My Account

You may be wondering why the My Account section comes at the end of the chapter. It was important for you to understand how AdWords works and all the tools Google provides for creating and managing your ad before you enter your financial information and launch your ad campaign. You could have just as easily typed your text ad, blindly added a few keywords, turned over your credit card number, and been done with things. But you don’t need to rush into spending money when there are so many tools to help you maximize your success for each dollar you spend.

There are four sections in the My Account tab. Billing Summary gives you a quick look at your recent billing. Billing Preferences is where you set up your billing arrangements with Google. Access is where you can add or edit the list of users who have access to your AdWords account. And the AdWords Account Preferences section is where you can set some basic information about how you access and view your AdWords account.

Setting your billing preferences

The Billing Preferences section is where you type your billing style, form of payment, billing address, any backup payment details, and any promotional codes you may have received to start an AdWords account.

The billing payment types allowed are based on your currency and billing location. Normally, you need to enter your credit card information. When you enter a credit card, this activates Post-Pay billing, which means that when you receive clicks or impressions, your credit card is debited.

Type your credit card information in the Primary Payment Details section. There are a large number of credit card types accepted by Google. You also can add backup payment details. This is important in case your trip to Rome causes your credit card to hit its upper limit and you don’t want your ads to stop running. You can specify a backup credit card that is billed automatically when charges to your primary card are declined.

Note 

Entering your payment options automatically starts your ad display.

Finally, redeem any Google coupons by typing the promotional code and clicking Redeem.

Setting access privileges

By default, your Google AdWords account ID is the only one authorized to access your AdWords account. When you want others to have access to your account, click the Invite other users link. You are then prompted to type a list of names and e-mail addresses for the invited people. Click Continue to continue, or click the Invite more users link to add additional users.

After adding the list of users, Google asks you to format the personalized message that will be sent by e-mail to the people you are inviting. They must accept your invitation before they can have access to your account. The last section allows you to monitor your awaited invitation responses.

Setting up your account preferences

Your AdWords account preferences allow you set some basic information about your account and your business. You can change which of your Google accounts you will use to access your AdWords account. When you first set up your account, you had the choice of using your existing Google account or selecting a new userid and password to access just the AdWords account. This is where you can change that information.

Set your language and notification options. These are your options:

• Display Language: This is the language in which your AdWords account pages are displayed, not your ads.

• Disapproved ads email notification: Tell Google if you want to be notified by e-mail when your ads are disapproved so you can take immediate action.

• Account performance suggestions: Decide if you want Google to send you suggestions in e-mail on improving your ad performance.

• Newsletters: Opt in or out of receiving the Google AdWords newsletter in e-mail.

• Google Market Research: Choose whether you want to participate in Google market surveys or product tests.

• Special Offers: Tell Google whether you want to receive special AdWords promotional offers.

Click Save Changes to save your language and notification option selections.

There are a few more settings you can modify in the account preferences. Set the time zone of your location. Select your business type in the About Your Business section. When running pharmaceutical ads, you need to enter your PharmacyChecker ID.

The Tracking section allows you to turn auto-tagging on or off. Auto-tagging is turned on by default and allows Google to create performance reports and analyses using Google Analytics by adding a URL parameter called glcid into the URL used to access your Web site.

Note 

Some Web sites do not allow arbitrary URL parameters such as the glcid. In that case, you need to turn auto-tagging off.

It’s recommended that you keep auto-tagging turned on unless it is critical that it be turned off. Without auto-tagging, you can’t receive important tracking statistics on your ad performance.

Finally, click the printer-friendly document link to view/print the Google AdWords Terms and Conditions.