Introducing content bids

Two and a half years ago, we launched content targeting -- a product that enables you to reach your customers on high-quality news pages, topic-specific websites, and blogs that they visit each day. Today, Google's content network reaches over 64% of unique Internet users (according to comScore's machine-based panel) in over 100 countries and 20 different languages.

We've made multiple tweaks and enhancements to the product – releasing image ad support, site targeting, and smart pricing -- and are happy to announce another enhancement to the program. Yesterday, we released content bids. This feature will allow you to place one bid (or maximum CPC) for ads that run on search sites and an entirely separate bid for ads running on content sites within the Google Network. In addition, we'll now evaluate your keywords for content targeting separately, ensuring that we're able to target your ads as accurately as possible on the content network. You'll notice that your 'inactive' keywords now read 'inactive for search' and that the minimum bid for content targeting is a static $0.01.

We hope you find the added flexibility and control that content bidding provides useful. If you've tried the Google content network once and decided that it wasn't working for you, this is a great time to give it another try.

Posted by Sarah, Inside AdWords crew