Do Keyword Level URLs Work on the Display Network?

I found myself asking this question when auditing some display campaigns for one of our new clients. They had an existing set of display campaigns, all using contextual targeting with an extensive list of keywords.

I noticed immediately that all the keyword list contained final URLs, which were different to the image ad level URL. This made me wonder whether the low performance could be attributed to this. Was the system defaulting to the image ad level URL, which wasn’t the most optimised page? My instinct was telling me that keyword level URLs only work on Search, but I still needed to find out for sure.

I do like coming across these interesting queries and the best part of working in digital advertising is finding new challenges daily. A Google search gave me lots of information about keyword level URLs on the Search network, but nothing about Display. Not one to let something go, like a dog who knows there’s a chance of food, I hounded our Google account managers for the answer.

I should have gone with my first instincts as the answer is what I expected; keyword level URLs don’t work on the display network.

The impact of this had been a 12-month display campaign targeting a niche product that sent the traffic through to the homepage, instead of the optimised product page. Luckily, this was picked up so that we could rebuild the campaign and ensure the client’s investment was directed to the best landing page. Phew!