Ya Know I had the same problem when I checked my keywords this am. I
know my site content has not changed and neither have my keywords. Why
my quality would fall so low overnight I have no clue. Like you big, I
am not spending arms and legs for a hit. Perhaps a mod will reply and
solve our dilemna. In the meantime If I were you, I would place my ads
on hold. You can accomplish this by going to your adwords account and
clicking pause at the top. Sorry I do not have a better answer, I am
in the same proverbial boat that you are.

Peace,

BLuEWoLF

On Jun 18, 11:08 pm, bigaaron wrote:

Hello bigaaron,

These high minimum CPCs may more accurately be thought of as a
financial incentive for you to improve quality - rather than as an
attempt to have you pay more. I can assure that that the AdWords team
does not expect advertisers will pay that amount. We do expect,
though, that it will serve as motivation for advertisers to improve
the quality of their keywords, ads and landing pages - in order to
improve the user experience of those who click on AdWords ads.

That said, you are almost certainly seeing high minimum bids as the
result of a poor quality score applied to the keywords - as the
AdWords system evaluates the quality of those keywords in relation to
their ads and landing pages.

Much more information on this subject, the understanding of which is
key to success with AdWords, may be found in the AdWords Help Center.
I have linked to several (of a great many) Help Center topics below as
a good starting point:

* Quality-Based Minimum Bids
http://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=49177

Excerpting from that page:

" [...] Minimum prices are based on the quality and relevance of the
keyword, its ad, and associated landing page. This minimum price is
called a minimum cost-per-click bid (CPC bid). This pricing model
favors higher quality ads by requiring lower minimum CPC bids for them
to enter the auction. Lower quality ads require higher minimum CPC
bids."

* What is a 'Quality Score' and how is it calculated?
http://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=10215

* Landing page and Site Quality Guidelines:

https://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=46675

Also, please be aware that there are some types of websites that will
simply be difficult to advertise affordably with AdWords - as
discussed on this page from the AdWords Help Center:

* Are there any types of websites that merit low landing page quality
scores?
http://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=66238

--------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------

Finally, landing page load time has recently been added as a factor of
Quality Score, as announced multiple times on the Inside AdWrods blog,
since early April.

More information on this Quality Score factor may be found here:

* Landing page load time now affects keywords' Quality Scores
http://adwords.blogspot.com/2008/06/landing-page-load-time-now-affect...

Also, this factor is discussed in another AdWords Help forum thread
started by BLuEWoLF, here:

http://groups.google.com/group/adwords-help-advanced/browse_thread/th...

AdWordsPro