Last week’s Microsoft adCenter upgrade was the culminating move in a lengthy process they’ve been running through for the better part of a year. Microsoft stands by the fact that things their users write in the forums and help centers turn into action and that this is just an example of their “open ear” policy. So for those of us who may have lost track of all the budgeting options changes in adCenter…cheat sheet!
- Budget Visibility & Guidance– adCenter users had quite a bit to say about the complexities of the budgeting options in the interface and how easy it was to lose track of your budget progress. Microsoft answered with the campaign budget status element on the dashboard, which allows you to identify budget problems from one place, and campaign budget alerts that let you know if a campaign has depleted it’s budget or is even running low. The budget suggestion tool was also introduced to the Opportunities tab, which provides information about click volume compared to a particular budget and helps the account manager determine a recommended budget to get through an entire month.
- Clear & Simple Budget Options– Many adCenter users reported that the budgeting options in the interface were too confusing, inconsistent with other platforms and required too much manual math on the side of the account manager. Microsoft cured those ailments by requiring fewer budget options to be completed when signing up for a new account, aligning their default options to the industry’s standard and they began offering two, simpler budget options:
- Daily Budget (default)- You can now set a daily spend without also setting a separate max monthly spend and can either be set to standard delivery, which spreads out ads and spend throughout the entire day, or accelerated delivery, which will deplete your budget as quickly as possible towards the beginning of the day.
- Monthly Budget- This option allows the account manager to set a spend cap for the entire month but no longer has an option to divide that budget evenly across the month. As such, this option is best for those clients with much larger budgets.
Let us know how all these option changes have affected your account management in Bing. Do you find your account maintenance is going more smoothly or is there still too much wrong with the interface for these changes to matter? Share your thoughts and ideas in the comments section below!
For further information about this topic, check out the following links:
- Microsoft Advertising adCenter Budgeting Updates Driven by Your Feedback-adCenter Blog
- The July 2011 Microsoft adCenter Upgrade is Here! -adCenter Blog
Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for more news updates from PPC Hero!
