SEM Development

Session management made it’s appearance for the first time in Overture’s AWS DTC-XML v1.2.1 specification. It allows you to generate a snapshot of your account and keep it on Overture’s servers. There are two ways to create a session:

CreateSessionGetListings
This command creates a session containing all of your listings. It’s lifetime is 72 hours and this operation can be performed 4 times in a 24 hour period.

CreateSessionGetListingsUpdated
With this command you create a session only of listings that have been updated within an allotted timeframe. As with CreateSessionGetListings, this session’s lifetime is 72 hours. Happily, this operation can be performed up to 10 times in a 24 hour period.

After the session is created you can retrieve the listings by invoking the GetListingsBySession command. This command can be invoked up to 1200 times in a 24 hour period so it’s unlikely you’ll top your quota. You can choose one, some or all of the following fields:

• searchTerm
• url
• online
• title
• description
• categoryId
• clickIndex
• minBid
• advancedOptIn
• advancedClickIndex
• contentBid
• contentOnline
• contentOptIn
• bid
• market
• lastUpdated

Last, and definitely least, is the GetSessionInfo command. It just returns the time your session was created along with how many records are in it.

These session methods have been a lifesaver for me. It’s better than GetListings because I can assemble a session of listings that have been updated and operate on those, rather than downloading every listing and then figuring out which ones have changed. It also allows double the quota of GetListings which is fantastic for large campaigns.

Now, if they would just up the quota on AddListings…

According to Google’s quota allowances addKeyword consumes 50 quota units while updateKeyword only consumes 10 units. On many underperforming keywords I’ve begun to lower the maxCpc value to 10,000 microns (.01 cents) instead of altering the status to “Deleted”. In most cases this will cause Google to deactivate the keyword. If the keyword’s minCpc is low enough that even a .01 cent maxCpc doesn’t deactivate it and it’s still losing money, it’s unlikely it will ever turn a profit. In this boundary case, deleting it may not be a bad idea.

At some future date, if research determines that these deactivated keywords will be profitable at a higher maxCpc you can activate them for 1/5th of the quota that you would expend if you had deleted them.

A quick note: Even when a keyword is marked “Inactive” it will be active in the contextual search. To avoid this scenario, turn off contextual search.

Another note: Using the aggregate functions updateKeywordList or addKeywordList will not save your quota. Both use the same number of quota units as their singular brethren.