A. Using AdWords Editor

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The  first thing you need to learn when developing ad campaigns is how to  use AdWords Editor. This is Google’s free download tool that enables
you to build and manage your AdWords campaigns with greater ease and   speed.

Better yet, the more campaigns you run with AdWords, the more keywords around which you build campaigns, and the more complex
your campaigns become over time, the more useful the AdWords Editor
tool will be for you.

The Basic Concept

When
you’re building a new website, or a new landing page for an existing
website, you don’t make it “live” — i.e., make it available for anyone
on the Internet to view — until you’re finished building it. That way,
the website or web page you build says exactly what you want it to say,
with no glitches and no potential embarrassment to you.

The same
basic concept applies to AdWords, when you have the AdWords Editor.
With this tool, you can download your entire AdWords account –both the
structure and the content of your account — to your computer. You can
then work on your campaigns offline, and when you’re finished, you can
upload them back to AdWords and start running them or restart them, as
the case may be.

Installing AdWords Editor

Installing AdWords Editor is pretty simple.

  • Go to http://www.google.com/intl/en/adwordseditor/,
    and click on the green “Download AdWords Editor” button as shown in the
    screenshot below. Be sure beforehand that you select the operating
    system (Windows or Mac) that your computer uses.

  • Once
    you’ve downloaded and accessed the software, you download your AdWords
    account. If you are opening AdWords Editor for the first time, a window
    will automatically appear to open your AdWords account.
  • Now
    that you’ve downloaded your account, you can begin working on your
    campaigns via the AdWords Editor interface. No Internet connection, no
    problem — you don’t need one until you’re done what you needed to do
    with your AdWords campaign.

Features of AdWords Editor

Of
course, working offline is just the tip of the iceberg, Once you have
AdWords editor set up, you have a number of other features:

  • You
    can quickly add, edit, and delete elements of a campaign, such as
    keywords, ad placements, entire ads, or entire ad groups, or the entire
    campaign itself.
  • You can do global changes of cost-per-click bids and destination URLs.
  • You can make adjustments to your campaign budget, ad group bids, or maximum cost-per-click bids.
  • You can find and replace text in various elements of a campaign, and copy or move items between campaigns and ad groups.
  • You can view and sort your account’s contents, including performance statistics and keyword terms.
  • You can add comments to your campaign as personal reminders or as explanations of what you changed.
  • You can export and import snapshots of your account, or pieces thereof, for archiving or sharing.
  • You can import an archive or share file and review the proposed changes.
  • You can accept or reject proposed changes to your campaign.
  • You can post changes to your campaigns on your AdWords account.

AdWords Editor Summary

The
importance of AdWords Editor is not that it enables you to make changes
to your AdWords account, because you can make them online through
Google’s web interface. Rather, its importance lies in the ability to
work on these changes wherever you are, 24/7. AdWords Editor ensures
that ability.

For more information on AdWords Editor’s many features, consult the following links to Google’s Learning Center:

On AdWords Editor generally and its features:
http://www.google.com/adwords/learningcenter/text/53405.html

On the various Add, Edit, and Delete functions:
http://www.google.com/adwords/learningcenter/text/53406.html

On viewing and sorting information in AdWords:
http://www.google.com/adwords/learningcenter/text/53408.html

On sharing and posting changes to your AdWords account:
http://www.google.com/adwords/learningcenter/text/53409.html

Now
that you understand means through which you can work with AdWords,
we’ll get into the nuts and bolts of what you can do. We’ll start with
the campaign level and work our way down.