPCSPy — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 00:19:02 +0000

Thanks for the good information about tarcking for MSN on Google Analytical tool. By the way would it be easier by using a keyword tracking tool (free or paid tools) than typing in all these tracking codes in our destination URLs?

Regards

PPC Spy

By: John

John — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 21:39:48 +0000

@ Andrew,

As for 301s, you can quickly check to see if a URL is being redirected by using a tool like this one: http://bit.ly/OrXI

Just insert your landing page URL, and it will tell you if there is an active 301 redirect in place.

I’ve always just pulled in the search query data into Analytics. It sounds like to me that you’ve got some sort of filter set up to display both the search query and the actual keyword from MSN – and something’s gone wrong. I’m not sure how to fix that one… I’ll do some searches and see if I can’t figure something out.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 20:45:25 +0000

Hi Everyone,

Is anyone else having trouble with MSN keyword tracking in Google Analytics recently?

Last week I wrote how a newly created campaign was not tracking correctly with a method that had been proven to track in some of my other clients’ MSN campaigns. Today I discovered that one of my clients MSN accounts which had been tracking for a few months is also not tracking properly. Instead of seeing the keyword with the exact search query in parentheses in Analytics, it is now displaying the exact search query as the actual keyword too. In the meantime, none of the keywords or tracking code has been messed with in the account itself.

Is this happening to anyone else?

By: Andrew

Andrew — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 14:12:56 +0000

Hi John,

I know the URLs are entered correctly as I have tested/checked them. The problem lies in the fact that when the ad displays on MSN search results and it is clicked, the URL takes you to just the normal website URL rather than the long tracking URL that should appear.

How would I find out if there is a 301 redirect messing things up too?

Thanks

By: John

John — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 13:32:01 +0000

@ Andrew,

I would suggest that you carefully review your tracking parameters in your destination URLs. Double check that you’ve listed Source and Medium correctly (those are the parameters that will tell Analytics that this traffic is PPC).

One other thing you should take a look at is whether or not your MSN destination URLs are hitting a 301 redirect. If they are – the 301 “kills” the tracking parameters completely – thus the traffic showing up as Organic (or possibly as Direct).

By: Andrew

Andrew — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 20:49:45 +0000

Some suggestions on this from anyone:

I’ve inserted tracking into MSN and Yahoo PPC campaigns/keywords before and they have worked wonderfully in Google Analytics. Now this occurred….I set up campaigns in Yahoo & MSN for one website over this past month (Dec.). Yahoo tracking is working fine in Google Analytics, but for some reason MSN is not showing up as cpc. Only MSN Organic is appearing in Analytics. I’ve checked the tracking codes for MSN keywords and they are exactly how they should be.

Any suggestions as to why MSN is not appearing in Analytics?

Thanks